Somewhere in Red Gap (2024)

E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell,
Project Gutenberg Beginners Projects, Clare Coney,
and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team

"SHE WAS STANDING ON THE CENTRE TABLE BY NOW, SO SHECOULD LAMP HERSELF IN THE GLASS OVER THE MANTEL"

By

Harry Leon Wilson

ILLUSTRATED BY
JOHN R. NEILL, F. R. GRUGER, AND
HENRY RALEIGH

New York
Grosset & Dunlap
Publishers

To
GEORGE HORACE LORIMER

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I. The Red Splash of Romance
CHAPTER II. Ma Pettengill and the Song of Songs
CHAPTER III. The Real Peruvian Doughnuts
CHAPTER IV. Once a Scotchman, Always
CHAPTER V. Non Plush Ultra
CHAPTER VI. Cousin Egbert Intervenes
CHAPTER VII. Kate; or, Up From the Depths
CHAPTER VIII. Pete's B'other-in-law
CHAPTER IX. Little Old New York

I

THE RED SPLASH OF ROMANCE

The walls of the big living-room in the Arrowhead ranch house aretastefully enlivened here and there with artistic spoils of the owner,Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill. There are family portraits in crayon,photo-engravings of noble beasts clipped from the Breeder's Gazette,an etched cathedral or two, a stuffed and varnished trout of such sizethat no one would otherwise have believed in it, a print in threecolours of a St. Bernard dog with a marked facial resemblance to thelate William E. Gladstone, and a triumph of architectural perspectiverevealing two sides of the Pettengill block, corner of Fourth and Mainstreets, Red Gap, made vivacious by a bearded fop on horseback who doffshis silk hat to a couple of overdressed ladies with parasols in apassing victoria.

And there is the photograph of the fat man. He is very large—both highand wide. He has filled the lens and now compels the eye. His broad facebeams a friendly interest. His moustache is a flourishing, uncurbed,riotous growth above his billowy chin.

The checked coat, held recklessly aside by a hand on each hip, revealsan incredible expanse of waistcoat, the pattern of which raveshorribly. From pocket to pocket of this gaudy shield curves a watchchain of massive links—nearly a yard of it, one guesses.

Often I have glanced at this noisy thing tacked to the wall, entrancedby the simple width of the man. Now on a late afternoon I loiteredbefore it while my hostess changed from riding breeches to the gown oflavender and lace in which she elects to drink tea after a day's hardwork along the valleys of the Arrowhead. And for the first time Iobserved a line of writing beneath the portrait, the writing of myhostess, a rough, downright, plain fashion of script: "Reading from leftto right—Mr. Ben Sutton, Popular Society Favourite of Nome, Alaska."

"Reading from left to right!" Here was the intent facetious. And MaPettengill is never idly facetious. Always, as the advertisem*nts say,"There's a reason!" And now, also for the first time, I noticed someprinted verses on a sheet of thickish yellow paper tacked to the wallclose beside the photograph—so close that I somehow divined an intimaterelationship between the two. With difficulty removing my gaze from thegentleman who should be read from left to right, I scanned these verses:

I briefly pondered the lyric. It told its own simple story and could atonce have been dismissed but for its divined and puzzling relationshipto the popular society favourite of Nome, Alaska. What could there be inthis?

Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill bustled in upon my speculation, but asusual I was compelled to wait for the talk I wanted. For some momentsshe would be only the tired owner of the Arrowhead Ranch—in the teagown of a debutante and with too much powder on one side of hernose—and she must have at least one cup of tea so corrosive that theScotch whiskey she adds to it is but a merciful dilution. She now drankeagerly of the fearful brew, dulled the bite of it with smoke from ahurriedly built cigarette, and relaxed gratefully into one of thosechairs which are all that most of us remember William Morris for. Eventhen she must first murmur of the day's annoyances, provided this timeby officials of the United States Forest Reserve. In the beginning Imust always allow her a little to have her own way.

"The annual spring rumpus with them rangers," she wearily boomed. "Everyyear they tell me just where to turn my cattle out on the Reserve, andevery year I go ahead and turn 'em out where I want 'em turned out,which ain't the same place at all, and then I have to listen patientlyto their kicks and politely answer all letters from the higher-ups andwait for the official permit, which always comes—and it's wearing on abody. Darn it! They'd ought to know by this time I always get my ownway. If they wasn't such a decent bunch I'd have words with 'em, givingme the same trouble year after year, probably because I'm a weak,defenceless woman. However!"

The lady rested largely, inert save for the hand that raised thecigarette automatically to her lips. My moment had come.

"What did Wilfred Lennox, the hobo poet, have to do with Mr. Ben Sutton,of Nome, Alaska?" I gently inquired.

"More than he wanted," replied the lady. Her glance warmed withmemories; she hovered musingly on the verge of recital. But thecigarette was half done and at its best. I allowed her another moment, amoment in which she laughed confidentially to herself, a little dry,throaty laugh. I knew that laugh. She would be marshalling certainevents in their just and diverting order. But they seemed to be many andof confusing values.

"Some said he not only wasn't a hobo but wasn't even a poet," shepresently murmured, and smoked again. Then: "That Ben Sutton, now, he'sa case. Comes from Alaska and don't like fresh eggs for breakfastbecause he says they ain't got any kick to 'em like Alaska eggs havealong in March, and he's got to have canned milk for his coffee. Say, Igot a three-quarters Jersey down in Red Gap gives milk so rich that thecream just naturally trembles into butter if you speak sharply to it oreven give it a cross look; not for Ben though. Had to send out forcanned milk that morning. I drew the line at hunting up case eggs forhim though. He had to put up with insipid fresh ones. And fat, that man!My lands! He travels a lot in the West when he does leave home, and hetells me it's the fear of his life he'll get wedged into one of themnarrow-gauge Pullmans some time and have to be chopped out. Well, as Iwas saying—" She paused.

"But you haven't begun," I protested. I sharply tapped the printedverses and the photograph reading from left to right. Now she becameanimated, speaking as she expertly rolled a fresh cigarette.

"Say, did you ever think what aggravating minxes women are after theybeen married a few years—after the wedding ring gets worn a little bitthin?"

This was not only brutal; it seemed irrelevant.

"Wilfred Lennox—" I tried to insist, but she commandingly raised thenew cigarette at me.

"Yes, sir! Ever know one of 'em married for as long as ten years thatdidn't in her secret heart have a sort of contempt for her life partneras being a stuffy, plodding truck horse? Of course they keep a certaindull respect for him as a provider, but they can't see him as dashingand romantic any more; he ain't daring and adventurous. All he ever doesis go down and open up the store or push back the roll-top, and keepfrom getting run over on the street. One day's like another with him,never having any wild, lawless instincts or reckless moods that make aman fascinating—about the nearest he ever comes to adventure is when heopens the bills the first of the month. And she often seeing him withoutany collar on, and needing a shave mebbe, and cherishing her own secretromantic dreams, while like as not he's prosily figuring out how he'sgoing to make the next payment on the endowment policy.

"It's a hard, tiresome life women lead, chained to these here plodders.That's why rich widows generally pick out the dashing young devils theydo for their second, having buried the man that made it for 'em. Oh,they like him well enough, call him 'Father' real tenderly, and seethat he changes to the heavy flannels on time, but he don't ever thrillthem, and when they order three hundred and fifty dollars' worth of dudsfrom the Boston Cash Emporium and dress up like a foreign countess, theydon't do it for Father, they do it for the romantic guy in the magazineserial they're reading, the handsome, cynical adventurer that has suchan awful power over women. They know darned well they won't ever meethim; still it's just as well to be ready in case he ever should make RedGap—or wherever they live—and it's easy with the charge account there,and Father never fussing more than a little about the bills.

"Not that I blame 'em. We're all alike—innocent enough, with freakshere and there that ain't. Why, I remember about a thousand years ago Iwas reading a book called 'Lillian's Honour,' in which the rightful earldidn't act like an earl had ought to, but went travelling off over themoors with a passel of gypsies, with all the she-gypsies falling in lovewith him, and no wonder—he was that dashing. Well, I used to think whatmight happen if he should come along while Lysander John was out withthe beef round-up or something. I was well-meaning, understand, but atthat I'd ought to have been laid out with a pick-handle. Oh, the nicestof us got specks inside us—if ever we did cut loose the best one of uswould make the worst man of you look like nothing worse than a naughtylittle boy cutting up in Sunday-school. What holds us, of course—wealways dream of being took off our feet; of being carried off by mainforce against our wills while we snuggle up to the romantic brute andplead with him to spare us—and the most reckless of 'em don't often gettheir nerve up to that. Well, as I was saying—"

But she was not saying. The thing moved too slowly. And still the womanpaltered with her poisoned tea and made cigarettes and mutteredinconsequently, as when she now broke out after a glance at thephotograph:

"That Ben Sutton certainly runs amuck when he buys his vests. He musthave about fifty, and the quietest one in the lot would make a leopardskin look like a piker." Again her glance dreamed off to visions.

I seated myself before her with some emphasis and said firmly: "Now,then!" It worked.

"Wilfred Lennox," she began, "calling himself the hobo poet, gets intoRed Gap one day and makes the rounds with that there piece of poetry yousee; pushes into stores and offices and hands the piece out, and like asnot they crowd a dime or two bits onto him and send him along. That'swhat I done. I was waiting in Dr. Percy Hailey Martingale's office for alittle painless dentistry, and I took Wilfred's poem and passed him atwo-bit piece, and Doc Martingale does the same, and Wilfred blew on tothe next office. A dashing and romantic figure he was, though kind offat and pasty for a man that was walking from coast to coast, but asmooth talker with beautiful features and about nine hundred dollars'worth of hair and a soft hat and one of these flowing neckties. Red itwas.

"So I looked over his piece of poetry—about the open road for hisuntamed spirit and him being stifled in the cramped haunts of men—andof course I get his number. All right about the urge of the wild to herwayward child, but here he was spending a lot of time in the crampedhaunts of men taking their small change away from 'em and not seeming tostifle one bit.

"Ain't this new style of tramp funny? Now instead of coming round to theback door and asking for a hand-out like any self-respecting tramp hadought to, they march up to the front door, and they're somebody with twoor three names that's walking round the world on a wager they made withone of the Vanderbilt boys or John D. Rockefeller. They've walkedthirty-eight hundred miles already and got the papers to prove it—aletter from the mayor of Scranton, Pennsylvania, and the mayor ofDavenport, Iowa, a picture post card of themselves on the courthousesteps at Denver, and they've bet forty thousand dollars they could startout without a cent and come back in twenty-two months with money intheir pocket—and ain't it a good joke?—with everybody along the wayentering into the spirit of it and passing them quarters and such, andthank you very much for your two bits for the picture post card—andthey got another showing 'em in front of the Mormon Tabernacle at SaltLake City, if you'd like that, too—and thank you again—and now they'llbe off once more to the open road and the wild, free life. Not! Yes, twoor three good firm Nots. Having milked the town they'll be right down tothe dee-po with their silver changed to bills, waiting for No. 6 to comealong, and ho! for the open railroad and another town that will skinpretty. I guess I've seen eight or ten of them boys in the last fiveyears, with their letters from mayors.

"But this here Wilfred Lennox had a new graft. He was the first I'd giveup to for mere poetry. He didn't have a single letter from a mayor, noreven a picture card of himself standing with his hat off in front ofPike's Peak—nothing but poetry. But, as I said, he was there with atalk about pining for the open road and despising the cramped haunts ofmen, and he had appealing eyes and all this flowing hair and necktie. SoI says to myself: 'All right, Wilfred, you win!' and put my purse backin my bag and thought no more of it.

"Yet not so was it to be. Wilfred, working the best he could to make aliving doing nothing, pretty soon got to the office of Alonzo Price,Choice Improved Real Estate and Price's Addition. Lon was out for themoment, but who should be there waiting for him but his wife, Mrs.Henrietta Templeton Price, recognized leader of our literary andartistic set. Or I think they call it a 'group' or a 'coterie' orsomething. Setting at Lon's desk she was, toying petulantly with horridold pens and blotters, and probably bestowing glances of disrelish fromtime to time round the grimy office where her scrubby little husbandtoiled his days away in unromantic squalor.

"I got to tell you about Henrietta. She's one of them like I just saidthe harsh things about, with the secret cry in her heart for romance andadventure and other forbidden things and with a kindly contempt forpeaceful Alonzo. She admits to being thirty-six, so you can figure itout for yourself. Of course she gets her husband wrong at that, as womenso often do. Alonzo has probably the last pair of side whiskers outsideof a steel engraving and stands five feet two, weighing a hundred andtwenty-six pounds at the ring side, but he's game as a swordfish, and asfor being romantic in the true sense of the word—well, no one that everheard him sell a lot in Price's Addition—three miles and a half up onthe mesa, with only the smoke of the canning factory to tell a body theywas still near the busy haunts of men, that and a mile of concretesidewalk leading a life of complete idleness—I say no one that everlistened to Lon sell a lot up there, pointing out on a blue print theproposed site of the Carnegie Library, would accuse him of not beingromantic.

"But of course Henrietta never sees Lon's romance and he ain't alwayshad the greatest patience with hers—like the time she got up the ArtLoan Exhibit to get new books for the M.E. Sabbath-school library andgot Spud Mulkins of the El Adobe to lend 'em the big gold-framed oilpainting that hangs over his bar. Some of the other ladies objected tothis—the picture was a big pink hussy lying down beside theocean—but Henrietta says art for art's sake is pure to them that arepure, or something, and they're doing such things constantly in theEast; and I'm darned if Spud didn't have his oil painting down and themosquito netting ripped off it before Alonzo heard about it and put theNot-at-All on it. He wouldn't reason with Henrietta either. He just saidhis objection was that every man that saw it would put one foot upgroping for the brass railing, which would be undignified for aSabbath-school scheme, and that she'd better hunt out something withclothes on like Whistler's portrait of his mother, or, if she wanted thenude in art, to get the Horse Fair or something with animals.

"I tell you that to show you how they don't hit it off sometimes. ThenHenrietta sulks. Kind of pinched and hungry looking she is, drapes herblack hair down over one side of her high forehead, wears daringgowns—that's what she calls 'em anyway—and reads the most outrageouskinds of poetry out loud to them that will listen. Likes this OmarSomething stuff about your path being beset with pitfalls and gin fizzesand getting soused out under a tree with your girl.

"I'm just telling you so you'll get Henrietta when Wilfred Lennox dripsgracefully in with his piece of poetry in one hand. Of course she musthave looked long and nervously at Wilfred, then read his poetry, thenlooked again. There before her was Romance against a background ofAlonzo Price, who never had an adventurous or evil thought in his life,and wore rubbers! Oh, sure! He must have palsied her at once, this wild,free creature of the woods who couldn't stand the cramped haunts of men.And I have said that Wilfred was there with the wild, free words abouthimself, and the hat and tie and the waving brown hair that give him somuch trouble. Shucks! I don't blame the woman. It's only a few yearssince we been let out from under lock and key. Give us a little time toget our bearings, say I. Wilfred was just one big red splash before heryearning eyes; he blinded her. And he stood there telling how this herelife in the marts of trade would sure twist and blacken some of the veryfinest chords in his being. Something like that it must have been.

"Anyway, about a quarter to six a procession went up Fourth Street,consisting of Wilfred Lennox, Henrietta, and Alonzo. The latter wastripping along about three steps back of the other two and every once ina while he would stop for a minute and simply look puzzled. I saw him.It's really a great pity Lon insists on wearing a derby hat with hisside whiskers. To my mind the two never seem meant for each other.

"The procession went to the Price mansion up on Ophir Avenue. And thatevening Henrietta had in a few friends to listen to the poet recite hisverses and tell anecdotes about himself. About five or six ladies inthe parlour and their menfolks smoking out on the front porch. The mendidn't seem to fall for Wilfred's open-road stuff the way the ladiesdid. Wilfred was a good reciter and held the ladies with his voice andhis melting blue eyes with the long lashes, and Henrietta was envied forhaving nailed him. That is, the women envied her. The men sort ofslouched off down to the front gate and then went down to the TemperanceBilliard Parlour, where several of 'em got stewed. Most of 'em, like oldJudge Ballard, who come to the country in '62, and Jeff Tuttle, who'salways had more than he wanted of the open road, were very cold indeedto Wilfred's main proposition. It is probable that low mutterings mighthave been heard among 'em, especially after a travelling man that wasplaying pool said the hobo poet had come in on the Pullman of No. 6.

"But I must say that Alonzo didn't seem to mutter any, from all I couldhear. Pathetic, the way that little man will believe right up to thebitter end. He said that for a hobo Wilfred wrote very good poetry,better than most hobos could write, he thought, and that Henriettaalways knew what she was doing. So the evening come to a peaceful end,most of the men getting back for their wives and Alonzo showing up infair shape and plumb eager for the comfort of his guest. It was Alonzo'snotion that the guest would of course want to sleep out in the frontyard on the breast of old earth where he could look up at the prettystars and feel at home, and he was getting out a roll of blankets whenthe guest said he didn't want to make the least bit of trouble and forone night he'd manage to sleep inside four stifling walls in a regularbed, like common people do. So Lon bedded him down in the guest chamber,but opened up the four windows in it and propped the door wide open sothe poor fellow could have a breeze and not smother. He told thisdowntown the next morning, and he was beginning to look right puzzledindeed. He said the wayward child of Nature had got up after about halfan hour and shut all the windows and the door. Lon thought first he wasintending to commit suicide, but he didn't like to interfere. He wastelling Jeff Tuttle and me about it when we happened to pass his office.

"'And there's another funny thing,'" he says. 'This chap was telling usall the way up home last night that he never ate meat—simply fruits andnuts with a mug of spring water. He said eating the carcasses ofmurdered beasts was abhorrent to him. But when we got down to the tablehe consented to partake of the roast beef and he did so repeatedly. Weusually have cold meat for lunch the day after a rib roast, but therewill be something else to-day; and along with the meat he drank twobottles of beer, though with mutterings of disgust. He said spring waterin the hills was pure, but that water out of pipes was full of typhoidgerms. He admitted that there were times when the grosser appetitesassailed him. And they assailed him this morning, too. He said he mightbring himself to eat some chops, and he did it without scarcely astruggle. He ate six. He said living the nauseous artificial life evenfor one night brought back the hateful meat craving. I don't know. He isundeniably peculiar. And of course you've heard about Pettikin's affairfor this evening?'

"We had. Just before leaving the house I had received Henrietta's cardinviting me to the country club that evening 'to meet Mr. WilfredLennox, Poet and Nature Lover, who will recite his original verses andgive a brief talk on "The World's Debt to Poetry."' And there you havethe whole trouble. Henrietta should have known better. But I've let outwhat women really are. I told Alonzo I would sure be among thosepresent, I said it sounded good. And then Alonzo pipes up about BenSutton coming to town on the eleven forty-two from the West. Ben makes atrip out of Alaska every summer and never fails to stop off a day or twowith Lon, they having been partners up North in '98.

"'Good old Ben will enjoy it, too,' says Alonzo; 'and, furthermore, Benwill straighten out one or two little things that have puzzled me aboutthis poet. He will understand his complex nature in a way that I confessI have been unequal to. What I mean is,' he says, 'there was talk when Ileft this morning of the poet consenting to take a class in poetry forseveral weeks in our thriving little city, and Henrietta was urging himto make our house his home. I have a sort of feeling that Ben will beable to make several suggestions of prime value. I have never known himto fail at making suggestions.'

"Funny, the way the little man tried to put it over on us, letting on hewas just puzzled—not really bothered, as he plainly was. You knewHenrietta was still seeing the big red splash of Romance, behind whichthe figure of her husband was totally obscured. Jeff Tuttle saw thefacts, and he up and spoke in a very common way about what would quicklyhappen to any tramp that tried to camp in his house, poet or no poet,but that's neither here nor there. We left Alonzo looking cheerilyforward to Ben Sutton on the eleven forty-two, and I went on to do someerrands.

"In the course of these I discovered that others besides Henrietta hadfell hard for the poet of Nature. I met Mrs. Dr. Percy Hailey Martingaleand she just bubbles about him, she having been at the Prices' the nightbefore.

"'Isn't he a glorious thing!' she says; 'and how grateful we should befor the dazzling bit of colour he brings into our drab existence!' Sheis a good deal like that herself at times. And I met Beryl Mae Macomber,a well known young society girl of seventeen, and Beryl Mae says: 'He'sawfully good looking, but do you think he's sincere?' And even Mrs.Judge Ballard comes along and says: 'What a stimulus he should be to usin our dull lives! How he shows us the big, vital bits!' and her at thatvery minute going into Bullitt & Fleishacker's to buy shoes for hernine year old twin grandsons! And the Reverend Mrs. Wiley Knapp in atthe Racquet Store wanting to know if the poet didn't make me think ofsome wild, free creature of the woods—a deer or an antelope poised forinstant flight while for one moment he timidly overlooked man in hishideous commercialism. But, of course, she was a minister's wife. I saidhe made me feel just like that. I said so to all of 'em. What else couldI say? If I'd said what I thought there on the street I'd of beenpinched. So I beat it home in self-protection. I was sympathizing goodand hearty with Lon Price by that time and looking forward to Ben Suttonmyself. I had a notion Ben would see the right of it where these poordubs of husbands wouldn't—or wouldn't dast say it if they did.

"About five o'clock I took another run downtown for some things I'dforgot, with an eye out to see how Alonzo and Ben might be coming on.The fact is, seeing each other only once a year that way they're apt tokind of loosen up—if you know what I mean.

"No sign of 'em at first. Nothing but ladies young and old—even some ofus older ranching set—making final purchases of ribbons and such forthe sole benefit of Wilfred Lennox, and talking in a flushed mannerabout him whenever they met. Almost every darned one of 'em had made ita point to stroll past the Price mansion that afternoon where Wilfredwas setting out on the lawn, in a wicker chair with some bottles of beersurveying Nature with a look of lofty approval and chatting withHenrietta about the real things of life.

"Beryl Mae Macomber had traipsed past four times, changing her clothestwice with a different shade of ribbon across her forehead and all hercollege pins on, and at last she'd simply walked right in and asked ifshe hadn't left her tennis racquet there last Tuesday. She says to Mrs.Judge Ballard and Mrs. Martingale and me in the Cut-Rate Pharmacy, shesays: 'Oh, he's just awfully magnetic—but do you really think he'ssincere?' Then she bought an ounce of Breath of Orient perfume and kindof two-stepped out. These other ladies spoke very sharply about thefreedom Beryl Mae's aunt allowed her. Mrs. Martingale said the poet, itwas true, had a compelling personality, but what was our young girlscoming to? And if that child was hers—

"So I left these two lady highbinders and went on into the retail sideof the Family Liquor Store to order up some cooking sherry, and thereover the partition from the bar side what do I hear but Alonzo Price andBen Sutton! Right off I could tell they'd been pinning a few on. Infact, Alonzo was calling the bartender Mister. You don't know about Lon,but when he calls the bartender Mister the ship has sailed. Ten minutesafter that he'll be crying over his operation. So I thought quick,remembering that we had now established a grillroom at the country club,consisting of a bar and three tables with bells on them, and aChinaman, and that if Alonzo and Ben Sutton come there at all they hadbetter come right—at least to start with. When I'd given my order Isent Louis Meyer in to tell the two gentlemen a lady wished to speak tothem outside.

"In a minute Ben comes out alone. He was awful glad to see me and I saidhow well he looked, and he did look well, sort of cordial andbulging—his forehead bulges and his eyes bulge and his moustache andhis chin, and he has cushions on his face. He beamed on me in a wide andhearty manner and explained that Alonzo refused to come out to meet alady until he knew who she was, because you got to be careful in a smalltown like this where every one talks. 'And besides,' says Ben, 'he'sjust broke down and begun to cry about his appendicitis that was threeyears ago. He's leaning his head on his arms down by the end of the barand sobbing bitterly over it. He seems to grieve about it as a personalloss. I've tried to cheer him up and told him it was probably all forthe best, but he says when it comes over him this way he simply can'tstand it. And what shall I do?'

"Well, of course I seen the worst had happened with Alonzo. So I says toBen: 'You know there's a party to-night and if that man ain't seen to hewill certainly sink the ship. Now you get him out of that swamp and I'llthink of something.' 'I'll do it,' says Ben, turning sideways so hecould go through the doorway again. 'I'll do it,' he says, 'if I have touse force on the little scoundrel.'

"And sure enough, in a minute he edged out again with Alonzo firmlyfastened to him in some way. Lon hadn't wanted to come and didn't wantto stay now, but he simply couldn't move. Say, that Ben Sutton wouldmake an awful grand anchor for a captive balloon. Alonzo wiped his eyesuntil he could see who I was. Then I rebuked him, reminding him of hissacred duties as a prominent citizen, a husband, and the secretary ofthe Red Gap Chamber of Commerce. 'Of course it's all right to take adrink now and then,' I says.

"Alonzo brightened at this. 'Good!' says he; 'now it's now and prettysoon it will be then. Let's go into a saloon or something like that!'

"'You'll come with me,' I says firmly. And I marched 'em down to theUnited States Grill, where I ordered tea and toast for 'em. Ben wassensible enough, but Alonzo was horrified at the thought of tea. 'It'stea or nice cold water for yours,' I says, and that set him off again.'Water!' he sobs. 'Water! Water! Maybe you don't know that some dearcousins of mine have just lost their all in the Dayton flood—twentyyears' gathering went in a minute, just like that!' and he tried to snaphis fingers. All the same I got some hot tea into him and sent for EddiePierce to be out in front with his hack. While we was waiting for Eddieit occurs to Alonzo to telephone his wife. He come back very solemn andsays: 'I told her I wouldn't be home to dinner because I was hungry andthere probably wouldn't be enough meat, what with a vegetarian poet inthe house. I told her I should sink to the level of a brute in the nightlife of our gay little city. I said I was a wayward child of Naturemyself if you come right down to it.'

"'Good for you,' I says, having got word that Eddie is outside with hishack. 'And now for the open road!' 'Fine!' says Alonzo. 'My spirit iscertainly feeling very untamed, like some poet's!' So I hustled 'em outand into the four wheeler. Then I give Eddie Pierce privateinstructions. 'Get 'em out into the hills about four miles,' I says,'out past the Catholic burying ground, then make an excuse that yourhack has broke down, and as soon as they set foot to the ground havethem skates of yours run away. Pay no attention whatever to theirpleadings or their profane threats, only yelling to 'em that you'll beback as soon as possible. But don't go back. They'll wait an hour or so,then walk. And they need to walk.'

"'You said something there,' says Eddie, glancing back at 'em. BenSutton was trying to cheer Alonzo up by reminding him of the Christmasnight they went to sleep in the steam room of the Turkish bath at Nome,and the man forgot 'em and shut off the steam and they froze to thebenches and had to be chiselled off. And Eddie trotted off with hisload. You'd ought to seen the way the hack sagged down on Ben's side.And I felt that I had done a good work, so I hurried home to get a biteto eat and dress and make the party, which I still felt would be a goodparty even if the husband of our hostess was among the killed ormissing.

"I reached the clubhouse at eight o'clock of that beautiful Juneevening, to find the party already well assembled on the piazza and thefront steps or strolling about the lawn, about eight or ten of ourprominent society matrons and near as many husbands. And mebbe thosedames hadn't lingered before their mirrors for final touches! Mrs.Martingale had on all her rings and the jade bracelet and the art-craftnecklace with amethysts, and Mrs. Judge Ballard had done her hair a newway, and Beryl Mae Macomber, there with her aunt, not only had a newscarf with silver stars over her frail young shoulders and a band ofcherry coloured velvet across her forehead, but she was wearing thefirst ankle watch ever seen in Red Gap. I couldn't begin to tell you thefussy improvements them ladies had made in themselves—and all, mindyou, for the passing child of Nature who had never paid a bill for 'emin his life.

"Oh, it was a gay, careless throng with the mad light of pleasure in itseyes, and all of 'em milling round Wilfred Lennox, who was eating it up.Some bantered him roguishly and some spoke in chest tones of what wasthe real inner meaning of life after all. Henrietta Templeton Pricehovered near with the glad light of capture in her eyes. Silent butproud Henrietta was, careless but superior, reminding me of the hunterthat has his picture taken over in Africa with one negligent foot onthe head of a two-horned rhinoceros he's just killed.

"But again the husbands was kind of lurking in the background, bunchedup together. They seemed abashed by this strange frenzy of theirwomenfolks. How'd they know, the poor dubs, that a poet wasn't somethinga business man had ought to be polite and grovelling to? They affectedan easy manner, but it was poor work. Even Judge Ballard, who seems ninefeet tall in his Prince Albert, and usually looks quite dignified andhostile with his long dark face and his moustache and goatee—even thegood old judge was rattled after a brief and unhappy effort to hold abit of converse with the guest of honour. Him and Jeff Tuttle went tothe grillroom twice in ten minutes. The judge always takes his with adash of pepper sauce in it, but now it only seemed to make him moregloomy.

"Well, I was listening along, feeling elated that I'd put Alonzo and BenSutton out of the way and wondering when the show would begin—Beryl Maein her high, innocent voice had just said to the poet: 'But seriouslynow, are you sincere?' and I was getting some plenty of that, when upthe road in the dusk I seen Bush Jones driving a dray-load of furniture.I wondered where in time any family could be moving out that way. Ididn't know any houses beyond the club and I was pondering about this,idly as you might say, when Bush Jones pulls his team up right in frontof the clubhouse, and there on the load is the two I had tried to lose.In a big armchair beside a varnished centre table sits Ben Suttonreading something that I recognized as the yellow card with Wilfred'sverses on it. And across the dray from him on a red-plush sofa is AlonzoPrice singing 'My Wild Irish Rose' in a very noisy tenor.

"Well, sir, I could have basted that fool Bush Jones with one of his owndray stakes. That man's got an intellect just powerful enough to takefurniture from one house to another if the new address ain't too hardfor him to commit to memory. That's Bush Jones all right! He has themachinery for thinking, but it all glitters as new as the day it was putin. So he'd come a mile out of his way with these two riots—and peopleoff somewhere wondering where that last load of things was!

"The ladies all affected to ignore this disgraceful spectacle, withHenrietta sinking her nails into her bloodless palms, but the men brokeout and cheered a little in a half-scared manner and some of 'em wentdown to help the newcomers climb out. Then Ben had words with Bush Jonesbecause he wanted him to wait there and take 'em back to town when theparty was over and Bush refused to wait. After suffering about twentyseconds in the throes of mental effort I reckon he discovered that hehad business to attend to or was hungry or something. Anyway, Ben paidhim some money finally and he drove off after calling out 'Good-night,all!' just as if nothing had happened.

"Alonzo and Ben Sutton joined the party without further formality. Theydidn't look so bad, either, so I saw my crooked work had done some good.Lon quit singing almost at once and walked good and his eyes didn'twabble, and he looked kind of desperate and respectable, and Ben wasfirst-class, except he was slightly oratorical and his collar had meltedthe way fat men's do. And it was funny to see how every husband therebucked up when Ben came forward, as if all they had wanted was some oneto make medicine for 'em before they begun the war dance. They moochedright up round Ben when he trampled a way into the flushed group aboutWilfred.

"'At last the well-known stranger!' says Ben cordially, seizing one ofWilfred's pale, beautiful hands. 'I've been hearing so much of you,wayward child of the open road that you are, and I've just been readingyour wonderful verses as I sat in my library. The woods and the hillsfor your spirit untamed and the fire of youth to warm yournights—that's the talk.' He paused and waved Wilfred's verses in a fat,freckled hand. Then he looked at him hard and peculiar and says: 'Whenyou going to pull some of it for us?'

"Wilfred had looked slightly rattled from the beginning. Now he smiled,but only with his lips—he made it seem like a mere Swedish exercise orsomething, and the next second his face looked as if it had been sewedup for the winter.

"'Little starry-eyed gypsy, I say, when are you going to pull some ofthat open-road stuff?' says Ben again, all cordial and sinister.

"Wilfred gulped and tried to be jaunty. 'Oh, as to that, I'm here to-dayand there to-morrow,' he murmurs, and nervously fixes his necktie.

"'Oh, my, and isn't that nice!' says Ben heartily—'the urge of the wildto her wayward child'—I know you're a slave to it. And now you're goingto tell us all about the open road, and then you and I are going to havean intimate chat and I'll tell you about it—about some of the dearestlittle open roads you ever saw, right round in these parts. I've justcounted nine, all leading out of town to the cunningest mountains andglens that would make you write poetry hours at a time, with Nature'sglad fruits and nuts and a mug of spring water and some bottled beer anda ham and some rump steak—'

"The stillness of that group had become darned painful, I want to tellyou. There was a horrid fear that Ben Sutton might go too far, even fora country club. Every woman was shuddering and smiling in a painfulmanner, and the men regarding Ben with glistening eyes. And Ben felt ithimself all at once. So he says: 'But I fear I am detaining you,' andlet go of the end of Wilfred's tie that he had been toying with in asomewhat firm manner. 'Let us be on with your part of the evening'sentertainment,' he says, 'but don't forget, gypsy wilding that you are,that you and I must have a chat about open roads the moment you havefinished. I know we are cramping you. By that time you will be feelingthe old, restless urge and you might take a road that wasn't open if Ididn't direct you.'

"He patted Wilfred loudly on the back a couple of times and Wilfredducked the third pat and got out of the group, and the ladies all beganto flurry their voices about the lovely June evening but wouldn't it bepleasanter inside, and Henrietta tragically called from the doorway tocome at once, for God's sake, so they all went at once, with the menonly half trailing, and inside we could hear 'em fixing chairs round andputting out a table for the poet to stand by, and so forth.

"Alonzo, however, had not trailed. He was over on the steps holdingBeryl Mae Macomber by her new scarf and telling her how flowerlike herbeauty was. And old Judge Ballard was holding about half the men,including Ben Sutton, while he made a speech. I hung back to listen.'Sir,' he was saying to Ben, 'Secretary Seward some years sincepurchased your territory from Russia for seven million dollars despitethe protests of a clamorous and purblind opposition. How nigg*rdly seemsthat purchase price at this moment! For Alaska has perfected you, sir,if it did not produce you. Gentlemen, I feel that we dealt unfairly byRussia. But that is in the dead past. It is not too late, however, totiptoe to the grillroom and offer a toast to our young sister of thesnows.'

"There was subdued cheers and they tiptoed. Ben Sutton was telling thejudge that he felt highly complimented, but it was a mistake to ring inthat snow stuff on Alaska. She'd suffered from it too long. He was goingon to paint Alaska as something like Alabama—cooler nights, of course,but bracing. Alonzo still had Beryl Mae by the scarf, telling her howflowerlike her beauty was.

"I went into the big room, picking a chair over by the door so I couldkeep tabs on that grillroom. Only three or four of the meekest husbandshad come with us. And Wilfred started. I'll do him the justice to say hewas game. The ladies thought anything bordering on roughness was allover, but Wilfred didn't. When he'd try to get a far-away look in hiseyes while he was reciting his poetry he couldn't get it any fartheraway than the grillroom door. He was nervous but determined, for therehad been notice given of a silver offering for him. He recited theverses on the card and the ladies all thrilled up at once, includingBeryl Mae, who'd come in without her scarf. They just clenched theirhands and hung on Wilfred's wild, free words.

"And after the poetry he kind of lectured about how man had ought tobreak away from the vile cities and seek the solace of great MotherNature, where his bruised spirit could be healed and the veneer ofcivilization cast aside and the soul come into its own, and things likethat. And he went on to say that out in the open the perspective of lifeis broadened and one is a laughing philosopher as long as the blue skyis overhead and the green grass underfoot. 'To lie,' says he, 'withrelaxed muscles on the carpet of pine needles and look up through thegently swaying branches of majestic trees at the fleecy white clouds,dreaming away the hours far from the sordid activities of the marketplace, is one of the best nerve tonics in all the world.' It was anunfortunate phrase for Wilfred, because some of the husbands had tiptoedout of the grillroom to listen, and there was a hearty cheer at this,led by Jeff Tuttle. 'Sure! Some nerve tonic!' they called out, andlaughed coarsely. Then they rushed back to the grillroom withouttiptoeing.

"The disgraceful interruption was tactfully covered by Wilfred and hisaudience. He took a sip from the glass of water and went on to talkabout the world's debt to poetry. Then I sneaked out to the grillroommyself. By this time the Chinaman had got tangled up with the orders andwas putting out drinks every which way. And they was being takenwillingly. Judge Ballard and Ben Sutton was now planting cotton inAlaska and getting good crops every year, and Ben was also promising tosend the judge a lovely spotted fawnskin vest that an Indian had madefor him, but made too small—not having more than six or eight fawns, Ijudged. And Alonzo had got a second start. Still he wasn't so bad yet,with Beryl Mae's scarf over his arm, and talking of the unparalleledbeauties of Price's Addition to Red Gap, which he said he wouldn't tradeeven for the whole of Alaska if it was offered to him to-morrow—notthat Ben Sutton wasn't the whitest soul God ever made and he'd like tohear some one say different—and so on.

"I mixed in with 'em and took a friendly drink myself, with the aim ofsmoothing things down, but I saw it would be delicate work. About all Icould do was keep 'em reminded there was ladies present and it wasn't abarroom where anything could be rightly started. Doc Martingale'sfeelings was running high, too, account, I suppose, of certainfull-hearted things his wife had blurted out to him about the hypnoticeyes of this here Nature lover. He was quiet enough, but vicious, actinglike he'd love to do some dental work on the poet that might or mightnot be painless for all he cared a hoot. He was taking his own drinksall alone, like clockwork—moody but systematic.

"Then we hear chairs pushed round in the other room and the chink ofsilver to be offered to the poet, and Henrietta come out to give wordfor the refreshments to be served. She found Alonzo in the hallwaytelling Beryl Mae how flowerlike her beauty was and giving her the elk'stooth charm off his watch chain. Beryl Mae was giggling heartily untilshe caught Henrietta's eye—like a cobra's.

"The refreshments was handed round peaceful enough, with the ladiespressing sardine sandwiches and chocolate cake and cups of coffee on toWilfred and asking him interesting questions about his adventurous lifein the open. And the plans was all made for his class in poetry to beheld at Henrietta's house, where the lady subscribers for a few weekscould come into contact with the higher realities of life, at eightdollars for the course, and Wilfred was beginning to cheer up again,though still subject to dismay when one of the husbands would glare inat him from the hall, and especially when Ben Sutton would look in withhis bulging and expressive eyes and kind of bark at him.

"Then Ben Sutton come and stood in the doorway till he caught Wilfred'seye and beckoned to him. Wilfred pretended not to notice the first time,but Ben beckoned a little harder, so Wilfred excused himself to the sixor eight ladies and went out. It seemed to me he first looked quickround him to make sure there wasn't any other way out. I was standing inthe hall when Ben led him tenderly into the grillroom with two fingers.

"'Here is our well-known poet and bon vivant,' says Ben to Alonzo, whohad followed 'em in. So Alonzo bristles up to Wilfred and glares at himand says: 'All joking aside, is that one of my new shirts you're wearingor is it not?'

"Wilfred gasped a couple times and says: 'Why, as to that, you see, themadam insisted—'

"Alonzo shut him off. 'How dare you drag a lady's name into a barroombrawl?' says he.

"'Don't shoot in here,' says Ben. 'You'd scare the ladies.'

"Wilfred went pasty, indeed, thinking his host was going to gun him.

"'Oh, very well, I won't then,' says Alonzo. 'I guess I can be agentleman when necessary. But all joking aside, I want to ask him this:Does he consider poetry to be an accomplishment or a vice?'

"'I was going to put something like that to him myself, only I couldn'tthink of it,' says Doc Martingale, edging up and looking quiterestrained and nervous in the arms. I was afraid of the doc. I wasafraid he was going to blemish Wilfred a couple of times right there.

"'An accomplishment or a vice? Answer yes or no!' orders the judge in ahard voice.

"The poet looks round at 'em and attempts to laugh merrily, but he onlydoes it from the teeth out.

"'Laugh on, my proud beauty!' says Ben Button. Then he turns to thebunch. 'What we really ought to do,' he says, 'we ought to make abeliever of him right here and now.'

"Even then, mind you, the husbands would have lost their nerve if Benhadn't took the lead. Ben didn't have to live with their wives so whatcared he? Wilfred Lennox sort of shuffled his feet and smiled a smile ofpure anxiety. He knew some way that this was nothing to cheer about.

"'I got it,' says Jeff Tuttle with the air of a thinker. 'We're crampingthe poor cuss here. What he wants is the open road.'

"'What he really wants,' says Alonzo, 'is about six bottles of my pure,sparkling beer, but maybe he'll take the open road if we show him a goodone.'

"'He wants the open road—show him a good one!' yells the other husbandsin chorus. It was kind of like a song.

"'I had meant to be on my way,' says Wilfred very cold and lofty.

"'You're here to-day and there to-morrow,' says Ben; 'but how can you bethere to-morrow if you don't start from here now?—for the way is longand lonely.'

"'I was about to start,' says Wilfred, getting in a couple of stepstoward the door.

"''Tis better so,' says Ben. 'This is no place for a county recorder'sson, and there's a bully road out here open at both ends.'

"They made way for the poet, and a sickening silence reigned. Even thewomen gathered about the door of the other room was silent. They knewthe thing had got out of their hands. The men closed in after Wilfred ashe reached the steps. He there took his soft hat out from under his coatwhere he'd cached it. He went cautiously down the steps. Beryl Mae brokethe silence.

"'Oh, Mr. Price,' says she, catching Alonzo by the sleeve, 'do you thinkhe's really sincere?'

"'He is at this moment,' says Alonzo. 'He's behaving as sincerely asever I saw a man behave.' And just then at the foot of the steps Wilfredmade a tactical error. He started to run. The husbands and Ben Suttongave the long yell and went in pursuit. Wilfred would have left them allif he hadn't run into the tennis net. He come down like a sack of meal.

"'There!' says Ben Sutton. 'Now he's done it—broke his neck orsomething. That's the way with some men—they'll try anything to get alaugh.'

"They went and picked the poet up. He was all right, only dazed.

"'But that's one of the roads that ain't open,' says Ben. 'And besides,you was going right toward the nasty old railroad that runs into thecramped haunts of men. You must have got turned round. Here'—he pointedout over the golf links—'it's off that way that Mother Nature awaitsher wayward child. Miles and miles of her—all open. Doesn't your gypsysoul hear the call? This way for the hills and glens, thou star-eyedwoodling!' and he gently led Wilfred off over the links, the rest of themen trailing after and making some word racket, believe me. They was allgood conversationalists at the moment. Doc Martingale was wanting thepoet to run into the tennis net again, just for fun, and Jeff Tuttlesays make him climb a tree like the monkeys do in their native glades,but Ben says just keep him away from the railroad, that's all. GoodMother Nature will attend to the rest.

"The wives by now was huddled round the side of the clubhouse, tooscared to talk much, just muttering incoherently and wringing theirhands, and Beryl Mae pipes up and says: 'Oh, perhaps I wronged himafter all; perhaps deep down in his heart he was sincere.'

"The moon had come up now and we could see the mob with its victimstarting off toward the Canadian Rockies. Then all at once they began torun, and I knew Wilfred had made another dash for liberty. Pretty soonthey scattered out and seemed to be beating up the shrubbery down by thecreek. And after a bit some of 'em straggled back. They paid noattention to us ladies, but made for the grillroom.

"'We lost him in that brush beyond the fifth hole,' says Alonzo. 'Noneof us is any match for him on level ground, but we got some goodtrackers and we're guarding the line to keep him headed off from therailroad and into his beloved hills.'

"'We should hurry back with refreshment for the faithful watchers,' saysJudge Ballard. 'The fellow will surely try to double back to therailroad.'

"'Got to keep him away from the cramped haunts of business men,' saysAlonzo brightly.

"'I wish Clay, my faithful old hound, were still alive,' says the judgewistfully.

"'Say, I got a peach of a terrier down to the house right now,' saysJeff Tuttle, 'but he's only trained for bear—I never tried him onpoets.'

"'He might tree him at that,' says Doc Martingale.

"'Percy,' cries his wife, 'have you forgotten your manhood?'

"'Yes,' says Percy.

"'Darling,' calls Henrietta, 'will you listen to reason a moment?'

"'No,' says Alonzo.

"'It's that creature from Alaska leading them on,' says Mrs. JudgeBallard—'that overdressed drunken rowdy!'

"Ben Sutton looked right hurt at this. He buttoned his coat over hischecked vest and says: 'I take that unkindly, madam—calling meoverdressed. I selected this suiting with great care. It ain't nice tocall me overdressed. I feel it deeply.'

"But they was off again before one thing could lead to another, takingbottles of hard liquor they had uncorked. 'The open road! The openroad!' they yelled as they went.

"Well, that's about all. Some of the wives begun to straggle off home,mostly in tears, and some hung round till later. I was one of these, notwishing to miss anything of an absorbing character. Edgar Tomlinson wentearly, too. Edgar writes 'The Lounger in the Lobby' column for theRecorder, and he'd come out to report the entertainment; but at oneo'clock he said it was a case for the sporting editor and he'd try toget him out before the kill.

"At different times one or two of the hunters would straggle back formore drink. They said the quarry was making a long detour round theirleft flank, trying his darndest to get to the railroad, but they hadhopes. And they scattered out. Ever and anon you would hear the longhowl of some lone drunkard that had got lost from the pack.

"About sunup they all found themselves at the railroad track about amile beyond the clubhouse, just at the head of Stender's grade. Therethey was voting to picket the track for a mile each way when along comethe four-thirty-two way freight. It had slowed up some making the grade,and while they watched it what should dart out from a bunch of scrub oakbut the active figure of Wilfred Lennox. He made one of them ironladders all right and was on top of a car when the train come by, butnone of 'em dast jump it because it had picked up speed again.

"They said Wilfred stood up and shook both fists at 'em and called 'emevery name he could lay his tongue to—using language so coarse you'dnever think it could have come from a poet's lips. They could see hishandsome face working violently long after they couldn't hear him. Justmy luck! I'm always missing something.

"So they come grouching back to the clubhouse and I took 'em home tobreakfast. When we got down to the table old Judge Ballard says: 'Whatmight have been an evening of rare enjoyment was converted into adetestable failure by that cur. I saw from the very beginning that hewas determined to spoil our fun.'

"'The joke is sure on us,' says Ben Sutton, 'but I bear him no grudge.In fact, I did him an injustice I knew he wasn't a poet, but I didn'tbelieve he was even a hobo till he jumped that freight.'

"Alonzo was out in the hall telephoning Henrietta. We could hear hischeerful voice: 'No, Pettikins, no! It doesn't ache a bit. What's that?Of course I still do! You are the only woman that ever meant anything tome. What? What's that? Oh, I may have errant fancies now and again, likethe best of men—you know yourself how sensitive I am to a certain typeof flowerlike beauty—but it never touches my deeper nature. Yes,certainly, I shall be right up the very minute good old Benleaves—to-morrow or next day. What's that? Now, now! Don't do that!Just the minute he leaves—G'—by.'

"And the little brute hung up on her!"

II

MA PETTENGILL AND THE SONG OF SONGS

The hammock between the two jack pines at the back of the Arrowheadranch house had lured me to mid—afternoon slumber. The day was hot andthe morning had been toilsome—four miles of trout stream, rocky,difficult miles. And my hostess, Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill, hadridden off after luncheon to some remote fastness of her domain, leavingme and the place somnolent.

In the shadowed coolness, aching gratefully in many joints, I hadplunged into the hammock's Lethe, swooning shamelessly to a benignoblivion. Dreamless it must long have been, for the shadows of ranchhouse, stable, hay barn, corral, and bunk house were long to the eastwhen next I observed them. But I fought to this wakefulness through oneof those dreams of a monstrous futility that sometimes madden us fromsleep. Through a fearsome gorge a stream wound and in it I hunted onecertain giant trout. Savagely it took the fly, but always the line brokewhen I struck; rather, it dissolved; there would be no resistance. Andthe giant fish mocked me each time, jeered and flouted me, camebrazenly to the surface and derided me with antics weirdly human.

Then, as I persisted, it surprisingly became a musical trout. Itwhistled, it played a guitar, it sang. How pathetic our mildly amazedacceptance of these miracles in dreams! I was only the more determinedto snare a fish that could whistle and sing simultaneously, andaccompany itself on a stringed instrument, and was six feet in length.It was that by now and ever growing. It seemed only an attractivenovelty and I still believed a brown hackle would suffice. But then Ibecame aware that this trout, to its stringed accompaniment, everwhistled and sang one song with a desperate intentness. That song was"The Rosary." The fish had presumed too far. "This," I shrewdly toldmyself, "is almost certainly a dream." The soundless words were magic.Gorge and stream vanished, the versatile fish faded to blue sky showingthrough the green needles of a jack pine. It was a sane world again andstill, I thought, with the shadows of ranch house, stable, hay barn,corral, and bunk house going long to the east. I stretched in thehammock, I tingled with a lazy well-being. The world was still; but wasit—quite?

On a bench over by the corral gate crouched Buck Devine, doing somethingneedful to a saddle. And as he wrought he whistled. He whistled "TheRosary" shrilly and with much feeling. Nor was the world still but forthis. From the bunk house came the mellow throbbing of a stringedinstrument, the guitar of Sandy Sawtelle, star rider of the Arrowhead,temporarily withdrawn from a career of sprightly endeavour by a sprainedankle and solacing his retirement with music. He was playing "TheRosary"—very badly indeed, but one knew only too well what he meant.The two performers were distant enough to be no affront to each other.The hammock, less happily, was midway between them.

I sat up with groans. I hated to leave the hammock.

"The trout also sang it," I reminded myself. Followed the voice, a voicefrom the stable, the cracked, whining tenor of a very aged vassal of theArrowhead, one Jimmie Time. Jimmie, I gathered, was currying a horse ashe sang, for each bar of the ballad was measured by the double thud of acurrycomb against the side of a stall. Whistle, guitar, and voice nowattacked the thing in differing keys and at varying points. Jimmie mightbe said to prevail. There was a fatuous tenderness in his attack and thethudding currycomb gave it spirit. Nor did he slur any of the affectingwords; they clave the air with an unctuous precision:

Came a dramatic and equally soulful interpolation: "Whoa, dang you! Youwould, would you? Whoa-a-a, now!"

Again the melody:

Buck Devine still mouthed his woful whistle and Sandy Sawtelle valiantlystrove for the true and just accord of his six strings. It was no placefor a passive soul. I parted swiftly from the hammock and made over thesun-scorched turf for the ranch house. There was shelter and surcease;doors and windows might be closed. The unctuous whine of Jimmie Timepursued me:

As I reached the hospitable door of the living-room I observed Lew Wee,Chinese chef of the Arrowhead, engaged in cranking one of those deviceswith a musical intention which I have somewhere seen advertised. It isan important-looking device in a polished mahogany case, and I recall inthe advertisem*nt I saw it was surrounded by a numerousenthralled-looking family in a costly drawing-room, while the ghost ofBeethoven simpered above it in ineffable benignancy. Something now toldme the worst, even as Lew Wee adjusted the needle to the revolving disk.I waited for no more than the opening orchestral strains. It is aleisurely rhythmed cacophony, and I had time to be almost beyond rangeere the voice took up a tale I was hearing too often in one day. Even soI distantly perceived it to be a fruity contralto voice with an expertsob.

A hundred yards in front of the ranch house all was holy peace, peace inthe stilled air, peace dreaming along the neighbouring hills and lyinglike a benediction over the wide river-flat below me, through which thestream wove a shining course. I exulted in it, from the dangers passed.Then appeared Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill from the fringe ofcottonwoods, jolting a tired horse toward me over the flat.

"Come have some tea," she cordially boomed as she passed. I returneduncertainly. Tea? Yes. But—However, the door would be shut and theAsiatic probably diverted.

As I came again to the rear of the ranch house Mrs. Pettengill, in khakiriding breeches, flannel shirt, and the hat of her trade, toweredbulkily as an admirable figure of wrath, one hand on her hip, onepoising a quirt viciously aloft. By the corral gate Buck Devine droopedcravenly above his damaged saddle; at the door of the bunk house SandySawtelle tottered precariously on one foot, his guitar under his arm, alook of guilty horror on his set face. By the stable door stood theincredibly withered Jimmie Time, shrinking a vast dismay.

"You hear me!" exploded the infuriated chatelaine, and I knew she wasrepeating the phrase.

"Ain't I got to mend this latigo?" protested Buck Devine piteously.

"You'll go up the gulch and beyond the dry fork and mend it, if youwhistle that tune again!"

Sandy Sawtelle rumpled his pink hair to further disorder and found a fewweak words for his conscious guilt.

"Now, I wasn't aiming to harm anybody, what with with my game laig andshet up here like I am—"

"Well, my Lord! Can't you play a sensible tune then?"

Jimmie Time hereupon behaved craftily. He lifted his head, showing theface of a boy who had somehow got to be seventy years old without evergetting to be more than a boy, and began to whistle softly andinnocently—an air of which hardly anything could be definitely saidexcept that it was not "The Rosary." It was very flagrantly not "TheRosary." His craft availed him not.

"Yes, and you, too!" thundered the lady. "You was the worst—you wassinging. Didn't I hear you? How many times I got to tell you? Firstthing you know, you little reprobate—"

Jimmie Time cowered again. Visibly he took on unbelievable years.

"Yes, ma'am," he whispered.

"Yes, ma'am," meekly echoed the tottering instrumentalist.

"Yes, ma'am," muttered Buck Devine, "not knowing you was anywheresnear—"

"Makes no difference where I be—you hear me!"

Although her back was toward me I felt her glare. The wretches winced.She came a dozen steps toward me, then turned swiftly to glare again.They shuddered, even though she spoke no word. Then she came on,muttering hotly, and together we approached the ranch house. A dozenfeet from the door she bounded ahead of me with a cry of baffled rage. Isaw why. Lew Wee, unrecking her approach, was cold-bloodedly committingan encore. She sped through the doorway, and I heard Lew Wee'sfrightened squeal as he sped through another. When I stood in the roomshe was putting violent hands to the throat of the thing.

"The hours I spend with th—" The throttled note expired in a verydreadful squawk of agony. It was as if foul murder had been done, anddone swiftly. The maddened woman faced me with the potentially evil diskclutched in her hands. In a voice that is a notable loss to our revivalsof Greek tragedy she declaimed:

"Ain't it the limit?—and the last thing I done was to hide out thatrecord up behind the clock where he couldn't find it!"

In a sudden new alarm and with three long steps she reached the door ofthe kitchen and flung it open. Through a window thus exposed we beheldthe offender. One so seldom thinks of the Chinese as athletes! Lew Weewas well down the flat toward the cottonwoods and still going strong.

"Ain't it the limit?" again demanded his employer. "Gosh all—excuse me,but they got me into such a state. Here I am panting like a tuckeredhound. And now I got to make the tea myself. He won't dare come backbefore suppertime."

It seemed to be not yet an occasion for words from me. I tried for alook of intelligent sympathy. In the kitchen I heard her noisily fill ateakettle with water. She was not herself yet. She still muttered hotly.I moved to the magazine—littered table and affected to be taken withthe portrait of a smug—looking prize Holstein on the first page of theStock Breeder's Gazette.

The volcano presently seethed through the room and entered its ownapartment.

Ten minutes later my hostess emerged with recovered aplomb. She haddonned a skirt and a flowered blouse, and dusted powder upon and abouther sunburned and rather blobby nose. Her crinkly gray hair had beendrawn to a knot at the back of her grenadier's head. Her widely set eyesgleamed with the smile of her broad and competent mouth.

"Tea in one minute," she promised more than audibly as she bustled intothe kitchen. It really came in five, and beside the tray she pleasantlyrelaxed. The cups were filled and a breach was made upon the cake shehad brought. The tea was advertising a sufficient strength, yet she nowraised the dynamics of her own portion.

"I'll just spill a hooker of this here Scotch into mine," she said, andthen, as she did even so: "My lands! Ain't I the cynical old Kate! Andsilly! Letting them boys upset me that way with that there fool song."She decanted a saucerful of the re-enforced tea and raised it to herpursed lips. "Looking at you!" she murmured cavernously and drank deep.She put the saucer back where nice persons leave theirs at all times."Say, it was hot over on that bench to-day. I was getting out that bunchof bull calves, and all the time here was old Safety First mumblinground—"

This was rather promising, but I had resolved differently.

"That song," I insinuated. "Of course there are people—"

"You bet there are! I'm one of 'em, too! What that song's done tome—and to other innocent bystanders in the last couple weeks—"

She sighed hugely, drank more of the fortified brew—nicely from the cupthis time—and fashioned a cigarette from materials at her hand.

In the flame of a lighted match Mrs. Pettengill's eyes sparkled with akind of savage retrospection. She shrugged it off impatiently.

"I guess you thought I spoke a mite short when you asked about Nettie'swedding yesterday."

It was true. She had turned the friendly inquiry with a rathermystifying abruptness. I murmured politely. She blew twin jets of smokefrom the widely separated corners of her generous mouth and thenshrewdly narrowed her gaze to some distant point of narration.

"Yes, sir, I says to her, 'Woman's place is the home.' And what youthink she come back with? That she was going to be a leader of the NewDawn. Yes, sir, just like that. Five feet one, a hundred and eightpounds in her winter clothes, a confirmed pickle eater—pretty enough,even if she is kind of peaked and spiritual looking—and going to leadthe New Dawn.

"Where'd she catch it? My fault, of course, sending her back East toschool and letting her visit the W.B. Hemingways, Mrs. H. being thewell-known clubwoman like the newspapers always print under her photo inevening dress. That's how she caught it all right.

"I hadn't realized it when she first got back, except she was pale andfar-away in the eyes and et pickles heavily at every meal—oh, mustard,dill, sour, sweet, anything that was pickles—and not enough meat andregular victuals. Gaunted she was, but I didn't suspect her mind wascontaminated none till I sprung Chester Timmins on her as a goodmarrying bet. You know Chet, son of old Dave that has the Lazy EightRanch over on Pipe Stone—a good, clean boy that'll have the ranch tohimself as soon as old Dave dies of meanness, and that can't be longnow. It was then she come out delirious about not being the pampered toyof any male—male, mind you! It seems when these hussies want to knockman nowadays they call him a male. And she rippled on about the freedomof her soul and her downtrod sisters and this here New Dawn.

"Well, sir, a baby could have pushed me flat with one finger. At first Ididn' know no better'n to argue with her, I was that affrighted. 'Why,Nettie Hosford,' I says, 'to think I've lived to hear my only sister'sonly child talking in shrieks like that! To think I should have to tellone of my own kin that women's place is the home. Look at me,' Isays—we was down in Red Gap at the time—'pretty soon I'll go up to theranch and what'll I do there?" I says.

"'Well, listen,' I says, 'to a few of the things I'll be doing: I'll bemarking, branding, and vaccinating the calves, I'll be classing andturning out the strong cattle on the range. I'll be having the coltsrid, breaking mules for haying, oiling and mending the team harness,cutting and hauling posts, tattooing the ears and registering thethoroughbred calves, putting in dams, cleaning ditches, irrigating theflats, setting out the vegetable garden, building fence, swinging newgates, overhauling the haying tools, receiving, marking, and brandingthe new two—year—old bulls, plowing and seeding grain for our workstock and hogs, breaking in new cooks and blacksmiths'—I was so mad Iwent on till I was winded. 'And that ain't half of it,' I says. 'Women'swork is never done; her place is in the home and she finds so much to doright there that she ain't getting any time to lead a New Dawn. I'llstart you easy,' I says; 'learn you to bake a batch of bread or do a tubof washing—something simple—and there's Chet Timmins, waiting to giveyou a glorious future as wife and mother and helpmeet.'

"She just give me one look as cold as all arctics and says, 'It'srepellent'—that's all, just 'repellent.' I see I was up against it. Nogood talking. Sometimes it comes over me like a flash when not to talk.It does to some women. So I affected a light manner and pretended tolaugh it off, just as if I didn't see scandal threatening—think ofhaving it talked about that a niece of my own raising was a leader ofthe New Dawn!

"'All right,' I says, 'only, of course, Chet Timmins is a good friendand neighbour of mine, even if he is a male, so I hope you won't mindhis dropping in now and again from time to time, just to say howdy andeat a meal.' And she flusters me again with her coolness.

"'No,' she says, 'I won't mind, but I know what you're counting on, andit won't do either of you any good. I'm above the appeal of a man's merepresence,' she says, 'for I've thrown off the age—long subjection; butI won't mind his coming. I shall delight to study him. They're allalike, and one specimen is as good as another for that. But neither ofyou need expect anything,' she says, 'for the wrongs of my sisters havearmoured me against the grossness of mere sex appeal.' Excuse me forgetting off such things, but I'm telling you how she talked.

"'Oh, shucks!' I says to myself profanely, for all at once I saw shewasn't talking her own real thoughts but stuff she'd picked up from thewell-known lady friends of Mrs. W.B. Hemingway. I was mad all right; butthe minute I get plumb sure mad I get wily. 'I was just trying you out,'I says. 'Of course you are right!' 'Of course I am,' says she, 'though Ihardly expected you to see it, you being so hardened a product of theancient ideal of slave marriage.'

"At them words it was pretty hard for me to keep on being wily, but Ikept all right. I kept beautifully. I just laughed and said we'd haveChet Timmins up for supper, and she laughed and said it would beamusing.

"And it was, or it would have been if it hadn't been so sad anddisgusting. Chet, you see, had plumb crumpled the first time he ever seteyes on her, and he's never been able to uncrumple. He always choked upthe minute she'd come into the room, and that night he choked worse'never because the little devil started in to lead him on—aiming to showme how she could study a male, I reckon. He couldn't even ask for somemore of the creamed potatoes without choking up—with her all the timeusing her eyes on him, and telling him how a great rough man like himscared 'poor little me.' Chet's tan bleaches out a mite by the end ofwinter, but she kept his face exactly the shade of that new mahoganysideboard I got, and she told him several times that he ought to go seea throat specialist right off about that choking of his.

"And after supper I'm darned if she didn't lure him out onto the porchin the moonlight, and stand there sad looking and helpless, simplyegging him on, mind you, her in one of them little squashy white dressesthat she managed to brush against him—all in the way of cold study,mind you. Say, ain't we the lovely tame rattlesnakes when we want to be!And this big husky lummox of a Chester Timmins—him she'd called amale—what does he do but stand safely at a distance of four feet in thegrand romantic light of the full moon, and tell her vivaciously allabout the new saddle he's having made in Spokane. And even then he notonly chokes but he giggles. They do say a strong man in tears is aterrible sight. But a husky man giggling is worse—take it from one whohas suffered. And all the time I knew his heart was furnishing enoughactual power to run a feed chopper. So did she!

"'The creature is so typical,' she says when the poor cuss had finallystumbled down the front steps. 'He's a real type.' Only she called it'teep,' having studied the French language among other things. 'He is ateep indeed!' she says.

"I had to admit myself that Chester wasn't any self-starter. I saw he'dhave to be cranked by an outsider if he was going to win a place of hisown in the New Dawn. And I kept thinking wily, and the next P.M. whenNettie and I was downtown I got my hunch. You know that music store onFourth Street across from the Boston Cash Emporium. It's kept by C.Wilbur Todd, and out in front in a glass case he had a mechanical banjothat was playing 'The Rosary' with variations when we come by. Westopped a minute to watch the machinery picking the strings and in aflash I says to myself, 'I got it! Eureka, California!' I says, 'it'scome to me!'

"Of course that piece don't sound so awful tender when it's done on abanjo with variations, but I'd heard it done right and swell one timeand so I says, 'There's the song of songs to bring foolish males andfemales to their just mating sense.'"

The speaker paused to drain her cup and to fashion another cigarette,her eyes dreaming upon far vistas.

"Ain't it fierce what music does to persons," she resumed. "Right off Iremembered the first time I'd heard that piece—in New York City fouryears ago, in a restaurant after the theatre one night, where I'd gonewith Mrs. W.B. Hemingway and her husband. A grand, gay place it was,with an orchestra. I picked at some untimely food and sipped ahighball—they wouldn't let a lady smoke there—and what interested mewas the folks that come in. Folks always do interest me somethingamazing. Strange ones like that, I mean, where you set and try tofigure out all about 'em, what kind of homes they got, and how they actwhen they ain't in a swell restaurant, and everything. Pretty soon comesa couple to the table next us and, say, they was just plain Mr. and Mrs.Mad. Both of 'em stall-fed. He was a large, shiny lad, with pink jowlsbarbered to death and wicked looking, like a well-known clubman orvillain. The lady was spectacular and cynical, with a cold, thin noseand eyes like a couple of glass marbles. Her hair was several shades offa legal yellow and she was dressed! She would have made handsome loot,believe me—aigrette, bracelets, rings, dog collar, gold-mesh bag,vanity case—Oh, you could see at a glance that she was one of themBroadway social favourites you read about. And both grouchy, like Isaid. He scowled till you knew he'd just love to beat a crippledstep-child to death, and she—well, her work wasn't so coarse; she kepther mad down better. She set there as nice and sweet as a pet scorpion.

"'A scrap,' I says to myself, 'and they've only half finished. She'sthreatened to quit and he, the cowardly dog, has dared her to.' Plainenough. The waiter knew it soon as I did when he come to take theirorder. Wouldn't speak to each other. Talked through him; fought it outto something different for each one. Couldn't even agree on the samekind of co*cktail. Both slamming the waiter—before they fought the orderto a finish each had wanted to call the head waiter, only the other onestopped it.

"So I rubbered awhile, trying to figure out why such folks want tofinish up their fights in a restaurant, and then I forgot 'em, lookingat some other persons that come in. Then the orchestra started this songand I seen a lady was getting up in front to sing it. I admit the piecegot me. It got me good. Really, ain't it the gooey mess of heart-throbswhen you come right down to it? This lady singer was a good-lookingsad-faced contralto in a low-cut black dress—and how she did get thetears out of them low notes! Oh, I quit looking at people while herchest was oozing out that music. And it got others, too. I noticed lotsof 'em had stopped eating when I looked round, and there was so muchclapping she had to get up and do it all over again. And what you think?In the middle of the second time I look over to these fighters, anddarned if they ain't holding hands across the table; and more, she's gota kind of pitiful, crying smile on and he's crying right out—cryinginto his cold asparagus, plain as day.

"What more would you want to know about the powers of this here piece ofmusic? They both spoke like human beings to the scared waiter when hecome back, and the lad left a five-spot on the tray when he paid hischeck. Some song, yes?

"And all this flashed back on me when Nettie and I stood there watchingthis cute little banjo. So I says to myself, 'Here, my morbid vestal,is where I put you sane; here's where I hurl an asphyxiating bomb intothe trenches of the New Dawn.' Out loud I only says, 'Let's go in andsee if Wilbur has got some new records.'

"'Wilbur?' says she, and we went in. Nettie had not met Wilbur.

"I may as well tell you here and now that C. Wilbur Todd is a shrimp.Shrimp I have said and shrimp I always will say. He talks real brightlyin his way—he will speak words like an actor or something—but forbrains! Say, he always reminds me of the dumb friend of the greatdetective in the magazine stories, the one that goes along to the sceneof the crime to ask silly questions and make fool guesses about theguilty one, and never even suspects who done the murder, till thedetective tells on the last page when they're all together in thelibrary.

"Sure, that's Wilbur. It would be an ideal position for him. Instead ofwhich he runs this here music store, sells these jitney pianos andphonographs and truck like that. And serious! Honestly, if you seen himcoming down the street you'd say, 'There comes one of these heremusicians.' Wears long hair and a low collar and a flowing necktie andtalks about his technique. Yes, sir, about the technique of working amachinery piano. Gives free recitals in the store every second Saturdayafternoon, and to see him set down and pump with his feet, and pushlevers and pull handles, weaving himself back and forth, tossing hislong, silken locks back and looking dreamily off into the distance,you'd think he was a Paderewski. As a matter of fact, I've seenPaderewski play and he don't make a tenth of the fuss Wilbur does. Andafter this recital I was at one Saturday he comes up to some of usladies, mopping his pale brow, and he says, 'It does take it out of one!I'm always a nervous wreck after these little affairs of mine.' Wouldthat get you, or would it not?

"So we go in the store and Wilbur looks up from a table he's setting atin the back end.

"'You find me studying some new manuscripts,' he says, pushing back theraven locks from his brow. Say, it was a weary gesture he done itwith—sort of languid and world-weary. And what you reckon he meant bystudying manuscripts? Why, he had one of these rolls of paper with themusic punched into it in holes, and he was studying that line that tellsyou when to play hard or soft and all like that. Honest, that was it!

"'I always study these manuscripts of the masters conscientiously beforeI play them,' says he.

"Such is Wilbur. Such he will ever be. So I introduced him to Nettie andasked if he had this here song on a phonograph record. He had. He had iton two records. 'One by a barytone gentleman, and one by amezzo-soprano,' says Wilbur. I set myself back for both. He also had itwith variations on one of these punched rolls. He played that for us. Ittook him three minutes to get set right at the piano and to dust hisfingers with a white silk handkerchief which he wore up his sleeve. Andhe played with great expression and agony and bending exercises, everand anon tossing back his rebellious locks and fixing us with a look ofpained ecstasy. Of course it sounded better than the banjo, but you gotto have the voice with that song if you're meaning to do any crookedwork. Nettie was much taken with it even so, and Wilbur played itanother way. What he said was that it was another school ofinterpretation. It seemed to have its points with him, though hefavoured the first school, he said, because of a certain almost ruggedfidelity. He said the other school was marked by a tendency to idealism,and he pulled some of the handles to show how it was done. I'm merelytelling you how Wilbur talked.

"Nettie listened very serious. There was a new look in her eyes. 'Thatsong has got to her even on a machinery piano,' I says, 'but wait tillwe get the voice, with she and Chester out in the mischievousmoonlight.' Wasn't I the wily old hound! Nettie sort of lingered to hearWilbur, who was going good by this time. 'One must be the soul behindthe wood and wire,' he says; 'one rather feels just that, or one remainsmerely a brutal mechanic.'

"'I understand,' says Nettie. 'How you must have studied!'

"'Oh, studied!' says Wilbur, and tossed his mane back and laughed in alofty and suffering manner. Studied! He'd gone one year to a businesscollege in Seattle after he got out of high school!

"'I understand,' says Nettie, looking all reverent and buffaloed.

"'It is the price one must pay for technique,' says Wilbur. 'And to-dayyou found me in the mood. I am not always in the mood.'

"'I understand,' says Nettie.

"I'm just giving you an idea, understand. Then Wilbur says, 'I willbring these records up this evening if I may. The mezzo-soprano requiresa radically different adjustment from the barytone.' 'My God!' thinks I,'has he got technique on the phonograph, too!' But I says he must comeby all means, thinking he could tend the machine while Nettie andChester is out on the porch getting wise to each other.

"'There's another teep for you,' I says to Nettie when we got out of theplace. 'He certainly is marked by tendencies,' I says. I meant it for anasty slam at Wilbur's painful deficiencies as a human being, but shetook it as serious as Wilbur took himself—which is some!

"'Ah, yes, the artist teep,' says she,'the most complex, the mostbaffling of all.'

"That was a kind of a sickish jolt to me—the idea that something as lowin the animal kingdom as Wilbur could baffle anyone—but I thinks,'Shucks! Wait till he lines up alongside of a regular human man likeChet Timmins!'

"I had Chet up to supper again. He still choked on words of onesyllable if Nettie so much as glanced at him, and turned all sorts ofpainful colours like a cheap rug. But I keep thinking the piece will fixthat all right.

"At eight o'clock Wilbur sifted in with his records and something elseflat and thin, done up in paper that I didn't notice much at the time.My dear heart, how serious he was! As serious as—well, I chanced to bepresent at the house of mourning when the barber come to shave old JudgeArmstead after he'd passed away—you know what I mean—kind of like himWilbur was, talking subdued and cat-footing round very solemn andprofessional. I thought he'd never get that machine going. He cleanedit, and he oiled it, and he had great trouble picking out the rightfibre needle, holding six or eight of 'em up to the light, doing secretthings to the machine's inwards, looking at us sharp as if we oughtn'tto be talking even then, and when she did move off I'm darned if hedidn't hang in a strained manner over that box, like he was the one thatwas doing it all and it wouldn't get the notes right if he took hisattention off.

"It was a first-class record, I'll say that. It was the malebarytone—one of them pleading voices that get all into you. It wasn'thalf over before I seen Nettie was strongly moved, as they say, only shewas staring at Wilbur, who by now was leading the orchestra with onegraceful arm and looking absorbed and sodden, like he done itunconsciously. Chester just set there with his mouth open, likesomething you see at one of these here aquariums.

"We moved round some when it was over, while Wilbur was picking out justthe right needle for the other record, and so I managed to cut that lumpof a Chester out of the bunch and hold him on the porch till I gotNettie out, too. Then I said 'Sh-h-h!' so they wouldn't move when Wilburlet the mezzo-soprano start. And they had to stay out there in thegolden moonlight with love's young dream and everything. The lady singerwas good, too. No use in talking, that song must have done a lot ofheart work right among our very best families. It had me going again soI plumb forgot my couple outside. I even forgot Wilbur, standing by thebox showing the lady how to sing.

"It come to the last—you know how it ends—'To kiss the cross,sweetheart, to kiss the cross!' There was a rich and silent moment and Isays, 'If that Chet Timmins hasn't shown himself to be a regular maleteep by this time—' And here come Chet's voice, choking as usual, 'Yes,paw switched to Durhams and Herefords over ten years ago—you seeHolsteins was too light; they don't carry the meat—' Honest! I'mtelling you what I heard. And yet when they come in I could see thatChester had had tears in his eyes from that song, so still I didn't givein, especially as Nettie herself looked very exalted, like she wasn't atthat minute giving two whoops in the bad place for the New Dawn.

"CHESTER JUST SET THERE WITH HIS MOUTH OPEN, LIKESOMETHING YOU SEE AT ONE OF THESE HERE AQUARIUMS";

"Nettie made for Wilbur, who was pushing back his hair with a weak butgraceful sweep of the arm—it had got down before his face like aportière—and I took Chet into a corner and tried to get some of thejust wrath of God into his heart; but, my lands! You'd have said hedidn't know there was such a thing as a girl in the whole KulancheValley. He didn't seem to hear me. He talked other matters.

"'Paw thinks,' he says, 'that he might manage to take them hundred andfifty bull calves off your hands.' 'Oh, indeed!' I says. 'And does hethink of buying 'em—as is often done in the cattle business —or is hemerely aiming to do me a favour?' I was that mad at the poor worm, buthe never knew. 'Why, now, paw says "You tell Maw Pettengill I might bewilling to take 'em off her hands at fifty dollars a head,"' he says. 'Ishould think he might be,' I says, 'but they ain't bothering my handsthe least little mite. I like to have 'em on my hands at anything lessthan sixty a head,' I says. 'Your pa,' I went on, 'is the man thatstarted this here safety-first cry. Others may claim the honour, but itbelongs solely to him.' 'He never said anything about that,' says poorChester. 'He just said you was going to be short of range this summer.''Be that all too true, as it may be,' I says, 'but I still got mybusiness faculties—' And I was going on some more, but just then I seenNettie and Wilbur was awful thick over something he'd unwrapped from theother package he'd brought. It was neither more nor less than a bigphoto of C. Wilbur Todd. Yes, sir, he'd brought her one.

"'I think the artist has caught a bit of the real just there, if youknow what I mean,' says Wilbur, laying a pale thumb across the upperpart of the horrible thing.

"'I understand,' says Nettie, 'the real you was expressing itself.'

"'Perhaps,' concedes Wilbur kind of nobly. 'I dare say he caught me inone of my rarer moods. You don't think it too idealized?'

"'Don't jest,' says she, very pretty and severe. And they both gazedspellbound.

"'Chester,' I says in low but venomous tones, 'you been hanging roundthat girl worse than Grant hung round Richmond, but you got to rememberthat Grant was more than a hanger. He made moves, Chester, moves! Do youget me?'

"'About them calves,' says Chester, 'pa told me it's his honestopinion—'

"Well, that was enough for once. I busted up that party sudden and firm.

"'It has meant much to me,' says Wilbur at parting.

"'I understand,' says Nettie.

"'When you come up to the ranch, Miss Nettie,' says Chester, 'you wantto ride over to the Lazy Eight, and see that there tame coyote I got. Itlicks your hand like a dog.'

"But what could I do, more than what I had done? Nettie was looking atthe photograph when I shut the door on 'em. 'The soul behind the woodand wire,' she murmurs. I looked closer then and what do you reckon itwas? Just as true as I set here, it was Wilbur, leaning forward allnegligent and patronizing on a twelve-hundred-dollar grand piano, hishair well forward and his eyes masterful, like that there nobleinstrument was his bond slave. But wait! And underneath he'd writ a barof music with notes running up and down, and signed his name to it—notplain, mind you, though he can write a good business hand if he wantsto, but all scrawly like some one important, so you couldn't tell if itwas meant for Dutch or English. Could you beat that for nerve—in a day,in a million years?

"'What's Wilbur writing that kind of music for?' I asks in a cold voice.'He don't know that kind. What he had ought to of written is a bunch ofthem hollow slats and squares like they punch in the only kind of musiche plays,' I says.

"'Hush!' says Nettie. 'It's that last divine phrase, "To kiss thecross!"'

"I choked up myself then. And I went to bed and thought. And this iswhat I thought: When you think you got the winning hand, keep onraising. To call is to admit you got no faith in your judgment. Betterlay down than call. So I resolve not to say another word to the girlabout Chester, but simply to press the song in on her. Already it hadmade her act like a human person. Of course I didn't worry none aboutWilbur. The wisdom of the ages couldn't have done that. But I seen I hadgot to have a real first-class human voice in that song, like the one Ihad heard in New York City. They'll just have to clench, I think, whenthey hear a good A-number-one voice in it.

"Next day I look in on Wilbur and say, 'What about this concert andmusical entertainment the North Side set is talking about giving for thestarving Belgians?'

"'The plans are maturing,' he says, 'but I'm getting up a Brahmsconcerto that I have promised to play—you know how terrificallydifficult Brahms is—so the date hasn't been set yet.'

"'Well, set it and let's get to work,' I says. 'There'll be you, and theNorth Side Ladies' String Quartet, and Ed Bughalter with a bass solo,and Mrs. Dr. Percy Hailey Martingale with the "Jewel Song" from Faust,and I been thinking,' I says, 'that we had ought to get a goodprofessional lady concert singer down from Spokane.'

"'I'm afraid the expenses would go over our receipts,' says Wilbur, andI can see him figuring that this concert will cost the Belgians moneyinstead of helping 'em; so right off I says, 'If you can get agood-looking, sad-faced contralto, with a low-cut black dress, that cansing "The Rosary" like it had ought to be sung, why, you can touch mefor that part of the evening's entertainment.'

"Wilbur says I'm too good, not suspicioning I'm just being wily, so hesays he'll write up and fix it. And a couple days later he says the ladyprofessional is engaged, and it'll cost me fifty, and he shows me herpicture and the dress is all right, and she had a sad, powerful face,and the date is set and everything.

"Meantime, I keep them two records het up for the benefit of myreluctant couple: daytime for Nettie —she standing dreamy-eyed while itwas doing, showing she was coming more and more human, understand—andevenings for both of 'em, when Chester Timmins would call. And Chethimself about the third night begins to get a new look in his eyes, kindof absent and desperate, so I thinks this here lady professional willsimply goad him to a frenzy. Oh, we had some sad musical week beforethat concert! That was when this crazy Chink of mine got took by thesong. He don't know yet what it means, but it took him all right; he gotregular besotted with it, keeping the kitchen door open all the time, sohe wouldn't miss a single turn. It took his mind off his work, too. Talkabout the Yellow Peril! He got so locoed with that song one day, whatdoes he do but peel and cook up twelve dollars' worth of the PiedmontQueen dahlia bulbs I'd ordered for the front yard. Sure! Served 'em withcream sauce, and we et 'em, thinking they was some kind of a Chinesevegetable.

"But I was saying about this new look in Chester's eyes, kind of far-offand criminal, when that song was playing. And then something give me apause, as they say. Chet showed up one evening with his nails allmanicured; yes, sir, polished till you needed smoked glasses to look at'em. I knew all right where he'd been. I may as well tell you that HenryLehman was giving Red Gap a flash of form with his new barbershop—tiled floor, plate-glass front, exposed plumbing, and a manicuregirl from Seattle; yes, sir, just like in the great wicked cities. Ithad already turned some of our very best homes into domestic hells, andno wonder! Decent, God-fearing men, who'd led regular lives and hadwhiskers and grown children, setting down to a little spindle-leggedtable with this creature, dipping their clumsy old hands into a pinksaucedish of suds and then going brazenly back to their innocentfamilies with their nails glittering like piano keys. Oh, that youngdame was bound to be a social pet among the ladies of the town, yes—no?She was pretty and neat figured, with very careful hair, though itscolour had been tampered with unsuccessfully, and she wore little,blue-striped shirtwaists that fitted very close—you know —with lowcollars. It was said that she was a good conversationalist and wouldtalk in low, eager tones to them whose fingers she tooled.

"Still, I didn't think anything of Chester resorting to that sanitaryden of vice. All I think is that he's trying to pretty himself up forNettie and maybe show her he can be a man-about-town, like them she hasknown in Spokane and in Yonkers, New York, at the select home of Mrs.W.B. Hemingway and her husband. How little we think when we had oughtto be thinking our darndest! Me? I just went on playing them tworecords, the male barytone and the lady mezzo, and trying to curse thatChinaman into keeping the kitchen door shut on his cooking, with Wilburdropping in now and then so him and Nettie could look at his photo,which was propped up against a book on the centre table—one of themlarge three-dollar books that you get stuck with by an agent and neverread—and Nettie dropping into his store now and then to hear himpractise over difficult bits from his piece that he was going to renderat the musical entertainment for the Belgians, with him asking her ifshe thought he shaded the staccato passage a mite too heavy, or someguff like that.

"So here come the concert, with every seat sold and the hall drapedpretty with flags and cut flowers. Some of the boys was down from theranch, and you bet I made 'em all come across for tickets, and oldSafety First—Chet's father—I stuck him for a dollar one, though he hadan evil look in his eyes. That's how the boys got so crazy about thishere song. They brought that record back with 'em. And Buck Devine, thatI met on the street that very day of the concert, he give me anotherkind of a little jolt. He'd been gossiping round town, the vicious waymen do, and he says to me:

"'That Chester lad is taking awful chances for a man that needs his twohands at his work. Of course if he was a foot-racer or something likethat, where he didn't need hands—' 'What's all this?' I asks. 'Why,'says Buck, 'he's had his nails rasped down to the quick till he almostscreams if they touch anything, and he goes back for more every singleday. It's a wonder they ain't mortified on him already; and say, itcosts him six bits a throw and, of course, he don't take no change froma dollar—he leaves the extra two bits for a tip. Gee! A dollar a dayfor keeping your nails tuned up—and I ain't sure he don't have 'em donetwice on Sundays. Mine ain't never had a file teched to 'em yet,' hesays. 'I see that,' I says. 'If any foul-minded person ever accuses youof it, you got abundant proofs of your innocence right there with you.As for Chester,' I says, 'he has an object.' 'He has,' says Buck. 'Notwhat you think,' I says. 'Very different from that. It's true,' Iconcedes, 'that he ought to take that money and go to some goodosteopath and have his head treated, but he's all right at that. Don'tyou set up nights worrying about it.' And I sent Buck slinking offshamefaced but unconvinced, I could see. But I wasn't a bit scared.

"Chet et supper with us the night of the concert and took Nettie and Ito the hall, and you bet I wedged them two close in next each other whenwe got to our seats. This was my star play. If they didn't fall for eachother now—Shucks! They had to. And I noticed they was more confidentialalready, with Nettie looking at him sometimes almost respectfully.

"Well, the concert went fine, with the hired lady professional singergiving us some operatic gems in various foreign languages in the firstpart, and Ed Bughalter singing "A King of the Desert Am I, Ha, Ha!" verybass—Ed always sounds to me like moving heavy furniture round thatain't got any casters under it—and Mrs. Dr. Percy Hailey Martingalewith the "Jewel Song" from Faust, that she learned in a musicalconservatory at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and "Coming Through the Rye"for an encore—holding the music rolled up in her hands, though the Lordknows she knew every word and note of it by heart—and the North SideLadies' String Quartet, and Wilbur Todd, of course, putting on more airsthan as if he was the only son of old man Piano himself, while heshifted the gears and pumped, and Nettie whispering that he always slepttwo hours before performing in public and took no nourishment but onecup of warm milk—just a bundle of nerves that way—and she sent him upa bunch of lilies tied with lavender ribbon while he was bowing andscraping, but I didn't pay no attention to that, for now it was coming.

"Yes, sir, the last thing was this here lady professional, getting upstern and kind of sweetish sad in her low-cut black dress to sing thesong of songs. I was awful excited for a party of my age, and I see theywas, too. Nettie nudged Chet and whispered, 'Don't you just love it?'And Chet actually says, 'I love it,' so no wonder I felt sure, when upto that time he'd hardly been able to say a word except about his pabeing willing to take them calves for almost nothing. Then I seen hiseyes glaze and point off across the hall, and darned if there wasn'tthis manicure party in a cheek little hat and tailored gown, settingwith Mrs. Henry Lehman and her husband. But still I felt all right,because him and Nettie was nudging each other intimately again whenProfessor Gluckstein started in on the accompaniment—I bet Wilburthinks the prof is awful old-fashioned, playing with his fingers thatway; I know they don't speak on the street.

"So this lady just floated into that piece with all the heart stopspulled out, and after one line I didn't begrudge her a cent of my fifty.I just set there and thrilled. I could feel Nettie and Chet thrilling,too, and I says, 'There's nothing to it—not from now on.'

"The applause didn't bust loose till almost a minute after she'd kissedthe cross in that rich brown voice of hers, and even then my coupledidn't join in. Nettie set still, all frozen and star-eyed, and Chesterwas choking and sniffling awful emotionally. 'I've sure nailed the youngfools,' I thinks. And, of course, this lady had to sing it again, andnot half through was she when, sure enough, I glanced down sideways andChet's right hand and her left hand is squirming together till they looklike a bunch of eels. 'All over but the rice,' I says, and at that Ifelt so good and thrilled! I was thinking back to my own time when I wasjust husband-high, though that wasn't so little, Lysander John being ascant six foot three—and our wedding tour to the Centennial and thetrip to Niagara Falls—just soaking in old memories that bless and bindthat this lady singer was calling up—well, you could have had anythingfrom me right then when she kissed that cross a second time, justpouring her torn heart out. 'Worth every cent of that fifty,' I says.

"Then everybody was standing up and moving out —wiping their eyes a lotof 'em was—so I push on ahead quick, aiming to be more wily than everand leave my couple alone. They don't miss me, either. When I look back,darned if they ain't kind of shaking hands right there in the hall.'Quick work!' I says. 'You got to hand it to that song.' Even then Inoticed Nettie was looking back to where Wilbur was tripping down fromthe platform, and Chester had his eyes glazed over on this manicureparty. Still, they was gripping each other's hands right there beforefolks, and I think they're just a bit embarrassed. My old heart wentright on echoing that song as I pushed forward—not looking back again,I was that certain.

"And to show you the mushy state I was in, here is old Safety Firsthimself leering at me down by the door, with a clean shave and his otherclothes on, and he says all about how it was a grand evening's musicalentertainment and how much will the Belgians get in cold cash, anyway,and how about them hundred and fifty head of bull calves that he waswilling to take off my hands, and me, all mushed up by that song as Iam telling you, saying to him in a hearty manner, 'They're yours, Dave!Take 'em at your own price, old friend.' Honest, I said it just thatway, so you can see. 'Oh, I'll be stuck on 'em at fifty a head,' saysDave, 'but I knew you'd listen to reason, we being such old neighbours.''I ain't heard reason since that last song,' I says. I'm listening to myheart, and it's a grand pity yours never learned to talk.' 'Fifty ahead,' says the old robber.

"So, thus throwing away at least fifteen hundred dollars like it was amere bagatelle or something, I walk out into the romantic night and beatit for home, wanting to be in before my happy couple reached there, sothey'd feel free to linger over their parting. My, but I did feelresponsible and dangerous, directing human destinies so brashly the wayI had."

There was a pause, eloquent with unworded emotions.

Then "Human destinies, hell!" the lady at length intoned.

Hereupon I amazingly saw that she believed her tale to be done. Ipermitted the silence to go a minute, perhaps, while she fingered thecigarette paper and loose tobacco.

"And of course, then," I hinted, as the twin jets of smoke were ratherviciously expelled.

"I should say so—'of course, then'—you got it. But I didn't get it fornear an hour yet. I set up to my bedroom window in the dark, waitingexcitedly, and pretty soon they slowly floated up to the front gate,talking in hushed tones and gurgles. 'Male and female created He them,'I says, flushed with triumph. The moon wasn't up yet, but you hadn't anytrouble making out they was such. He was acting outrageously like a maleand she was suffering it with the splendid courage which has longdistinguished our helpless sex. And there I set, warming my old heart init and expanding like one of them little squeezed-up sponges you see inthe drug-store window which swells up so astonishing when you put it inwater. I wasn't impatient for them to quit, oh, no! They seemed toclench and unclench and clench again, as if they had all the time in theworld—with me doing nothing but applaud silently.

"After spending about twenty years out there they loitered softly up thewalk and round to the side door where I'd left the light burning, and Islipped over to the side window, which was also open, and looked down onthe dim fond pair, and she finally opened the door softly and the lightshone out."

Again Ma Pettengill paused, her elbows on the arms of her chair, hershoulders forward, her gray old head low between them. She drew a longbreath and rumbled fiercely:

"And the mushy fool me, forcing that herd of calves on old Dave at thatscandalous price—after all, that's what really gaffed me the worst! Mystars! If I could have seen that degenerate old crook again thatnight—but of course a trade's a trade, and I'd said it. Ain't I the oldsilly!"

"The door opened and the light shone out—"

I gently prompted.

She erected herself in the chair, threw back her shoulders, and her widemouth curved and lifted at the corners with the humour that never longdeserts this woman.

"Yep! That light flooded out its golden rays on the reprehensible personof C. Wilbur Todd," she crisply announced. "And like they say in thestories, little remains to be told.

"I let out a kind of strangled yell, and Wilbur beat it right across mynew lawn, and I beat it downstairs. But that girl was like asleepwalker—not to be talked to, I mean, like you could talk topersons.

"'Aunty,' she says in creepy tones, 'I have brought myself to theultimate surrender. I know the chains are about me, already I feel theshackles, but I glory in them.' She kind of gasped and shivered inhorrible delight. 'I've kissed the cross at last,' she mutters.

"I was so weak I dropped into a chair and I just looked at her. At firstI couldn't speak, then I saw it was no good speaking. She was free,white, and twenty-one. So I never let on. I've had to take a jolt or twoin my time. I've learned how. But finally I did manage to ask how aboutChet Timmins.

"'I wronged dear Chester,' she says. 'I admit it freely. He has a heartof gold and a nature in a thousand. But, of course, there could never beanything between him and a nature like mine; our egos function ondifferent planes,' she says. 'Dear Chester came to see it, too. It'sonly in the last week we've come to understand each other. It was reallythat wonderful song that brought us to our mutual knowledge. It helpedus to understand our mutual depths better than all the ages of eternitycould have achieved.' On she goes with this mutual stuff, till you'dhave thought she was reading a composition or something. 'And dearChester is so radiant in his own new-found happiness,' she says. 'What!'I yells, for this was indeed some jolt.

"'He has come into his own,' she says. 'They have eloped to Spokane,though I promised to observe secrecy until the train had gone. A veryworthy creature I gather from what Chester tells me, a MissMacgillicuddy—'

"'Not the manicure party?' I yells again.

"'I believe she has been a wage-earner,' says Nettie. 'And dear Chesteris so grateful about that song. It was her favourite song, too, and itseemed to bring them together, just as it opened my own soul to Wilbur.He says she sings the song very charmingly herself, and he thought itpreferable that they be wed in Spokane before his father objected. Andoh, aunty, I do see how blind I was to my destiny, and how kind you wereto me in my blindness—you who had led the fuller life as I shall leadit at Wilbur's side.'

"'You beat it to your room,' I orders her, very savage and disorganized.For I had stood about all the jolts in one day that God had meant meto. And so they was married, Chester and his bride attending theceremony and Oscar Teetz' five-piece orchestra playing the—" Shebroke off, with a suddenly blazing glance at the disk, and seized itfrom the table rather purposefully. With a hand firmly at both edges shestared inscrutably at it a long moment.

"I hate to break the darned thing," she said musingly at last. "I guessI'll just lock it up. Maybe some time I'll be feeling the need to hearit again. I know I can still be had by it if all the circ*mstances isright."

Still she stared at the thing curiously.

"Gee! It was hot getting them calves out to-day, and old Safety Firstmoaning about all over the place how he's being stuck with 'em, tillmore than once I come near forgetting I was a lady—and, oh, yes"—shebrightened—"I was going to tell you. After it was all over, Wilbur, thegallant young tone poet, comes gushing up to me and says, 'Now, aunty,always when you are in town you must drop round and break bread withus.' Aunty, mind you, right off the reel. 'Well,' I says, 'if I dropround to break any bread your wife bakes I'll be sure to bring ahammer.' I couldn't help it. He'll make a home for the girl all right,but he does something sinful to my nerves every time he opens his face.And then coming back here, where I looked for God's peace and quiet, andbeing made to hear that darned song every time I turned round!

"I give orders plain enough, but say, it's like a brush fire—you neverknow when you got it stamped out."

From the kitchen came the sound of a dropped armful of stove wood. Hardupon this, the unctuous whining tenor of Jimmie Time:

"You, Jimmie Time!" It is a voice meant for Greek tragedy and a theatreopen to the heavens. I could feel the terror of the aged vassal.

"Yes, ma'am!" The tone crawled abasingly. "I forgot myself."

I was glad, and I dare say he had the wit to be, that he had not to facethe menace of her glare.

III

THE REAL PERUVIAN DOUGHNUTS

The affairs of Arrowhead Ranch are administered by its owner, Mrs.Lysander John Pettengill, through a score or so of hired experts. As atrout-fishing guest of the castle I found the retainers of thisexcellent feudalism interesting enough and generally explicable. Butstanding out among them, both as a spectacle and by reason of hispeculiar activities, is a shrunken little man whom I would hearaddressed as Jimmie Time. He alone piqued as well as interested. Therewas a tang to all the surmises he prompted in me.

I have said he is a man; but wait! The years have had him, have scouredand rasped and withered him; yet his face is curiously but the face of aboy, his eyes but the fresh, inquiring, hurt eyes of a boy who has beenmisused for years threescore. Time has basely done all but age him. Somuch for the wastrel as Nature has left him. But Art has furthered thepiquant values of him as a spectacle.

In dress, speech, and demeanour Jimmie seems to be of the West,Western—of the old, bad West of informal vendetta, when a man'sincrease of years might lie squarely on his quickness in the "draw";when he went abundantly armed by day and slept lightly atnight—trigger fingers instinctively crooked. Of course such days havevery definitely passed; wherefore the engaging puzzle of certainsurvivals in Jimmie Time—for I found him still a two-gun man. He worethem rather consciously sagging from his lean hips—almost pompously, itseemed. Nor did he appear properly unconscious of his remainingattire—of the broad-brimmed hat, its band of rattlesnake skin; of thefringed buckskin shirt, opening gallantly across his pinched throat; ofhis corduroy trousers, fitting bedraggled; of his beautiful beadedmoccasins.

He was perfect in detail—and yet he at once struck me as being tooacutely aware of himself. Could this suspicion ensue, I wondered, fromthe circ*mstance that the light duties he discharged in and about theArrowhead Ranch house were of a semidomestic character; from a markedincongruity in the sight of him, full panoplied for homicide, bearingarmfuls of wood to the house; or, with his wicked hat pulled desperatelyover a scowling brow, and still with his flaunt of weapons, engaging asinkful of soiled dishes in the kitchen under the eyes of a mere unarmedChinaman who sat by and smoked an easy cigarette at him, scornful offirearms?

There were times, to be sure, when Jimmie's behaviour was in nice accordwith his dreadful appearance—as when I chanced to observe him late thesecond afternoon of my arrival. Solitary in front of the bunk house, herapidly drew and snapped his side arms at an imaginary foe some pacesin front of him. They would be simultaneously withdrawn from theirholsters, fired from the hip and replaced, the performer snarlingviciously the while. The weapons were unloaded, but I inferred that thefoe crumpled each time.

Then the old man varied the drama, vastly increasing the advantage ofthe foe and the peril of his own emergency by turning a careless back onthe scene. The carelessness was only seeming. Swiftly he wheeled, andeven as he did so twin volleys came from the hip. It was spirited—theweapons seemed to smoke; the smile of the marksman was evil andmasterly. Beyond all question the foe had crumpled again, despite histremendous advantage of approach.

I drew gently near before the arms were again holstered and permittedthe full exposure of my admiration for this readiness of retort underdifficulties. The puissant one looked up at me with suspicion, hostileyet embarrassed. I stood admiring ingenuously, stubborn in myfascination. Slowly I won him. The coldness in his bright little eyeswarmed to awkward but friendly apology.

"A gun fighter lets hisself git stiff," he winningly began; "then, firstthing he knows, some fine day—crack! Like that! All his own fault, too,'cause he ain't kep' in trim." He jauntily twirled one of the heavyrevolvers on a forefinger. "Not me, though, pard! Keep m'self up andcomin', you bet! Ketch me not ready to fan the old forty-four! I guessnot! Some has thought they could. Oh, yes; plenty has thought theycould. Crack! Like that!" He wheeled, this time fatally intercepting thefoe as he treacherously crept round a corner of the bunk house. "Buryin'ground for you, mister! That's all—bury-in' ground!"

The desperado replaced one of the weapons and patted the other withgrisly affection. In the excess of my admiration I made bold to reachfor it. He relinquished it to me with a mother's yearning. And all toolegible in the polished butt of the thing were notches! Nine sinisternotches I counted—not fresh notches, but emphatic, eloquent, chilling.I thrust the bloody record back on its gladdened owner.

"Never think it to look at me?" said he as our eyes hung above that grimbit of bookkeeping.

"Never!" I warmly admitted.

"Me—I always been one of them quiet, mild-mannered ones that youwouldn't think butter would melt in their mouth—jest up to a certainpoint. Lots of 'em fooled that way about me—jest up to a certain point,mind you—then, crack! Buryin' ground—that's all! Never go huntin'trouble—understand? But when it's put on me—say!"

He lovingly replaced the weapon—with its mortuary statistics—doffedthe broad-brimmed hat with its snake-skin garniture, and placed aforefinger athwart an area of his shining scalp which is said by acertain pseudoscience to shield several of man's more spiritualattributes. The finger traced an ancient but still evil looking scar.

"One creased me there," he confessed—"a depity marshal—that time theyhad a reward out for me, dead or alive."

I was for details.

"What did you do?"

Jimmie Time stayed laconic.

"Left him there—that's all!"

It was arid, yet somehow informing. It conveyed to me that a marshal hadbeen cleverly put to needing a new deputy.

"Burying ground?" I guessed.

"That's all!" He laughed venomously—a short, dry, restrained laugh."They give me a nickname," said he. "They called me Little Sure Shot. Nowonder they did! Ho! I should think they would of called me somethinglike that." He lifted his voice. "Hey! Boogles!"

I had been conscious of a stooping figure in the adjacent vegetablegarden. It now became erect, a figure of no distinction—short, rounded,decked in carelessly worn garments of no elegance. It slouchedinquiringly toward us between rows of sprouted corn. Then I saw that thehead surmounting it was a noble head. It was uncovered, burnished to ahalf circle of grayish fringe; but it was shaped in the grand manner andwell borne, and the full face of it was beautified by features of a veryRoman perfection. It was the face of a judge of the Supreme Court orthe face of an ideal senator. His large grave eyes bathed us in afriendly regard; his full lips of an orator parted with leisurely andpromising unction. I awaited courtly phrases, richly rounded periods.

"A regular hell-cat—what he is!"

Thus vocalized the able lips. Jimmie Time glowed modestly.

"Show him how I can shoot," said he.

The amazing Boogies waddled—yet with dignity—to a point ten pacesdistant, drew a coin from the pocket of his dingy overalls, and spun itto the blue of heaven. Ere it fell the deadly weapon bore swiftly on itand snapped.

"Crack!" said the marksman grimly.

His assistant recovered the coin, scrutinized it closely, rubbed a fatthumb over its supposedly dented surface, and again spun it. Thedesperado had turned his back. He drew as he wheeled, and again I wasgiven to understand that his aim had been faultless.

"Good Little Sure Shot!" declaimed Boogies fulsomely.

"Hold it in your hand oncet," directed Little Sure Shot. The intrepidassistant gallantly extended the half dollar at arm's length betweenthumb and finger and averted his statesman's face with practicedapprehension. "Crack!" said Little Sure Shot, and the coin seemed to bestruck from the unscathed hand. "Only nicked the aidge of it," said he,genially deprecating. "I don't like to take no chancet with the lad'smitt."

It had indeed been a pretty display of sharpshooting —and noiseless.

"Had me nervous, you bet, first time he tried that," called Boogles."Didn't know his work then. Thought sure he'd wing me."

Jimmie Time loftily ejected imaginary shells from his trusty firearm andseemed to expel smoke from its delicate interior. Boogies waddled hisapproach.

"Any time they back Little Sure Shot up against the wall they want toduck," said he warmly. "He has 'em hard to find in about a minute. Tellhim about that fresh depity marshal, Jimmie."

"I already did," said Jimmie.

"Ain't he the hell-cat?" demanded Boogles, mopping a brow that DanielWebster would have observed with instant and perhaps envious respect.

"I been a holy terror in my time, all right, all right!" admitted thehero. "Never think it to look at me though. One o' the deceivin' kindtill I'm put upon; then—good-night!"

"Jest like that!" murmured Boogles.

"Buryin' ground—that's all." The lips of the bad man shut grimly onthis.

"Say," demanded Boogles, "on the level, ain't he the real Peruviandoughnuts? Don't he jest make 'em all hunt their—" The tribute wasunfinished.

"You ol' Jim! You ol' Jim Time!" Shrilly this came from Lew Wee, Chinesecook of the Arrowhead framed in the kitchen doorway of the ranch house.He brandished a scornful and commanding dish towel at the bad man, whoinstantly and almost cravenly cowered under the distant assault. Thegarment of his old bad past fell from him, leaving him as one exposed inthe market-place to the scornful towels of Chinamen. "You run, ol' JimTime! How you think catch 'um din' not have wood?"

"Now I was jest goin' to," mumbled Jimmie Time; and he amazingly slunkfrom the scene of his late triumphs toward the open front of awoodhouse.

His insulter turned back to the kitchen with a final affronting flourishof the towel. The whisper of Boogles came hoarsely to me: "Some of thesedays Little Sure Shot'll put a dose o' cold lead through that Chink'sheart."

"Is he really dangerous?" I demanded.

"Dangerous!" Boogles choked warmly on this. "Let me tell you, that oldboy is the real Peruvian doughnuts, and no mistake! Some day there won'tbe so many Chinks round this dump. No, sir-ee! That little cutthroat'llhave another notch in his gun."

The situation did indeed seem to brim with the cheerfullest promise; yetsomething told me that Little Sure Shot was too good, too perfect.Something warned me that he suffered delusions of grandeur—that hefell, in fact, somewhat short of being the real doughnuts, either of aPeruvian or any other valued sort.

Nor had many hours passed ere it befell emphatically even so. There hadbeen the evening meal, followed by an hour or so of the always pleasingand often instructive talk of my hostess, Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill,who has largely known life for sixty years and found it entertaining andgood. And we had parted at an early nine, both tired from the work andthe play that had respectively engaged us the day long.

My candle had just been extinguished when three closely fired shotscracked the vast stillness of the night. Ensued vocal explosions of acurdling shrillness from the back of the house. One instantly knew themto be indignant and Chinese. Caucasian ears gathered this much. I lookedfrom an open window as the impassioned cries came nearer. The lucentmoon of the mountains flooded that side of the house, and starkly intoits light from round the nearest corner struggled Lew Wee, the Chinaman.He shone refulgent, being yet in the white or full-dress uniform of hiscalling.

In one hand he held the best gun of Jimmie Time; in the other—thereseemed to be a well-gripped connection with the slack of a buckskinshirt—writhed the alleged real doughnuts of a possibly Peruviancharacter. The captor looked aloft and remained vocal, waving the gun,waving Jimmie Time, playing them together as cymbals, never looseningthem. It was fine. It filled the eye and appeased the deepest longingsof the ear.

Then from a neighbouring window projected the heroic head and shouldersof my hostess, and there boomed into the already vivacious libretto apassionate barytone, or thereabout, of sterling timbre.

"What in the name of—"

I leave it there. To do so is not only kind but necessary. The mostindulgent censor that ever guarded the columns of a print intended foryoung and old about the evening lamp would swiftly delete from thisinvocation, if not the name of Deity itself, at least the greater numberof the attributes with which she endowed it. A few were conventionalenough, but they served only to accentuate others that were too hastilyselected in the heat of this crisis. Enough to say that the ladyoverbore by sheer mass of tone production the strident soprano of LewWee, controlling it at length to a lucid disclosure of his grievance.

From the doorway of his kitchen, inoffensively proffering a finalcigarette to the radiant night, he had been the target of three shotswith intent to kill. He submitted the weapon. He submitted the writhingassassin.

"I catch 'um!" he said effectively, and rested his case.

"Now—I aimed over his head." It was Jimmie Time alias Little Sure Shot,and he whimpered the words. "I jest went to play a sell on him."

The voice of the judge boomed wrathfully on this:

"You darned pestering mischief, you! Ain't I forbid you time and againever to load them guns? Where'd you get the ca'tridges?"

"Now—I found 'em," pleaded the bad man. "I did so; I found 'em."

"Cooned 'em, you mean!" thundered the judge. "You cooned 'em from Buckor Sandy. Don't tell me, you young reprobate!"

"He all like bad man," submitted the prosecution. "I tell 'um catchstlovewood; he tell 'um me: 'You go to haitch!' I tell 'um: 'You ownselfgo to haitch! He say: 'I flan you my gun plitty soon!' He do."

"I aimed over the coward's head," protested the defendant.

"Can happen!" sanely objected the prosecution.

"Ain't I told you what I'd do if you loaded them guns?" roared thejudge. "Gentle, limping, baldheaded—" [Deleted by censor.] "How manymore times I got to tell you? Now you know what you'll get. You'll getyour needings—that's what you'll get! All day to-morrow! You hear me?You'll wear 'em all day to-morrow! Put 'em on first thing in the morningand wear 'em till sundown. No hiding out, neither! Wear 'em where folkscan see what a bad boy you are. And swearing, too! I got to be 'shamedof you! Yes, sir! Everybody'll know how 'shamed I am to have a tough kidlike you on the place. I won't be able to hold my head up. You wear'em!"

"I—I—I aimed above—" Jimmie Time broke down. He was weeping bitterly.His captor released him with a final shake, and he brought a forearm tohis streaming eyes.

"You'll wear 'em all day to-morrow!" again thundered the judge as theculprit sobbed a stumbling way into obscurity.

"You'self go to haitch!" the unrelenting complainant called after him.

The judge effected a rumbling withdrawal. The night was again calm. ThenI slept on the problem of the Arrowhead's two-gun bad man. It seemed nowpretty certain that the fatuous Boogles had grossly overpraised him. Imust question his being the real doughnuts of any sort—even themildest—much less the real Peruvian. But what was "'em" that indegrading punishment and to the public shame of the Arrowhead he mustwear on the morrow? What, indeed, could "'em" be?

I woke, still pondering the mystery. Nor could I be enlightened duringmy breakfast, for this was solitary, my hostess being long abroad to farplaces of the Arrowhead, and the stolid mask of Lew Wee inviting noquestions.

Breakfast over, I stationed myself in the bracing sunlight that warmedthe east porch and aimlessly overhauled a book of flies. To three thathad proved most popular in the neighbouring stream I did small bits ofmending, ever with a questing eye on adjacent outbuildings, where LittleSure Shot—née Time—might be expected to show himself, wearing "'em."

A blank hour elapsed. I no longer affected occupation with the flies.Jimmie Time was irritating me. Had he not been specifically warned to"wear 'em" full shamefully in the public eye? Was not the public eyepresent, avid? Boogles I saw intermittently among beanpoles in thegarden. He appeared to putter, to have no care or system in his labour.And at moments I noticed he was dropping all pretense of this to standmotionless, staring intently at the shut door of the stable.

Could his fallen idol be there, I wondered? Purposefully I also watchedthe door of the stable. Presently it opened slightly; then, with evidentinfinite caution, it was pushed outward until it hung half yawning. Apalpitant moment we gazed, Boogles and I. Then shot from the stablegloom an astounding figure in headlong flight. Its goal appeared to bethe bunk house fifty yards distant; but its course was devious, laidclearly with a view to securing such incidental brief shelter as wouldbe afforded by the corral wall, by a meagre clump of buck-brush, by awagon, by a stack of hay. Good time was made, however. The fugitivevanished into the bunk house and the door of that structure was slammedto. But now the small puzzle I had thought to solve had grown to be, inthat brief space —easily under eight seconds—a mystery of enormous, ofsheerly inhuman dimensions. For the swift and winged one had been alltoo plainly a correctly uniformed messenger boy of the Western UnionTelegraph Company—that blue uniform with metal buttons, with thecorded red at the trouser sides, the flat cap fronted by a badge ofnickel—unthinkable, yet there. And the speedy bearer of this scenicinvestiture had been the desperate, blood-letting, two-gun bad man ofthe Arrowhead.

It was a complication not to be borne with any restraint. I hastened tostand before the shut door of the sanctuary. It slept in an unpromisingstillness. Invincibly reticent it seemed, even when the anguished faceof Jimmie Time, under that incredible cap with its nickeled badge,wavered an instant back of the grimy window—wavered and vanished withan effect of very stubborn finality. I would risk no defeat there. Ipassed resolutely on to Boogles, who now most diligently trained uptender young bean vines in the way they should go.

"Why does he hide in there?" I demanded in a loud, indignant voice. Iwas to have no nonsense about it.

Boogles turned on me the slow, lofty, considering regard of a UnitedStates senator submitting to photography for publication in a press thathas no respect for private rights. He lacked but a few clothes and theportico of a capitol. Speech became immanent in him. One should not havebeen surprised to hear him utter decorative words meant for therejoicing and incitement of voters. Yet he only said—or started to say:

"Little Sure Shot'll get that Chink yet! I tell you, now, that old boyis sure the real Peruvian—"

This was absurdly too much. I then and there opened on Boogles, openedflooding gates of wrath and scorn on him—for him and for his idol ofclay who, I flatly told him, could not be the real doughnuts of anysort. As for his being the real Peruvian—Faugh!

Often I had wished to test in speech the widely alleged merits of thisvocable. I found it do all that has been claimed for it. Its effect onBoogles was so withering that I used it repeatedly in the next threeminutes. I even faughed him twice in succession, which is very insultingand beneficial indeed, and has a pleasant feel on the lips.

"And now then," I said, "if you don't give me the truth of this matterhere and now, one of us two is going to be mighty sorry for it."

In the early moments of my violence Boogles had protested weakly; thenhe began to quiver perilously. On this I soothed him, and at theprecisely right moment I cajoled. I lured him to the bench by the corralgate, and there I conferred costly cigarettes on him as man to man.Discreetly then I sounded for the origins of a certain bad man who had away—even though they might crease him—of leaving deputy marshals wherehe found them. Boogles smoked one of the cigarettes before he succumbed;but first:

"Let me git my work," said he, and was off to the bunk house.

I observed his part in an extended parley before the door was opened tohim. He came to me on the bench a moment later, bearing a ball ofscarlet yarn, a large crochet hook of bone, and something begun in thezephyr but as yet without form.

"I'm making the madam a red one for her birthday," he confided.

He bent his statesman's head above the task and wrought with nimblefingers the while he talked. It was difficult, this talk of his,scattered, fragmentary; and his mind would go from it, his voice expireuntimely. He must be prompted, recalled, questioned. His hands workedwith a very certain skill, but in his narrative he dropped stitches.Made to pick these up, the result was still a droning monotony burdenedwith many irrelevancies. I am loath to transcribe his speech. It werebetter reported with an eye strictly to salience.

You may see, then—and I hope with less difficulty than I had inseeing—Jimmie Time and Boogles on night duty at the front of the littleWestern Union Office off Park Row in the far city of New York. The lawof that city is tender to the human young. Night messenger boys must beadults. It is one of the preliminary shocks to the visitor—to ring forthe messenger boy of tradition and behold in his uniform a venerablegentleman with perhaps a flowing white beard. I still think Jimmie Timeand Boogles were beating the law—on a technicality. Of course Jimmiewas far descended into the vale of years, and even Boogles wasforty—but adults!

It is three o'clock of a warm spring morning. The two legal adultsconverse in whispers, like bad boys kept after school. They whisper soas not to waken the manager, a blasé, mature youth of twenty who sleepsexpertly in the big chair back of the railing. They whisper of theterrific hazards and the precarious rewards of their adventurouscalling. The hazards are nearly all provided by the youngsters who comeon the day watch—hardy ruffians of sixteen or so who not only "pick on"these two but, with sportive affectations, often rob them, when theychange from uniform to civilian attire, of any spoil the night may havebrought them. They are powerless against these aggressions. They can butwhisper their indignation.

Boogles eyed the sleeping manager.

"I struck it fine to-night, Jimmie!" he whispered. Jimmie mutelyquestioned. "Got a whole case note. You know that guy over to thenewspaper office—the one that's such a tank drama—he had to send anote up to a girl in a show that he couldn't be there."

"That tank drama? Sure, I know him. He kids me every time he's stewed."

"He kids me, too, something fierce; and he give me the case note."

"Them strong arms'll cop it on you when they get here," warned Jimmie.

"Took my collar off and hid her on the inside of it. Oh, I know tricks!"

"Chee! You're all to the Wall Street!"

"I got to look out for my stepmother, too. She'd crown me with a chairif she thought I held out on her. Beans me about every day just fornothing anyway."

"Don't you stand for it!"

"Yah! All right for you to talk. You're the lucky guy. You're an orphan.S'pose you had a stepmother! I wish I was an orphan."

Jimmie swelled with the pride of orphanship.

"Yes; I'd hate to have any parents knocking me round," he said. "But ifit ain't a stepmother then it's somebody else that beans you. A guy inthis burg is always getting knocked round by somebody."

"Read some more of the novel," pleaded Boogles, to change thedistressing topic.

Jimmie drew a tattered paper romance from the pocket of his faded coatand pushed the cap back from his seamed old forehead. It went backeasily, having been built for a larger head than his. He found the placehe had marked at the end of his previous half-hour with literature.Boogles leaned eagerly toward him. He loved being read to. Doing ithimself was too slow and painful:

"'No,' said our hero in a clear, ringing voice; 'all your tainted goldwould not keep me here in the foul, crowded city. I must have the free,wild life of the plains, the canter after the Texas steers, and thefierce battles with my peers. For me the boundless, the glorious West!'"

"Chee! It must be something grand—that wild life!" interruptedBoogles. "That's the real stuff—the cowboy and trapper on themperaries, hunting bufflers and Injuns. I seen a film—"

Jimmie Time frowned at this. He did not like interruptions. He firmlyresumed the tale:

"With a gesture of disdain our hero waved aside the proffered gold ofthe scoundrelly millionaire and dashed down the stairway of the proudmansion to where his gallant steed, Midnight, was champing at thehitching post. At that moment—"

Romance was snatched from the hands of Jimmie Time. The manager toweredabove him.

"Ain't I told you guys not to be taking up the company's time with themnovels?" he demanded. He sternly returned to his big chair behind therailing, where he no less sternly took up his own perusal of theconfiscated tale.

"The big stiff!" muttered Jimmie. "That's the third one he's copped onme this week. A kid in this choint ain't got no rights! I got a goodnotion to throw 'em down cold and go with the Postal people."

"Never mind! I'll blow you to an ice cream after work," consoledBoogles.

"Ice cream!" Jimmie Time was contemptuous. "I want the free, wild lifeof the boundless peraries. I want b'ar steaks br'iled on the glowingcoals of the camp fire. I want to be Little Sure Shot, trapper, scout,and guide—"

"Next out!" yelled the manager. "Hustle now!"

Jimmie Time was next out. He hustled sullenly.

Boogles, alone, slept fitfully on his bench until the young thugs of theday watch straggled in. Then he achieved the change of his uniform tocivilian garments, with only the accustomed minor maltreatment at thehands of these tormentors. True, with sportive affectations—yet withdeadly intentness—they searched him for possible loot; but only hispockets. His dollar bill, folded inside his collar, went unfound. Withassumed jauntiness he strolled from the outlaws' den and safely reachedthe street.

The gilding on the castellated towers of the tallest building in theworld dazzled his blinking, foolish eyes. That was a glorious summitwhich sang to the new sun, but no higher than his own elation at themoment. Had he not come off with his dollar? He found balm and a tenderstimulus in the morning air —an air for dreams and revolt. Boogles feltthis as thousands of others must have felt it who were yet tamelyissuing from subway caverns and the Brooklyn Bridge to be wage slaves.

A block away from the office he encountered Jimmie Time, who seemed toawait him importantly. He seethed with excitement.

"I got one, too!" he called. "That tank drama he sent another noteuptown to a restaurant where a party was, and he give me a case note,too."

He revealed it; and when Boogles withdrew his own treasure the two werelovingly compared and admired. Nothing in all the world can be so foulto the touch as the dollar bill that circulates in New York, but thesetwo were intrepidly fondled.

"I ain't going back to change," said Jimmie Time. "Them other kids wouldcop it on me."

"Have some cigarettes," urged Boogies, and royally bought them—withgilded tips, in a beautiful casket.

"I had about enough of their helling," declared Jimmie, still glowingwith a fine desperation.

They sought the William Street Tunnel under the Brooklyn Bridge. It wascool and dark there. One might smoke and take his ease. And plan! Theysprawled on the stone pavement and smoked largely.

"Chee! If we could get out West and do all them fine things!" musedBoogies.

"Let's!" said Jimmie Time.

"Huh!" Boogies gasped blankly at this.

"Let's beat it!"

"Chee!" said Boogies. He stared at this bolder spirit with startledadmiration.

"Me—I'm going," declared Jimmie Time stoutly, and waited.

Boogies wavered a tremulous moment.

"I'm going with you," he managed at last.

He blurted the words. They had to rush out to beat down his nativecaution with quick blows.

"Listen!" said Jimmie Time impressively. "We got money enough to start.Then we just strike out for the peraries."

"Like the guy in the story!" Boogies glowed at the adept who before hisvery eyes was turning a beautiful dream into stark reality. He waspraying that his own courage to face it would endure.

"You hurry home," commanded Jimmie, "and cop an axe and all the grub youcan lay your hands on."

Boogies fell from the heights as he had feared he would.

"Aw, chee!" he said sanely. "And s'pose me stepmother gets her lamps onme! Wouldn't she bean me? Sure she would!"

"Bind her and gag her," said Jimmie promptly. "What's one weak woman?"

"Yah! She's a hellion and you know it."

"Listen!" said Jimmie sternly. "If you're going into the wild andlawless life of the peraries with me you got to learn to get things.Jesse James or Morgan's men could get me that axe and that grub, and notmake one-two-three of it."

"Them guys had practice—and likely they never had to go against theirstepmothers."

"Do I go alone, then?"

"Well, now—"

"Will you or won't you?"

Boogies drew a fateful breath.

"I'll take a chance. You wait here. If I ain't back in one hour you'llknow I been murdered."

"Good, my man!" said Jimmie Time with the air of an outlaw chief. "Beoff at once."

Boogies was off. And Boogies was back in less than the hour with adelectable bulging meal sack. He was trembling but radiant.

"She seen me gitting away and she yelled her head off," he gasped; "butyou bet I never stopped. I just thought of Jesse James and GeneralGrant, and run like hell!"

"Good, my man!" said Jimmie Time; and then, with a sudden gleam of thepractical, he inventoried the commissary and quartermaster supplies inthe sack. He found them to be: One hatchet; one well-used boiledhambone; six greasy sugared crullers; four dill pickles; a bottle ofcatchup; two tomatoes all but obliterated in transit; two loaves ofbread; a flatiron.

Jimmie cast the last item from him.

"Wh'd you bring that for?" he demanded.

"I don't know," confessed Boogies. "I just put it in. Mebbe I was afraidshe'd throw it at me when I was making my getaway. It'll be good forcracking nuts if we find any on the peraries. I bet they have nuts!"

"All right, then. You can carry it if you want to, pard."

Jimmie thrust the bundle into Boogies' arms and valiantly led adesperate way to the North River. Boogies panted under his burden asthey dodged impatient taxicabs. So they came into the maze of docktraffic by way of Desbrosses Street. The eyes of both were lit byadventure. Jimmie pushed through the crowd on the wharf to a ticketoffice. A glimpse through a door of the huge shed had given himinspiration. No common ferryboats for them! He had seen the statelyriver steamer, Robert Fulton, gay with flags and bunting, awaiting thethrong of excursionists. He recklessly bought tickets. So far, so good.A momentous start had been made.

At this very interesting point in his discourse to me, however, Boogiesbegan to miss explosions too frequently. From the disorderly jumble ofhis narrative to this moment I believe I have brought something like thetruth; I have caused the widely scattered parts to cohere. After this Icould make little of his maunderings.

They were on the crowded boat and the boat steamed up the Hudson River;and they disembarked at a thriving Western town—which, I gather, wasYonkers—because Boogies feared his stepmother might trace him to thisboat, and because Jimmie Time became convinced that detectives were onhis track, wanting him for the embezzlement of a worn but stillpracticable uniform of the Western Union Telegraph Company. So it wasagreed that they should take to the trackless forest, where there areways of throwing one's pursuers off the scent; where they would travelby night, guided by the stars, and lay up by day, subsisting on springwater and a little pemmican—source undisclosed. They were not going tobe taken alive—that was understood.

They hurried through the streets of this thriving Western town,ultimately boarding an electric car —with a shrewd eye out for thehellhounds of the law; and the car took them to the beginning of thefrontier, where they found the trackless forest. They reached the depthsof this forest after climbing a stone wall; and Jimmie Time said theWest looked good to him and that he could already smell the "b'ar steaksbr'iling."

Plain enough still, perhaps; but immediately it seemed that a princesshad for some time been sharing this great adventure. She was a beautifulgolden-haired princess, though quite small, and had flowers in her hairand put some in the cap of Jimmie Time—behind the nickel badge—andsaid she would make him her court dwarf or jester or knight, orsomething; only the scout who was with her said this was rather sillyand that they had better be getting home or they knew very well whatwould happen to them. But when they got lost Jimmie Time looked at thisscout's rifle and said it was a first-class rifle, and would knock anIndian or a wild animal silly.

And the scout smoked a cigarette and got sick by it, and cried somethingfierce; so they made a fire, and the princess didn't get sick when shesmoked hers, but told them a couple of bully stories, like reading in abook, and ate every one of the greasy sugared crullers, because she wasa genuine princess, and Boogies thought at this time that maybe theboundless West wasn't what it was cracked up to be; so, after they metthe madam, the madam said, well, if they was wanting to go out West theymight as well come along here; and they said all right—as long as theywas wanting to go out West anyway, why, they might as well come alongwith her as with anybody else.

And that Chink would mighty soon find out if Little Sure Shot wasn't thereal Peruvian doughnuts, because that old murderer would sure have himhard to find, come sundown; still, he was glad he had come along withthe madam, because back there it wasn't any job for you, account ofgetting too fat for the uniform, with every one giving you the laughthat way—and they wouldn't get you a bigger one—.

I left Boogies then, though he seemed not to know it. His needle workedswiftly on the red one he was making for the madam, and his aimless,random phrases seemed to flow as before; but I knew now where to applyfor the details that had been too many for his slender gift ofnarrative.

At four that afternoon Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill, accompanied by oneBuck Devine, a valued retainer, rode into the yard and dismounted. Sheat once looked searchingly about her. Then she raised her voice, whichis a carrying voice even when not raised: "You, Jimmie Time!"

Once was enough. The door of the bunk house swung slowly open and thedisgraced one appeared in all his shameful panoply. The cap was pulledwell down over a face hopelessly embittered. The shrunken little figuredrooped.

"None of that hiding out!" admonished his judge. "You keep standinground out here where decent folks can look at you and see what a badboy you are."

With a glance she identified me as one of the decent she would haveedified. Jimmie Time muttered evilly in undertones and slouched forward,head down.

"Ain't he the hostile wretch?" called Buck Devine, who stood with thehorses. He spoke with a florid but false admiration.

Jimmie Time, snarling, turned on him: "You go to—."

I perceived that Lew Wee the night before had delicately indicated by amere initial letter a bad word that could fall trippingly from the lipsof Jimmie.

"Sure!" agreed Buck Devine cordially. "And say, take this here telegramup to the corner of Broadway and Harlem; and move lively now—don't youstop to read any of them nickel liberries."

I saw what a gentleman should do. I turned my back on the piteous figureof Jimmie Time. I moved idly off, as if the spectacle of his ignominyhad never even briefly engaged me.

"Shoot up a good cook, will you?" said the lady grimly. "I'll give youyour needings." She followed me to the house.

On the west porch, when she had exchanged the laced boots, khaki ridingbreeches, and army shirt for a most absurdly feminine house gown, we hadtea. Her nose was powdered, and her slippers were bronzed leather andmonstrous small. She mingled Scotch whiskey with the tea and drank herfirst cupful from a capacious saucer.

"That fresh bunch of campers!" she began. "What you reckon they did lastnight? Cut my wire fence in two places over on the west flat—yes,sir!—had a pair of wire clippers in the whip socket. What I didn't give'em! Say, ain't it a downright wonder I still retain my girlishlaughter?"

But then, after she had refused my made cigarette for one of her owndeft handiwork, she spoke as I wished her to:

"Yes; three years ago. Me visiting a week at the home of Mrs. W.B.Hemingway and her husband, just outside of Yonkers, back in York State.A very nice swell home, with a nice front yard and everything. And alsoMrs. W.B.'s sister and her little boy, visiting her from Albany, thesister's name being Mrs. L.H. Cummins, and the boy being nine years oldand named Rupert Cummins, Junior; and very junior he was for his age,too—I will say that. He was a perfectly handsome little boy; but youmight call him a blubberhead if you wanted to, him always being scaredsilly and pestered and rough-housed out of his senses by his little girlcousin, Margery Hemingway—Mrs. W.B.'s little girl, you understand—andher only seven, or two years younger than Junior, but leading him roundinto all kinds of musses till his own mother was that demoralized aftera couple of days she said if that Margery child was hers she'd have herput away in some good institution.

"Of course she only told that to me, not to Margery's mother. I don'tknow—mebbe she would of put her away, she was that frightened littleMargery would get Junior killed off in some horrible manner, like thetime she got him to see how high he dast jump out of the apple treefrom, or like the time she told him, one ironing day, that if he drank awhole bowlful of starch it would make him have whiskers like his pa infifteen minutes. Things like that—not fatal, mebbe, but wearing.

"Well, this day come a telegram about nine A.M. for Mrs. W.B., that heraunt, with money, is very sick in New Jersey, which is near Yonkers; soshe and Mrs. L.H. Cummins, her sister, must go to see about thisaunt—and would I stay and look after the two kids and not let them getpoisoned or killed or anything serious? And they might have to stayovernight, because the aunt was eccentric and often thought she wassick; but this time she might be right. She was worth all the way fromthree to four hundred thousand dollars.

"So I said I'd love to stay and look after the little ones. I wanted tostay. Shopping in New York City the day before, two bargain sales—onebeing hand-embroidered Swiss waists from two-ninety-eight upward—I feltas if a stampede of longhorns had caught me. Darned near bedfast I was!Say, talk about the pale, weak, nervous city woman with exhaustedvitality! See 'em in action first, say I. There was a corn-fed hussy ina plush bonnet with forget-me-nots, two hundred and thirty or forty onthe hoof, that exhausted my vitality all right—no holds barred, an armlike first-growth hick'ry across my windpipe, and me up against a solidpillar of structural ironwork! Once I was wrastled by a cinnamon bearthat had lately become a mother; but the poor old thing would have losther life with this dame after the hand-embroidereds. Gee! I was lame inplaces I'd lived fifty-eight years and never knew I had.

"So off went these ladies, with Mrs. L.H. Cummins giving me special andprivate warning to be sure and keep Junior well out of it in case littlemischievous Margery started anything that would be likely to kill her.And I looked forward to a quiet day on the lounge, where I could ache inpeace and read the 'Famous Crimes of History,' which the W.B.'s had intwelve volumes—you wouldn't have thought there was that many, wouldyou? I dressed soft, out of respect to my corpse, and picked out acorking volume of these here Crimes and lay on the big lounge by an openwindow where the breeze could soothe me and where I could keep tabs onthe little ones at their sports; and everything went as right as if Ihad been in some A-Number-One hospital where I had ought to of been.

"Lunchtime come before I knew it; and I had mine brought to my bed ofpain by the Swede on a tray, while the kids et theirs in an orderly anduproarious manner in the dining-room. Rupert, Junior, was dressed likeone of these boy scouts and had his air gun at the table with him, andlittle Margery was telling him there was, too, fairy princes all roundin different places; and she bet she could find one any day she wantedto. They seemed to be all safe enough, so I took up my Crimes again.Really, ain't history the limit?—the things they done in it and gotaway with—never even being arrested or fined or anything!

"Pretty soon I could hear the merry prattle of the little ones again outin the side yard. Ain't it funny how they get the gambling spirit soyoung? I'd hear little Margery say: 'I bet you can't!' And Rupert,Junior, would say:' I bet I can, too!' And off they'd go ninety miles ona straight track: 'I bet you'd be afraid to!'—'I bet I wouldn'tbe!'—'I bet you'd run as fast!'—'I bet I never would!' Ever see suchnatural-born gamblers? And it's all about what Rupert, Junior, would doif he seen a big tiger in some woods—Rupert betting he'd shoot it dead,right between the eyes, and Margery taking the other end. She has by farthe best end of it, I think, it being at least a forty-to-one shot thatRupert, the boy scout, is talking high and wide. And I drop into theCrimes again at a good, murderous place with stilettos.

"I can't tell even now how it happened. All I know is that it was twoo'clock, and all at once it was five-thirty P.M. by a fussy gold clockover on the mantel with a gold young lady, wearing a spear, standing ontop of it. I woke up without ever suspicioning that I'd been asleep.Anyway, I think I'm feeling better, and I stretch, though careful,account of the dame in the plush bonnet with forget-me-nots; and I liethere thinking mebbe I'll enter the ring again to-morrow for some othertruck I was needing, and thinking how quiet and peaceful it is—howawful quiet! I got it then, all right. That quiet! If you'd known littleMargery better you'd know how sick that quiet made me all at once. Mygizzard or something turned clean over.

"I let out a yell for them kids right where I lay. Then I bounded to myfeet and run through the rooms downstairs yelling. No sign of 'em! Andout into the kitchen—and here was Tillie, the maid, and Yetta, thecook, both saying it's queer, but they ain't heard a sound of 'emeither, for near an hour. So I yelled out back to an old hick of agardener that's deef, and he comes running; but he don't know a thing onearth about the kids or anything else. Then I am sick! I send Tillie oneway along the street and the gardener the other way to find out if anyneighbours had seen 'em. Then in a minute this here Yetta, the cook,says: 'Why, now, Miss Margery was saying she'd go downtown to buy somecandy,' and Yetta says: 'You know, Miss Margery, your mother never 'etsyou have candy.' And Margery says: 'Well, she might change her mind anyminute—you can't tell; and it's best to have some on hand in case shedoes.' And she'd got some poker chips out of the box to buy the candywith—five blue chips she had, knowing they was nearly money anyway.

"And when Yetta seen it was only poker chips she knew the kid couldn'tbuy candy with 'em—not even in Yonkers; so she didn't think any moreabout it until it come over her—just like that—how quiet everythingwas. Oh, that Yetta would certainly be found bone clear to the centre ifher skull was ever drilled—the same stuff they slaughter the poorelephants for over in Africa—going so far away, with Yetta right thereto their hands, as you might say. And I'm getting sicker and sicker! I'dhave retained my calm mind, mind you, if they had been my own kids—butkids of others I'd been sacredly trusted with!

"And then down the back stairs comes this here sandy-complected,horse-faced plumber that had been frittering away his time all day up ina bathroom over one little leak, and looking as sad and mournful as ifhe hadn't just won eight dollars, or whatever it was. He must have beenborn that way—not even being a plumber had cheered him up.

"'Blackhanders!'" he says right off, kind of brightening a little bit.

"I like to fainted for fair! He says they had lured the kids off withcandy and popcorn, and would hold 'em in a tenement house for tenthousand dollars, to be left on a certain spot at twelve P.M. He seemedto know a lot about their ways.

"'They got the Honourable Simon T. Griffenbaugh's youngest that way,'he says, 'only a month ago. Likely the same gang got these two.'

"'How do you know?' I asks him.

"'Well,' he says, 'they's a gang of over two hundred of these I-talianBlackhanders working right now on a sewer job something about two milesup the road. That's how I know,' he says. 'That's plain enough, ain'tit? It's as plain as the back of my hand. What chance would them twodefenceless little children have with a gang of two hundredBlackhanders?'

"But that looked foolish, even to me. 'Shucks!' I says. 'That don'tstand to reason.' But then I got another scare. 'How about water?' Isays. 'Any places round here they could fall into and get drownded?'

"He'd looked glum again when I said two hundred Blackhanders didn'tsound reasonable; but he cheers up at this and says: 'Oh, yes; lots ofplaces they could drownd—cricks and rivers and lakes and ponds andtanks—any number of places they could fall into and never come upagain.' Say, he made that whole neighbourhood sound like Venice, Italy.You wondered how folks ever got round without gondolas or something.'One of Dr. George F. Maybury's two kids was nearly drownded lastTuesday—only the older one saved him; a wonder it was they didn't haveto drag the river and find 'em on the bottom locked in each other'sarms! And a boy by the name of Clifford Something, only the other day,playing down by the railroad tracks—'

"I shut him off, you bet! I told him to get out quick and go to his homeif he had one.

"'I certainly hope I won't have to read anything horrible in to-morrow'spaper!' he says as he goes down the back stoop. 'Only last week they wasa nigg*r caught—'

"I shut the door on him. Rattled good and plenty I was by then. Backcomes this silly old gardener—he'd gone with his hoe and was stillgripping it. The neighbours down that way hadn't seen the kids. Backcomes Tillie. One neighbour where she'd been had seen 'em climb on to astreet car—only it wasn't going downtown but into the country; and thisneighbour had said to herself that the boy would be likely to let someone have it in the eye with his gun, the careless way he was lugging it.

"Thank the Lord, that was a trace! I telephoned to the police and told'em all about it. And I telephoned for a motor car for me and got intosome clothes. Good and scared—yes! I caught sight of my face in thelooking-glass, and, my! but it was pasty—it looked like one of thesecheap apple pies you see in the window of a two-bit lunch place! Andwhile I'm waiting for this motor car, what should come but a telegramfrom Mr. W.B. himself saying that the aunt was worse and he would go toNew Jersey himself for the night! Some said this aunt was worth a gooddeal more than she was supposed to be. And I not knowing the name ofthis town in Jersey where they would all be!—it was East Something orWest Something, and hard to remember, and I'd forgot it.

"I called the police again and they said descriptions was being sentout, and that probably I'd better not worry, because they often hadcases like this. And I offered to bet them they hadn't a case sinceYonkers was first thought of that had meant so much spot cash to 'em asthis one would mean the minute I got a good grip on them kids. So thiscop said mebbe they had better worry a little, after all, and they'dsend out two cars of their own and scour the country, and try to findthe conductor of this street car that the neighbour woman had seen thekids get on to.

"I r'ared round that house till the auto come that I'd ordered. It waslate coming, naturally, and nearly dark when it got there; but wecovered a lot of miles while the daylight lasted, with the man lookingsharp out along the road, too, because he had three kids of his own thatwould do any living thing sometimes, though safe at home and asleep atthat minute, thank God!

"It was moisting when we started, and pretty soon it clouded up and thedark came on, and I felt beat. We got fair locoed. We'd go down one roadand then back the same way. We stopped to ask everybody. Then we foundthe two autos sent out by the police. I told the cops again what wouldhappen to 'em from me the minute the kids was found—the kids or theirbodies. I was so despairing—what with that damned plumber andeverything! I'll bet he's the merry chatterbox in his own home. Thepolice said cheer up—nothing like that, with the country as safe as achurch. But we went over to this Blackhanders' construction camp, justthe same, to make sure, and none of the men was missing, the boss said,and no children had been seen; and anyway his men was ordinary decentwops and not Blackhanders—and blamed if about fifty of 'em didn't turnout to help look! Yes, sir, there they was—foreigners to the last manexcept the boss, who was Irish—and acting just like human beings.

"It was near ten o'clock now; so we went to a country saloon totelephone police headquarters, and they had found the car conductor, heremembering because he had threatened to put the boy scout off the carif he didn't quit pointing his gun straight at an old man with goldspectacles setting across the aisle. And finally they had got offthemselves about three miles down the road; he'd watched 'em climb overa stone wall and start up a hill into some woods that was there. And hewas Conductor Number Twenty-seven, if we wanted to know that.

"We beat it to that spot after I'd powdered my nose and we'd had a quickround of drinks. The policemen knew where it was. It wasn't moisting anymore—it was raining for fair; and we done some ground-and-loftyskidding before we got there. We found the stone wall all right and theslope leading up to the woods; but, my Lord, there was a good half mileof it! We strung out—four cops and my driver and me—hundreds of yardsapart and all yelling, so maybe the poor lost things would hear us.

"We made up to the woods without raising a sign; and, my lands, wasn'tit dark inside the woods! I worked forward, trying to keep straight fromtree to tree; but I stumbled and tore my clothes and sprained my wrist,and blacked one eye the prettiest you'd want to see—mighty near being ablubberhead myself, I was—it not being my kids, you understand. Oh, Ikept to it though! I'd have gone straight up the grand old state of NewYork into Lake Erie if something hadn't stopped me.

"It was a light off through the pine and oak trees, and down in a kindof little draw—not a lamplight but a fire blazing up. I yelled to bothsides toward the others. I can yell good when I'm put to it. Then Istarted for the light. I could make out figures round the fire. Mebbeit's a Blackhanders' camp, I think; so I didn't yell any more. Icat-footed. And in a minute I was up close and seen 'em —there in thedripping rain.

"Rupert, Junior, was asleep, leaned setting up against a tree, with amessenger boy's cap on. And Margery was asleep on a pile of leaves, withher cheek on one hand and something over her. And a fat man was asleepon his back, with his mouth open, making an awful fuss about it. And theonly one that wasn't asleep was a funny little old man setting againstanother tree. He had on the scout's campaign hat and he held the gunacross his chest in the crook of his arm. He hadn't any coat on. Then Isee his coat was what was over Margery; and I looked closer and it was amessenger boy's coat.

"I was more floored than ever when I took that in. I made a little move,and this funny old man must have heard me—he looked like one of themsilly little critters that play hob with Rip Van Winkle out on themountain before he goes to sleep. And he co*cks his ears this way andthat; then he jumped to his feet, and I come forward where he could seeme. And darned if he didn't up with this here air gun of Rupert's, likea flash, and plunk me with a buckshot it carried—right on my sprainedwrist, too!

"Say, I let out a yell, and I had him by the neck of his shirt in onegrab. I was still shaking him when the others come to. The fat man setup and rubbed his eyes and blinked. That's all he done. Rupert woke upthe same minute and begun to cry like a baby; and Margery woke up, butshe didn't cry. She took a good look at me and she says: 'You let himalone! He's my knight—he slays all the dragons. He's a good knight!'

"There I was, still shaking the little old man—I'd forgot all abouthim. So I dropped him on the ground and reached for Margery; and I wasso afraid I was going to blubber like Rupert, the scout, that I let outsome words to keep from it. Yes, sir; I admit it.

"'Oh! Oh! Oh! Swearing!' says Rupert. I shall tell mother and Aunt Hildajust what you said!'

"Mebby you can get Rupert's number from that. I did anyway. I stood upfrom Margery and cuffed him. He went on sobbing, but not without reason.

"'Margery Hemingway,' I says, 'how dare you!' And she looks up all cooland cunning, and says: 'Ho! I bet I know worse words than what you said!See if I don't.' So then I shut her off mighty quick. But still shedidn't cry. 'I s'pose I must go back home,' she says. 'And perhaps it isall for the best. I have a very beautiful home. Perhaps I should staythere oftener.'

"I turned on the Blackhanders.

"'Did these brutes entice you away with candy?' I demanded. 'Was theyholding you here for ransom?'

"'Huh! I should think not!' she says. 'They are a couple of 'fraid-cats.They were afraid as anything when we all got lost in these woods andwanted to keep on finding our way out. And I said I bet they were awfulcowards, and the fat one said of course he was; but this old one becamevery, very indignant and said he bet he wasn't any more of a coward thanI am, but we simply ought to go where there were more houses. And so Iconsented and we got lost worse than ever—about a hundred miles, Ithink—in this dense forest and we couldn't return to our beautifulhomes. And this one said he was a trapper, scout, and guide; so he builtthis lovely fire and I ate a lot of crullers the silly things hadbrought with them. And then this old one flung his robe over me becauseI was a princess, and it made me invisible to prowling wolves; andanyway he sat up to shoot them with his deadly rifle that he took awayfrom Cousin Rupert. And Cousin Rupert became very tearful indeed; so wetook his hat away, too, because it's a truly scout hat.'

"'And she smoked a cigarette,' says Rupert, still sobbing.

"'He smoked one, too, and I mean to tell his mother,' says Margery.'It's something I think she ought to know.'

"'It made me sick,' says Rupert. 'It was a poison cigarette; I nearlydied.'

"'Mine never made me sick,' says Margery—'only it was kind of sting-yto the tongue and I swallowed smoke through my nose repeatedly. Andfirst, this old one wouldn't give us the cigarettes at all, until Ithreatened to cast a spell on him and turn him into a toad forever. Inever did that to any one, but I bet I could. And the fat one cried likeanything and begged me not to turn the old one into a toad, and the oldone said he didn't think I could in a thousand years, but he wouldn'ttake any chances in the Far West; so he gave us the cigarettes, andRupert only smoked half of his and then he acted in a very common way, Imust say. And this old one said we would have br'iled b'ar steaks forbreakfast. What is a br'iled b'ar steak? I'm hungry.'

"Such was little angel-faced Margery. Does she promise to make lifeinteresting for those who love her, or does she not?

"Well, that's all. Of course these cops when they come up said the twomen was desperate crooks wanted in every state in the Union; but I sworeI knew them both well and they was harmless; and I made it right with'em about the reward as soon as I got back to a check book. After thatthey'd have believed anything I said. And I sent something over to theBlackhanders that had turned out to help look, and something toConductor Number Twenty-seven. And the next day I squared myself withMrs. W.B. Hemingway and her husband, and Mrs. L.H. Cummins, when theycome back, the aunt not having been sick but only eccentric again.

"And them two poor homeless boys—they kind of got me, I admit, afterI'd questioned 'em awhile. So I coaxed 'em out here where they couldlead the wild, free life. Kind of sad and pathetic, almost, they was.The fat one I found was just a kind of natural-born one—a feeb youunderstand—and the old one had a scar that the doctor said explainedhim all right —you must have noticed it up over his temple. It's wherehis old man laid him out once, when he was a kid, with a stovelifter. Itseemed to stop his works.

"Yes; they're pretty good boys. Boogies was never bad but once, accountof two custard pies off the kitchen window sill. I threatened him withhis stepmother and he hid under the house for twenty-four hours. Theother one is pretty good, too. This is only the second time I had topunish him for fooling with live ca'tridges. There! It's sundown andhe's got on his Wild Wests again."

Jimmie Time swaggered from the bunk house in his fearsome regalia. Underthe awed observation of Boogles he wheeled, drew, and shot from the hipone who had cravenly sought to attack him from the rear.

"My, but he's hostile!" murmured my hostess. "Ain't he just the hostilelittle wretch?"

IV

ONCE A SCOTCHMAN, ALWAYS

Terrific sound waves beat upon the Arrowhead ranch house this night. Atfive o'clock a hundred and twenty Hereford calves had been torn fromtheir anguished mothers for the first time and shut into a too adjacentfeeding pen. Mothers and offspring, kept a hundred yards apart by twostout fences, unceasingly bawled their grief, a noble chorus of yearningand despair. The calves projected a high, full-throated barytone, withhere and there a wailing tenor against the rumbling bass of their dams.And ever and again pealed distantly into the chorus the flute obbligatoof an emotional coyote down on the flat. There was never a diminuendo.The fortissimo had been steadily maintained for three hours and wouldendure the night long, perhaps for two other nights.

At eight o'clock I sleepily wondered how I should sleep. And thuswondering, I marvelled at the indifference to the racket of my hostess,Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill. Through dinner and now as she read a SanFrancisco newspaper she had betrayed no consciousness of it. She readher paper and from time to time she chuckled.

"How do you like it?" I demanded, referring to the monstrous din.

"It's great," she said, plainly referring to something else. "One ofthem real upty-up weddings in high life, with orchestras and bowers oforchids and the bride a vision of loveliness—"

"I mean the noise."

"What noise?" She put the paper aside and stared at me, listeningintently. I saw that she was honestly puzzled, even as the chorusswelled to unbelievable volume. I merely waved a hand. The coyote wasthen doing a most difficult tremolo high above the clamour.

"Oh, that!" said my enlightened hostess. "That's nothing; just a littlebunch of calves being weaned. We never notice that—and say, they gotthe groom's mother in here, too. Yes, sir, Ellabelle in all her tiarasand sunbursts and dog collars and diamond chest protectors—Mrs. AngusMcDonald, mother of groom, in a stunning creation! I bet they didn'tneed any flashlight when they took her, not with them stones all overher person. They could have took her in a coal cellar."

"How do you expect to sleep with all that going on?" I insisted.

"All what? Oh, them calves. That's nothing! Angus says to her when theyfirst got money: 'Whatever you economize in, let it not be in diamonds!'He says nothing looks so poverty-stricken as a person that can onlyafford a few. Better wear none at all than just a mere handful, hesays. What do you think of that talk from a man named Angus McDonald?You'd think a Scotchman and his money was soon parted, but I heard himsay it from the heart out. And yet Ellabelle never does seem to get him.Only a year ago, when I was at this here rich place down from SanFrancisco where they got the new marble palace, there was a lovelyblow-up and Ellabelle says to me in her hysteria: 'Once a Scotchman,always a Scotchman!' Oh, she was hysteric all right! She was like what Iseen about one of the movie actresses, 'the empress of stormy emotion.'Of course she feels better now, after the wedding and all this newspaperguff. And it was a funny blow-up. I don't know as I blamed her at thetime."

I now closed a window and a door upon the noisy September night. Ithelped a little. I went back to a chair nearer to this woman with earstrained in rejection. That helped more. I could hear her now, save inthe more passionate intervals of the chorus.

"All right, then. What was the funny blow-up?" She caught thesignificance of the closed door and window.

"But that's music," she insisted. "Why, I'd like to have a good recordof about two hundred of them white-faced beauties being weaned, so Icould play it on a phonograph when I'm off visiting—only it would makeme too homesick." She glanced at the closed door and window in a waythat I found sinister.

"I couldn't hear you," I suggested.

"Oh, all right!" She listened wistfully a moment to the now slightlydulled oratorio, then: "Yes, Angus McDonald is his name; but there aretwo kinds of Scotch, and Angus is the other kind. Of course he's one ofthe big millionaires now, with money enough to blind any kind of aScotchman, but he was the other kind even when he first come out to us,a good thirty years ago, without a cent. He's a kind of second or thirdcousin of mine by marriage or something—I never could quite work itout—and he'd learned his trade back in Ohio; but he felt that the Eastdidn't have any future to speak of, so he decided to come West. He was apainter and grainer and kalsominer and paperhanger, that kind ofthing—a good, quiet boy about twenty-five, not saying much, chunky andslow-moving but sure, with a round Scotch head and a snub nose, and oneheavy eyebrow that run clean across his face—not cut in two like mostare.

"He landed on the ranch and slowly looked things over and let on after afew days that he mebbe would be a cowboy on account of it taking himoutdoors more than kalsomining would. Lysander John was pretty busy, buthe said all right, and gave him a saddle and bridle and a pair of bullpants and warned him about a couple of cinch-binders that he mustn't tryto ride or they would murder him. And so one morning Angus asked alittle bronch-squeezer we had, named Everett Sloan, to pick him outsomething safe to ride, and Everett done so. Brought him up a nice oldrope horse that would have been as safe as a supreme-court judge, butthe canny Angus says: 'No, none of your tricks now! That beast has thevery devil in his eye, and you wish to sit by and laugh your fool headoff when he displaces me.' 'Is that so?' says Everett. 'I suspect you,'says Angus. 'I've read plentifully about the tricks of you cowlads.''Pick your own horse, then,' says Everett. 'I'd better,' says Angus, andpicks one over by the corral gate that was asleep standing up, with awisp of hay hanging out of his mouth like he'd been too tired to finisheating it. 'This steed is more to my eye,' says Angus. 'He's old andwithered and he has no evil ambitions. But maybe I can wake him up.''Maybe you can,' says Everett, 'but are you dead sure you want to?'Angus was dead sure. 'I shall thwart your murderous design,' says he. SoEverett with a stung look helped him saddle this one. He had his alibiall right, and besides, nothing ever did worry that buckaroo as long ashis fingers wasn't too cold to roll a cigarette.

"The beast was still asleep when Angus forked him. Without seeming towake up much he at once traded ends, poured Angus out of the saddle, andstacked him up in some mud that was providentially there—mud softenough to mire your shadow. Angus got promptly up, landed a strong kickin the ribs of the outlaw which had gone to sleep again before he lit,shook hands warmly with Everett and says: 'What does a man need with twotrades anyway? Good-bye!'

"But when Lysander John hears about it he says Angus has just the rightstuff in him for a cowman. He says he has never known one yet that youcould tell anything to before he found it out for himself, and Angusmust sure have the makings of a good one, so he persuades him to stayround for a while, working at easy jobs that couldn't stack him up, andlater he sent him to Omaha with the bunch in charge of a trainload ofsteers.

"The trip back was when his romance begun. Angus had kept fancy-free upto that time, being willing enough but thoroughly cautious. Do youremember the eating-house at North Platte, Nebraska? The night trainfrom Omaha would reach there at breakfast time and you'd get out in thefrosty air, hungry as a confirmed dyspeptic, and rush into the big redbuilding past the man that was rapidly beating on a gong with one ofthese soft-ended bass-drum sticks. My, the good hot smells inside!Tables already loaded with ham and eggs and fried oysters and friedchicken and sausage and fried potatoes and steaks and hot biscuits andcorn bread and hot cakes and regular coffee—till you didn't know whichto begin on, and first thing you knew you had your plate loaded with toomany things—but how you did eat!—and yes, thank you, another cup ofcoffee, and please pass the sirup this way. And no worry about thetrain pulling out, because there the conductor is at that other tableand it can't go without him, so take your time—and about three more ofthem big fried oysters, the only good fried ones I ever had in theworld! To this day I get hungry thinking of that North Platte breakfast,and mad when I go into the dining-car as we pass there and try to getthe languid mulatto to show a little enthusiasm.

"Well, they had girls at that eating-house. Of course no one evernoticed 'em much, being too famished and busy. You only knew in ageneral way that females was passing the food along. But Angus actuallydid notice Ellabelle, though it must have been at the end of the meal,mebbe when she was pouring the third cup. Ellabelle was never rightpretty to my notion, but she had some figure and kind of a sad dignity,and her brown hair lacked the towers and minarets and golden domes thatthe other girls built with their own or theirs by right of purchase. Andshe seems to have noticed Angus from the very first. Angus saw that whenshe wasn't passing the fried chicken or the hot biscuits along, even forhalf a minute, she'd pick up a book from the window sill and glancestudiously at its pages. He saw the book was called 'Lucile.' And helooked her over some more—between mouthfuls, of course—theneat-fitting black dress revealing every line of her lithe young figure,like these magazine stories say, the starched white apron and the lookof sad dignity that had probably come of fresh drummers trying to teachher how to take a joke, and the smooth brown hair—he'd probably gotwise to the other kind back in the social centres of Ohio—and all atonce he saw there was something about her. He couldn't tell what it was,but he knew it was there. He heard one of the over-haired ones call herEllabelle, and he committed the name to memory.

"He also remembered the book she was reading. He come back with a copyhe'd bought at Spokane and kept it on his bureau. Not that he read itmuch. It was harder to get into than 'Peck's Bad Boy,' which was hisfavourite reading just then.

"Pretty soon another load of steers is ready—my sakes, what scrubbyrunts we sent off the range in them days compared to now!—and Anguspleads to go, so Lysander John makes a place for him and, coming back,here's Ellabelle handing the hot things along same as ever, with'Lucile' at hand for idle moments. This time Angus again made certainthere was something about her. He cross-examined her, I suppose, betweenthe last ham and eggs and the first hot cakes. Her folks was cornfarmers over in Iowa and she'd gone to high school and had meant to be ateacher, but took this job because with her it was anything to get outof Iowa, which she spoke of in a warm, harsh way.

"Angus nearly lost the train that time, making certain there wassomething about her. He told her to be sure and stay there till heshowed up again. He told me about her when he got back. 'There'ssomething about her,' he says. 'I suspect it's her eyes, though it mightbe something else.'

"Me? I suspected there was something about her, too; only I thought itwas just that North Platte breakfast and his appetite. No meal can everbe like breakfast to them that's two-fisted, and Angus was. He'd thinkthere was something about any girl, I says to myself, seeing her throughthe romantic golden haze of them North Platte breakfast victuals. Ofcourse I didn't suggest any such base notion to Angus, knowing howlittle good it does to talk sense to a man when he thinks there'ssomething about a girl. He tried to read 'Lucile' again, but couldn'tseem to strike any funny parts.

"Next time he went to Omaha, a month later, he took his other suit andhis new boots. 'I shall fling caution to the winds and seal my fate,' hesays. 'There's something about her, and some depraved scoundrel mightfind it out.' 'All right, go ahead and seal,' I says. 'You can't expectus to be shipping steers every month just to give you twenty minuteswith a North Platte waiter girl.' 'Will she think me impetuous?' sayshe. 'Better that than have her think you ain't,' I warns him. 'Men havebeen turned down for ten million reasons, and being impetuous is aboutthe only one that was never numbered among them. It will be strangeo'clock when that happens.' 'She's different,' says Angus. 'Of course,'I says. 'We're all different. That's what makes us so much alike.' 'Youmight know,' says he doubtfully.

"He proved I did, on the trip back. He marched up to Ellabelle's end ofthe table in his other suit and his new boots and a startling necktiehe'd bought at a place near the stockyards in South Omaha, and proposedhonourable marriage to her, probably after the first bite of sausage andwhile she was setting his coffee down. 'And you've only twenty minutes,'he says, 'so hurry and pack your grip. We'll be wed when we get off thetrain.' 'You're too impetuous,' says Ellabelle, looking more than everas if there was something about her. 'There, I was afraid I'd be,' saysAngus, quitting on some steak and breaking out into scarlet rash. 'Whatdid you think I am?' demands Ellabelle. 'Did you think I would answeryour beck and call or your lightest nod as if I were your slave orsomething? Little you know me,' she says, tossing her head indignantly.'I apologize bitterly,' says Angus. 'The very idea is monstrous,' saysshe. 'Twenty minutes—and with all my packing! You will wait over tillthe four-thirty-two this afternoon,' she goes on, very stern andnervous, 'or all is over between us.' 'I'll wait as long as that foryou,' says Angus, going to the steak again. 'Are the other meals here asgood as breakfast?' 'There's one up the street,' says Ellabelle; 'aPresbyterian.' 'I would prefer a Presbyterian,' says Angus. 'Are thosefried oysters I see up there?'

"That was about the way of it, I gathered later. Anyway, Angus broughther back, eating on the way a whole wicker suitcase full of lunch thatshe put up. And she seemed a good, capable girl, all right. She told methere was something about Angus. She'd seen that from the first. Evenso, she said, she hadn't let him sweep her off her feet like he hadmeant to, but had forced him to give her time to do her packing andconsider the grave step she was taking for better or worse, like everytrue, serious-minded woman ought to.

"Angus now said he couldn't afford to fritter away any more time in thecattle business, having a wife to support in the style she had beenaccustomed to, so he would go to work at his trade. He picked outWallace, just over in Idaho, as a young and growing town where he coulddo well. He rented a nice four-room cottage there, with an icebox out onthe back porch and a hammock in the front yard, and begun to paper andpaint and grain and kalsomine and made good money from the start.Ellabelle was a crackajack housekeeper and had plenty of time to lie outin the hammock and read 'Lucile' of afternoons.

"By and by Angus had some money saved up, and what should he do withbits of it now and then but grubstake old Snowstorm Hickey, who'd beenscratching mountainsides all his life and never found a thing and likelynever would—a grouchy old hardshell with white hair and whiskerswhirling about his head in such quantities that a body just naturallycalled him Snowstorm without thinking. It made him highly indignant,but he never would get the things cut. Well, and what does this oldsnow-scene-in-the-Alps do after about a year but mush along up the cañonpast Mullan and find a high-grade proposition so rich it was scandalous!They didn't know how rich at first, of course, but Angus got assays andthey looked so good they must be a mistake, so they sunk a shaft anddrifted in a tunnel, and the assays got better, and people with moneywas pretty soon taking notice.

"One day Snowstorm come grouching down to Angus and tells about acapitalist that had brought two experts with him and nosed over theworkings for three days. Snowstorm was awful dejected. He had hated thecapitalist right off. 'He wears a gold watch chain and silk underclotheslike one of these fly city dames,' says Snowstorm, who was a knowing oldscoundrel, 'and he says his syndicate on the reports of these twothieving experts will pay twelve hundred for it and not a cent more.What do you think of that for nerve?'

"'Is that all?' says Angus, working away at his job in the newInternational Hotel at Wallace. Graining a door in the dining-room hewas, with a ham rind and a stocking over one thumb nail, doing littlecurlicues in the brown wet paint to make it look like what the wood wasat first before it was painted at all. 'Well,' he says, 'I suspectedfrom the assays that we might get a bit more, but if he had expertswith him you better let him have it for twelve hundred. After all,twelve hundred dollars is a good bit of money.'

"'Twelve hundred thousand,' says Snowstorm, still grouchy.

"'Oh,' says Angus. 'In that case don't let him have it. If the sharkoffers that it'll be worth more. I'll go into the mining business myselfas soon as I've done this door and the wainscoting and give them theirvarnish.'

"He did so. He had the International finished in three more days, turneddown a job in the new bank building cold, and went into the miningbusiness just like he'd do anything else—slow and sure, yet impetuoushere and there. It wasn't a hard proposition, the stuff being therenearly from the grass roots, and the money soon come a-plenty. Snowstormnot only got things trimmed up but had 'em dyed black as a crow's wingand retired to a life of sinful ease in Spokane, eating bacon and beansand cocoanut custard pie three times a day till the doctors found outwhat a lot of expensive things he had the matter with him.

"Angus not only kept on the job but branched out into other mines thathe bought up, and pretty soon he quit counting his money. You know whatthat would mean to most of his race. It fazed him a mite at first. Hetried faithfully to act like a crazy fool with his money, experimentingwith revelry and champagne for breakfast, and buying up the Sans Soosydance hall every Saturday night for his friends and admirers. But hewasn't gaited to go on that track long. Even Ellabelle wasn't worriedthe least bit, and in fact she thought something of the kind was due hisposition. And she was busy herself buying the things that are champagneto a woman, only they're kept on the outside. That was when Angus toldher if she was going in for diamonds at all to get enough so she couldappear to be wasteful and contemptuous of them. Two thousand she givefor one little diamond circlet to pin her napkin up on her chest with.It was her own idea.

"Then Angus for a time complicated his amateur debauchery with fasthorses. He got him a pair of matched pacing stallions that would goanywhere, he said. And he frequently put them there when he had the mainchandelier lighted. In driving them over a watering-trough one night anaccident of some sort happened. Angus didn't come to till after his legwas set and the stitches in—eight in one place, six in another, and soon; I wonder why they're always so careful to count the stitches in aperson that way—and he wished to know if his new side-bar buggy wassafe and they told him it wasn't, and he wanted to know where his teamwas, but nobody knew that for three days, so he says to the doctors andEllabelle: 'Hereafter I suspect I shall take only soft drinks like beerand sherry. Champagne has a bonnier look but it's too enterprising. Imight get into trouble some time.' And he's done so to this day. Oh,I've seen him take a sip or two of champagne to some one's health, oras much Scotch whiskey in a tumbler of water as you could dribble from amedium-boilered fountain pen. But that's a high riot with him. He'll eatone of these corned peaches in brandy, and mebbe take a cream pitcher ofbeer on his oatmeal of a morning when his stomach don't feel just right,but he's never been a willing performer since that experiment inhurdling.

"When he could walk again him and Ellabelle moved to the InternationalHotel, where she wouldn't have to cook or split kindling and could makea brutal display of diamonds at every meal, and we went down to seethem. That was when Angus give Lysander John the scarfpin he'd sentclear to New York for—a big gold bull's head with ruby eyes and in itsmouth a nugget of platinum set with three diamonds. Of course LysanderJohn never dast wear it except when Angus was going to see it.

"Then along comes Angus, Junior, though poor Ellabelle thinks forseveral days that he's Elwin. We'd gone down so I could be with her.

"'Elwin is the name I have chosen for my son,' says she to Angus thethird day.

"'Not so,' says Angus, slumping down his one eyebrow clear across in afirm manner. 'You're too late. My son is already named. I named himAngus the night before he was born.'

"'How could you do that when you didn't know the sex?' demands Ellabellewith a frightened air of triumph.

"'I did it, didn't I?' says Angus. 'Then why ask how I could?' And hecurved the eyebrow up one side and down the other in a fighting way.

"Ellabelle had been wedded wife of Angus long enough to know when theScotch curse was on him. 'Very well,' she says, though turning her faceto the wall. Angus straightened the eyebrow. 'Like we might have twonow, one of each kind,' says he quite soft, 'you'd name your daughter asyou liked, with perhaps no more than a bit of a suggestion from me, tobe taken or not by you, unless we'd contend amiably about it for alength of time till we had it settled right as it should be. But ason—my son—why, look at the chest on him already, projecting outwardlike a clock shelf—and you would name him—but no matter! I wasforehanded, thank God.' Oh, you saw plainly that in case a girl evercome along Ellabelle would have the privilege of naming it anything inthe world she wanted to that Angus thought suitable.

"So that was settled reasonably, and Angus went on showing what to dowith your mine instead of selling it to a shark, and the baby fatted up,being stall-fed, and Ellabelle got out into the world again, with moremoney than ever to spend, but fewer things to buy, because in Wallaceshe couldn't think of any more. Trust her, though! First theInternational Hotel wasn't good enough. Angus said they'd have amansion, the biggest in Wallace, only without slippery hardwood floors,because he felt brittle after his accident. Ellabelle says Wallaceitself ain't big enough for the mansion that ought to be a home to hisonly son. She was learning how to get to Angus without seeming to. Hethought there might be something in that, still he didn't like to trustthe child away from him, and he had to stick there for a while.

"So Ellabelle's health broke down. Yes, sir, she got to be a totalwreck. Of course the fool doctor in Wallace couldn't find it out. Shetried him and he told her she was strong as a horse and ought to bedoing a tub of washing that very minute. Which was no way to talk to thewife of a rich mining man, so he lost quite a piece of money by it.Ellabelle then went to Spokane and consulted a specialist. That's thedifference. You only see a doctor, but a specialist you consult. Thisone confirmed her fears about herself in a very gentlemanly way andreaped his reward on the spot. Ellabelle's came after she had convincedAngus that even if she did have such a good appetite it wasn't a normalone, but it was, in fact, one of her worst symptoms and threatened herwith a complete nervous breakdown. After about a year of this, whenAngus had horned his way into a few more mines—he said he might as wellhave a bunch of them since he couldn't be there on the spot anyway—theywent to New York City. Angus had never been there except to pass from aClyde liner to Jersey City, and they do say that when he heard therates, exclusive of board, at the one Ellabelle had picked out fromreading the papers, he timidly asked her if they hadn't ought to go tothe other hotel. She told him there wasn't any other—not for them. Shetold him further it was part of her mission to broaden his horizon, andshe firmly meant to do it if God would only vouchsafe her a remnant ofher once magnificent vitality.

"She didn't have to work so hard either. Angus begun to get a broaderhorizon in just a few days, corrupting every waiter he came in contactwith, and there was a report round the hotel the summer I was there thata hat-boy had actually tried to reason with him, thinking he was aforeigner making mistakes with his money by giving up a dollar billevery time for having his hat snatched from him. As a matter of fact,Angus can't believe to this day that dollar bills are money. He feelsapologetic when he gives 'em away. All the same I never believed thatreport about the hat-boy till someone explained to me that he wasn'tallowed to keep his loot, not only having clothes made special withoutpockets but being searched to the hide every night like them poorunfortunate Zulus that toil in the diamond mines of Africa. Of course Icould see then that this boy had become merely enraged like a wild-catat having a dollar crowded onto him for some one else every time a headwaiter grovelled Angus out of the restaurant.

"The novelty of that life wore off after about a year, even with sidetrips to resorts where the prices were sufficiently outrageous to charmEllabelle. She'd begun right off to broaden her own horizon. After onlyone week in New York she put her diamond napkin pincher to doing otherwork, and after six months she dressed about as well as them prominentsociety ladies that drift round the corridors of this hotel waiting forparties that never seem on time, and looking none too austere while theywait.

"So Ellabelle, having in the meantime taken up art and literature andgone to lectures where the professor would show sights and scenes inforeign lands with his magic lantern, begun to feel the call of the OldWorld. She'd got far beyond 'Lucile'—though 'Peck's Bad Boy' was stillthe favourite of Angus when he got time for any serious reading—- andwas coming to loathe the crudities of our so-called Americancivilization. So she said. She begun to let out to Angus that theywasn't doing right by the little one, bringing him up in a hole like NewYork City where he'd catch the American accent—though God knows whereshe ever noticed that danger there!—and it was only fair to the childto get him to England or Paris or some such place where he could havedecent advantages. I gather that Angus let out a holler at first so thatEllabelle had to consult another specialist and have little Angusconsult one, too. They both said: 'Certainly, don't delay another day ifyou value the child's life or your own,' and of course Angus had to givein. I reckon that was the last real fight he ever put up till the timeI'm going to tell you about.

"They went to England and bought a castle that had never known theprofane touch of a plumber, having been built in the time of the firstearl or something, and after that they had to get another castle inFrance, account of little Angus having a weak throat that Ellabelle gotanother gentlemanly specialist to find out about him; and so it went,with Ellabelle hovering on the very edge of a nervous breakdown, andtaking up art and literature at different spots where fashion gathered,going to Italy and India's coral strand to study the dead past, and soforth, and learning to address her inferiors in a refined and hostilemanner, with little Angus having a maid and a governess and somethingnew the matter with him every time Ellabelle felt the need of a change.

"At first Angus used to make two trips back every year, then he cut themdown to one, and at last he'd only come every two or three years, havinghis hirelings come to him instead. He'd branched out a lot, even at thatdistance, getting into copper and such, and being president of banks andtrusts here and there and equitable cooperative companies and all suchthings that help to keep the lower classes trimmed proper. For a wholelot of years I didn't see either of 'em. I sort of lost track of theoutfit, except as I'd see the name of Angus heading a new board ofdirectors after the reorganization, or renting the north half ofScotland for the sage-hen and coyote shooting, or whatever the game isthere. Of course it took genius to do this with Angus, and I've neverdenied that Ellabelle has it. I bet there wasn't a day in all them yearsthat Angus didn't believe himself to be a stubborn, domineering brute,riding roughshod over the poor little wreck of a woman. If he didn't itwasn't for want of his wife accusing him of it in so many words—andperhaps a few more.

"I guess she got to feeling so sure of herself she let her work coarsenup. Anyway, when little Angus come to be eighteen his pa shocked her oneday by saying he must go back home to some good college. 'You meanEngland,' says Ellabelle, they being at the time on some other foreigndomains.

"'I do not,' says Angus, 'nor Sweden nor Japan nor East Africa. I meanthe United States.' 'You're jesting,' says she. 'You wrong me cruelly,'says Angus. 'The lad's eighteen and threatening to be a foreigner.Should he stay here longer it would set in his blood.' 'Remember hisweak throat,' says Ellabelle. 'I did,' says Angus. 'To save you troubleI sent for a specialist to look him over. He says the lad has never aflaw in his throat. We'll go soon.'

"Of course it was dirty work on the part of Angus, getting to thespecialist first, but she saw she had to take it. She knew it was likethe time they agreed on his name—she could see the Scotch blood leapingin his veins. So she gave in with never a mutter that Angus could hear.That's part of the genius of Ellabelle, knowing when she can and whenshe positively cannot, and making no foolish struggle in the latterevent.

"Back they come to New York and young Angus went to the swellest collegeEllabelle could learn about, and they had a town house and a countryhouse and Ellabelle prepared to dazzle New York society, having metfrayed ends of it in her years abroad. But she couldn't seem to put itover. Lots of male and female society foreigners that she'd met wouldcome and put up with her and linger on in the most friendly manner, butEllabelle never fools herself so very much. She knew she wasn't makingthe least dent in New York itself. She got uncomfortable there. I betshe had that feeling you get when you're riding your horse over softground and all at once he begins to bog down.

"Anyway, they come West after a year or so, where Angus had more dragand Ellabelle could feel more important. Not back to Wallace, of course.Ellabelle had forgotten the name of that town, and also they come over aroad that misses the thriving little town of North Platte by severalhundred miles. And pretty soon they got into this darned swell littlesuburb out from San Francisco, through knowing one of the old familiesthat had lived there man and boy for upward of four years. It's a townwhere I believe they won't let you get off the train unless you got avisitor's card and a valet.

"Here at last Ellabelle felt she might come into her own, for partiesseemed to recognize her true worth at once. Some of them indeed shecould buffalo right on the spot, for she hadn't lived in Europe and suchplaces all them years for nothing. So, camping in a miserable rentedshack that never cost a penny over seventy thousand dollars, with onlythirty-eight rooms and no proper space for the servants, they set towork building their present marble palace—there's inside and outsidepictures of it in a magazine somewhere round here—bigger than the stateinsane asylum and very tasty and expensive, with hand-painted ceilingsand pergolas and cafés and hot and cold water and everything.

"It was then I first see Ellabelle after all the years, and I want totell you she was impressive. She looked like the descendant of a longline of ancestry or something and she spoke as good as any reciter youever heard in a hall. Last time I had seen her she was still forgettingabout the r's—she'd say: 'Oh, there-urr you ah!' thus showing she wasat least half Iowa in breed—but nothing like that now. She could givethe English cards and spades and beat them at their own game. Her facelooked a little bit overmassaged and she was having trouble keeping herhips down, and wore a patent chin-squeezer nights, and her hair couldn'tbe trusted to itself long at a time; but she knew how to dress and she'dlearned decency in the use of the diamond except when it was reallyproper to break out all over with 'em. You'd look at her twice in anyshow ring. Ain't women the wonders! Gazing at Ellabelle when she hadeverything on, you'd never dream that she'd come up from the vilestdregs only a few years before—helping cook for the harvest hands inIowa, feeding Union Pacific passengers at twenty-two a month, orsplitting her own kindling at Wallace, Idaho, and dreaming about a newsilk dress for next year, or mebbe the year after if things went well.

"Men ain't that way. Angus had took no care of his figure, which was nowpouchy, his hair was gray, and he was either shedding or had beenreached, and he had lines of care and food in his face, and took nopains whatever with his accent—or with what he said, for that matter. Inever saw a man yet that could hide a disgraceful past like a woman can.They don't seem to have any pride. Most of 'em act like they don't carea hoot whether people find it out on 'em or not.

"Angus was always reckless that way, adding to his wife's burden ofanxiety. She'd got her own vile past well buried, but she never knewwhen his was going to stick its ugly head up out of its grave. He'd goalong all right for a while like one of the best set had ought to—thenZooey! We was out to dinner at another millionaire's one night—in thattown you're either a millionaire or drawing wages from one—and Angustalked along with his host for half an hour about the impossibility ofgetting a decent valet on this side of the water, Americans not knowingtheir place like the English do, till you'd have thought he was born toit, and then all at once he breaks out about the hardwood finish to thedining-room, and how the art of graining has perished and ought to berevived. 'And I wish I had a silver dollar,' he says, 'for every doorlike that one there that I've grained to resemble the natural wood socunningly you'd never guess it—hardly.'

"At that his break didn't faze any one but Ellabelle. The host was anold train-robber who'd cut your throat for two bits—I'll bet hecouldn't play an honest game of solitaire—and he let out himself rightoff that he had once worked in a livery stable and was proud of it; butpoor Ellabelle, who'd been talking about the dear Countess of Comtessaor somebody, and the dukes and earls that was just one-two-three withher on the other side, she blushed up till it almost showed through thesecond coating. Angus was certainly poison ivy to her on occasion, andhe'd refuse to listen to reason when she called him down about it. He'ddo most of the things she asked him to about food and clothes and soforth—like the time he had the two gold teeth took out and replaced byreal porcelain nature fakers—but he never could understand why hewasn't free to chat about the days when he earned what money he had.

"It was this time that I first saw little Angus since he had changedfrom a governess to a governor—or whatever they call the he-teacher ofa millionaire's brat. He was home for the summer vacation. Naturally I'dbeen prejudiced against him not only by his mother's praise but by hisfather's steady coppering of the same. Judiciously comparing the two, Iwas led to expect a kind of cross between Little Lord Fauntleroy and thelate Sitting Bull, with the vices of each and the virtues of neither.Instead of which I found him a winsome whelp of six-foot or so withScotch eyes and his mother's nose and chin and a good, big, straightmouth, and full of the most engaging bedevilments for one and all. Hedidn't seem to be any brighter in his studies than a brute of that ageshould be, and though there was something easy and grand in his mannerthat his pa and ma never had, he wasn't really any more foreign thanwhat I be. Of course he spoke Eastern American instead of Western, butyou forgive him that after a few minutes when you see how nice henaturally meant to be. I admit we took to each other from the start.They often say I'm a good mixer, but it took no talent to get next tothat boy. I woke up the first night thinking I knew what old silly woulddo her darndest to adopt him if ever his poor pa and ma was to getbuttered over the right of way in some railroad accident.

"And yet I didn't see Angus, Junior, one bit the way either of hisparents saw him. Ellabelle seemed to look on him merely as a smartdresser and social know-it-all that would be a 98 cent credit to her inthe position of society queen for which the good God had always intendedher. And his father said he wasn't any good except to idle away his timeand spend money, and would come to a bad end by manslaughter in ahigh-powered car; or in the alcoholic ward of some hospital; that hewas, in fact, a mere helling scapegrace that would have been put in somegood detention home years before if he hadn't been born to a father thatwas all kinds of a so-and-so old Scotch fool. There you get Angus,fills, from three different slants, and I ain't saying there wasn'tjustification for the other two besides mine. The boy could act in acrowd of tea-drinking women with a finish that made his father look likesome one edging in to ask where they wanted the load of coal dumped. Butalso Angus, peer, was merely painting the lily, as they say, when he'dtell all the different kinds of Indian the boy was. That very summerbefore he went back to the educational centre where they teach sucharts, he helped wreck a road house a few miles up the line till itlooked like one of them pictures of what a Zeppelin does to a rare oldEnglish drug store in London. And a week later he lost a race with theLos Angeles flyer, account of not having as good a roadbed to run on asthe train had, and having to take too short a turn with his new car.

"I remember we three was wondering where he could be that night thetelephone rung from the place where kindly strangers had hauled him forfirst aid to the foolish. But it was the boy himself that was able totalk and tell his anxious parents to forget all about it. His fathertook the message and as soon as he got the sense of it he begun to gethopeful that the kid had broke at least one leg—thinking, he must havebeen, of the matched pacing stallions that once did himself such a goodturn without meaning to. His disappointment was pitiful as he turned tous after learning that he had lit on his head but only sustained a fewbruises and sprains and concussions, with the wall-paper scraped offhere and there.

"'Struck on his head, the only part of him that seems invulnerable,'says the fond father. 'What's that?' he yells, for the boy was talkingagain. He listened a minute, and it was right entertaining to watch hisface work as the words come along. It registered all the evil thatScotland has suffered from her oppressors since they first thought upthe name for it. Finally he begun to splutter back—it must have soundedfine at the other end—but he had to hang up, he was that emotional.After he got his face human again he says to us:

"'Would either of you think now that you could guess at what might havebeen his dying speech? Would you guess it might be words of cheer to thebereaved mother that nursed him, or even a word of comfort to the idiotfather that never touched whipleather to his back while he was stillhusky enough to get by with it? Well, you'd guess wild. He's butinflamed with indignation over the state of the road where he passed outfor some minutes. He says it's a disgrace to any civilized community,and he means to make trouble about it with the county supervisor, whomust be a murderer at heart, and then he'll take it up to the supremecourt and see if we can't have roads in this country as good asNapoleon the First made them build in France, so a gentleman can speedup a bit over five miles an hour without breaking every bone in hisbody, to say nothing of totally ruining a car costing forty-eighthundred dollars of his good money, with the ink on the check for itscarce dry. He was going on to say that he had the race for the crossingas good as won and had just waved mockingly at the engineer of thedefeated train who was pretending to feel indifferent about it—but Ihung up on him. My strength was waning. Was he here this minute I makeno doubt I'd go to the mat with him, unequal as we are in prowess.' Hedribbled off into vicious mutterings of what he'd say to the boy if hewas to come to the door.

"Then dear Ellabelle pipes up: 'And doesn't the dear boy say who waswith him in this prank?'

"Angus snorted horribly at the word 'prank,' just like he'd never hadone single advantage of foreign travel. 'He does indeed—one of thoseHammersmith twin louts was with him—the speckled devil with the lisp, Igather—and praise God his bones, at least, are broke in two places!'

"Ellabelle's eyes shined up at this with real delight. 'How terrible!'she says, not looking it. 'That's Gerald Hammersmith, son of Mrs. St.John Hammersmith, leader of the most exclusive set here—oh, she's quitein the lead of everything that has class! And after this we must knoweach other far, far better than we have in the past. She has nevercalled up to this time. I must inquire after her poor boy directlyto-morrow comes.' That is Ellabelle. Trust her not to overlook a singlebet.

"Angus again snorted in a common way. 'St. John Hammersmith!' says he,steaming up, 'When he trammed ore for three-fifty a day and went to bedwith his clothes on any night he'd the price of a quart of gin-and-beermixed—liking to get his quick—his name was naked 'John' with never aSaint to it, which his widow tacked on a dozen years later. And speakingof names, Mrs. McDonald, I sorely regret you didn't name your own sonafter your first willful fancy. It was no good day for his father whenyou put my own name to him.'

"But Ellabelle paid no attention whatever to this rough stuff, beingalready engaged in courting the Hammersmith dame for the good of hersocial importance. I make no doubt before the maid finished rubbing inthe complexion cream that night she had reduced this upstart to theranks and stepped into her place as leader of the most exclusive socialset between South San Francisco and old Henry Miller's ranch house atGilroy. Anyway, she kept talking to herself about it, almost over themangled remains of her own son, as you might say.

"A year later the new mansion was done, setting in the centre of sixtyacres of well-manicured land as flat as a floor and naturally calledHillcrest. Angus asked me down for another visit. There had been granddoings to open the new house, and Ellabelle felt she was on the way toruling things social with an iron hand if she was just careful anddidn't overbet her cards. Angus, not being ashamed of his scandalouspast, was really all that kept her nerves strung up. It seems he'd giveher trouble while the painters and decorators was at work, hanging round'em fascinated and telling 'em how he'd had to work ten hours a day inhis time and how he could grain a door till it looked exactly like thenatural wood, so they'd say it wasn't painted at all. And one day hebecome so inflamed with evil desire that Ellabelle, escorting a bunch ofthe real triple-platers through the mansion, found him with his coat offlearning how to rub down a hardwood panel with oil and pumice stone.Gee! Wouldn't I like to of been there! I suppose I got a lower nature aswell as the rest of us.

"After I'd been there a few days, along comes Angus, fills, out intothe world from college to make a name for himself. By ingenuity ornative brute force he had contrived to graduate. He was nice as ever andtold me he was going to look about a bit until he could decide what hisfield of endeavour should be. Apparently it was breaking his neck inoutdoor sports, including loop-the-loop in his new car on roads notmeant for it, and delighting Ellabelle because he was a fine social dragin her favour, and enraging his father by the same reasons. Ellabellewas especially thrilled by his making up to a girl that was daughter tothis here old train-robber I mentioned. It was looking like he mightform an alliance, as they say, with this old family which had livedquite a decent life since they actually got it. The girl looked to menice enough even for Angus, Junior, but his pa denounced her as ayellow-haired pest with none but frivolous aims in life, who wouldn'tknow whether a kitchen was a room in a house or a little woolly animalfrom Paraguay. We had some nice, friendly breakfasts, I believe not,whilst they discussed this poisonous topic, old Angus being only furtherembittered when it comes out that the train-robber is also dead setagainst this here alliance because his only daughter needs a decent,reputable man who would come home nights from some low mahogany den in abank building, and not a worthless young hound that couldn't make adollar of his own and had displayed no talent except for winning thenotice of head waiters and policemen. Old Angus says he knows wellenough his son can be arrested out of most crowds just on thatdescription alone, but who is this So-and-So old thug to be saying it inpublic?

"And so it went, with Ellabelle living in high hopes and young Angusbusy inventing new ways to bump himself off, and old Angus getting moreand more seething—quiet enough outside, but so desperate inside that itwasn't any time at all till I saw he was just waiting for a good chanceto make some horrible Scotch exhibition of himself.

"Then comes the fatal polo doings, with young Angus playing on the sidethat won, and Ellabelle being set up higher than ever till she actuallybegins to snub people here and there at the game that look like they'dswallow it, and old Angus ashamed and proud and glaring round as if he'dlike to hear some one besides himself call his son a worthless younghound—if they wanted to start something.

"And the polo victory of course had to be celebrated by a banquet at thehotel, attended by all the players and their huskiest ruffian friends.They didn't have the ponies there, but I guess they would of if they'dthought of it. It must have been a good banquet, with vintages and songand that sort of thing—I believe they even tried to have food atfirst—and hearty indoor sports with the china and silver and chairsthat had been thoughtlessly provided and a couple of big mirrors thatlooked as if you could throw a catsup bottle clear through them, onlyyou couldn't, because it would stop there after merely breaking theglass, and spatter in a helpless way.

"And of course there was speeches. The best one, as far as I couldlearn, was made by the owner of the outraged premises at a latehour—when the party was breaking up—as you might put it. He said thebill would be about eighteen hundred dollars, as near as he could tellat first glance. He was greeted with hearty laughter and applause fromthe high-spirited young incendiaries and retired hastily through anunsuspected door to the pantry as they rushed for him. It was then theyfound out what to do with the rest of the catsup—and did it—so thewalls and ceiling wouldn't look so monotonous, and fixed the windows sothey would let out the foul tobacco smoke, and completed a largepainting of the Yosemite that hung on the wall, doing several things toit that hadn't occurred to the artist in his hurry, and performed aserious operation on the piano without the use of gas. The tables, Ibelieve, was left flat on their backs.

"Angus, fills, was fetched home in a car by a gang of his roguishyoung playmates. They stopped down on the stately drive under my windowand a quartet sung a pathetic song that run:

"Don't forget your parents,
Think all they done for you!

"Then young Angus ascended the marble steps to the top one, bared hisagreeable head to the moonlight, and made them a nice speech. He saidthe campaign now in progress, fellow-citizens, marked the gravest crisisin the affairs of our grand old state that an intelligent constituencyhad ever been called upon to vote down, but that he felt they were onthe eve of a sweeping victory that would sweep the corrupt hell-houndsof a venal opposition into an ignominy from which they would never beswept by any base act of his while they honoured him with theirsuffrages, because his life was an open book and he challenged anyson-of-a-gun within sound of his voice to challenge this to his face ortake the consequences of being swept into oblivion by the high tide ofa people's indignation that would sweep everything before it on thethird day of November next, having been aroused in its might at lastfrom the debasing sloth into which the corrupt hell-hounds of a venalopposition had swept them, but a brighter day had dawned, which wouldsweep the onrushing hordes of petty chicanery to where they would gettheirs; and, as one who had heard the call of an oppressed people, hewould accept this fitting testimonial, not for its intrinsic worth butfor the spirit in which it was tendered. As for the nefarious tariff onwatch springs, sawed lumber, and indigo, he would defer his masterlydiscussion of these burning issues to a more fitting time because a manhad to get a little sleep now and then or he wasn't any good next day.In the meantime he thanked them one and all, and so, gentlemen,good-night.

"The audience cheered hoarsely and drove off. I guess the speech wouldhave been longer if a light hadn't showed in the east wing of the castlewhere Angus, peer, slept. And then all was peace and quiet till thestorm broke on a rocky coast next day. It didn't really break untilevening, but suspicious clouds no bigger than a man's hand might havebeen observed earlier. If young Angus took any breakfast that morning itwas done in the privacy of his apartment under the pitying glances of avalet or something. But here he was at lunch, blithe as ever, and fullof merry details about the late disaster. He spoke with much humourabout a wider use for tomato catsup than was ever encouraged by the oldschool of house decorators. Old Angus listened respectfully, taking onlya few bites of food but chewing them long and thoughtfully. Ellabellewas chiefly interested in the names of the hearty young vandals. She wasdelighted to learn that they was all of the right set, and her eyesglowed with pride. The eyes of Angus, peer, was now glowing with whatI could see was something else, though I couldn't make out just what itwas. He never once exploded like you'd of thought he was due to.

"Then come a note for the boy which the perfect-mannered Englishman thatwas tending us said was brought by a messenger. Young Angus glanced atthe page and broke out indignantly. 'The thieving old pirate!' he says.'Last night he thought it would be about eighteen hundred dollars, andthat sounded hysterical enough for the few little things we'd scratchedor mussed up. I told him he would doubtless feel better this morning,but in any event to send the bill to me and I would pay it.'

"'Quite right of you,' says Ellabelle proudly.

"'And now the scoundrel sends me one for twenty-three hundred and odd.He's a robber, net!'

"Old Angus said never a word, but chewed slowly, whilst various puzzlingexpressions chased themselves acrost his eloquent face. I couldn't makea thing out of any of them.

"'Never patronize the fellow again,' says Ellabelle warmly.

"'As to that,' says her son, 'he hinted something last night abouthaving me arrested if I ever tried to patronize him again, but thatisn't the point. He's robbing me now.'

"'Oh, money!' says Ellabelle in a low tone of disgust and with a gesturelike she was rebuking her son for mentioning such a thing before theservant.

"'But I don't like to be taken advantage of,' says he, looking veryannoyed and grand. Then old Angus swallowed something he'd been chewingfor eight minutes and spoke up with an entirely new expression thatpuzzled me more than ever.

"'If you're sure you have the right of it, don't you submit to theoutrage.'

"Angus, Junior, backed up a little bit at this, not knowing quite how totake the old man's mildness. 'Oh, of course the fellow might win out ifhe took it into court,' he says. 'Every one knows the courts are just amass of corruption.'

"'True, I've heard gossip to that effect,' says his father. 'Yet theremust be some way to thwart the crook. I'm feeling strangely ingenious atthe moment.' He was very mild, and yet there was something sinister andScotch about him that the boy felt.

"'Of course I'd pay it out of my own money,' he remarks generously.

"'Even so, I hate to see you cheated,' says his father kindly. 'I hateto have you pay unjust extortions out of the mere pittance yourtight-fisted old father allows you.'

"Young Angus said nothing to this, but blushed and cougheduncomfortably.

"'If you hurt that hotel anything like twenty-three hundred dollars'worth, it must be an interesting sight,' his father goes on brightly.

"'Oh, it was funny at the time,' says Angus boy, cheering up again.

"'Things often are,' says old Angus. 'I'll have a look.'

"'At the bill?'

"'No, at the wreck,' says he. The old boy was still quiet on theoutside, but was plainly under great excitement, for he now folded hisnapkin with care, a crime of which I knew Ellabelle had broken him thefirst week in New York, years before. I noticed their butler had thefine feeling to look steadily away at the wall during this obscenity.The offender then made a pleasant remark about the beauty of the day andleft the palatial apartment swiftly. Young Angus and his mother lookedat each other and strolled after him softly over rugs costing abouteighty thousand dollars. The husband and father was being driven off bya man he could trust in a car they had let him have for his own use.Later Ellabelle confides to me that she mistrusts old Angus iscontemplating some bit of his national deviltry. 'He had a strange lookon his face,' says she, 'and you know—once a Scotchman, always aScotchman! Oh, it would be pitiful if he did anything peculiarly Scotchjust at our most critical period here!' Then she felt of her face tosee if there was any nervous lines come into it, and there was, and shebeat it for the maid to have 'em rubbed out ere they set.

"Yet at dinner that night everything seemed fine, with old Angus asjovial as I'd ever seen him, and the meal come to a cheerful end and wewas having coffee in the Looey de Medisee saloon, I think it is, beforea word was said about this here injured hotel.

"'You were far too modest this morning, you sly dog!' says Angus,peer, at last, chuckling delightedly. 'You misled me grievously. Thatjob of wrecking shows genius of a quality that was all too rare in mytime. I suspect it's the college that does it. I shouldn't wonder now ifgoing through college is as good as a liberal education. I don't believemere uneducated house-wreckers could have done so pretty a job in twicethe time, and there's clever little touches they never would havethought of at all.'

"'It did look thorough when we left,' says young Angus, not quiteknowing whether to laugh.

"'It's nothing short of sublime,' says his father proudly. 'I stood inthat deserted banquet hall, though it looks never a bit like one, withruin and desolation on every hand as far as the eye could reach. Itinspired such awe in the bereaved owner and me that we instinctivelyspoke in hushed whispers. I've had no such gripping sensation as thatsince I gazed upon the dead city of Pompeii. No longer can it be saidthat Europe possesses all the impressive ruins.'

"Angus boy grinned cheerfully now, feeling that this tribute washeartfelt.

"'I suspect now,' goes on the old boy, 'that when the wreckage iscleared away we shall find the mangled bodies of several that perishedwhen the bolts descended from a clear sky upon the gay scene.'

"'Perhaps under the tables,' says young Angus, chirking up still more atthis geniality. 'Two or three went down early and may still be there.'

"'Yet twenty-three hundred for it is a monstrous outrage,' says the oldman, changing his voice just a mite. 'Too well I know the cost of suchrepairs. Fifteen hundred at most would make the place better thanever—and to think that you, struggling along to keep up appearances onthe little I give you, should be imposed upon by a crook thatundoubtedly has the law on his side! I could endure no thought of it, soI foiled him.'

"'How?' says young Angus, kind of alarmed.

"Angus, peer, yawned and got up. 'It's a long story and would hardlyinterest you,' says he, moving over to the door. 'Besides, I must be tobed against the morrow, which will be a long, hard day for me.' Hisvoice had tightened up.

"'What have you done?' demands Ellabelle passionately.

"'Saved your son eight hundred dollars,' says Angus, 'or the equivalentof his own earnings for something like eight hundred years at currentprices for labour.'

"'I've a right to know,' says Ellabelle through her teeth and stiffeningin her chair. Young Angus just set there with his mouth open.

"'So you have,' says old Angus, and he goes on as crisp as a bunch ofcelery: 'I told you I felt ingenious. I've kept this money in the familyby the simple device of taking the job. I've engaged two other paintersand decorators besides myself, a carpenter, an electrician, a glazier,and a few proletariats of minor talent for clearing away the wreckage. Ishall be on the job at eight. The loafers won't start at seven, as Iused to. Don't think I'd see any son of mine robbed before my very eyes.My new overalls are laid out and my valet has instructions to get meinto them at seven, though he persists in believing I'm to attend afancy-dress ball at some strangely fashionable hour. So I bid you allgood evening.'

"Well, I guess that was the first time Ellabelle had really let go ofherself since she was four years old or thereabouts. Talk about theempress of stormy emotion! For ten minutes the room sounded like atorture chamber of the dark Middle Ages. But the doctor reached there atlast in a swift car, and him and the two maids managed to get her laidout all comfortable and moaning, though still with outbreaks about everytwenty minutes that I could hear clear over on my side of the house.

"And down below my window on the marble porch Angus, fills, waswalking swiftly up and down for about one hour. He made no speech likethe night before. He just walked and walked. The part that struck me wasthat neither of them had ever seemed to have the slightest notion ofpleading old Angus out of his mad folly. They both seemed to know theScotch when it did break out.

"At seven-thirty the next morning the old boy in overalls and jumper anda cap was driven to his job in a car as big as an apartment house. Thecurtains to Ellabelle's Looey Seez boudoir remained drawn, with hourlybulletins from the two Swiss maids that she was passing away in greatagony. Angus, Junior, was off early, too, in his snakiest car. A fewminutes later they got a telephone from him sixty miles away that hewould not be home to lunch. Old Angus had taken his own lunch with himin a tin pail he'd bought the day before, with a little cupola on topfor the cup to put the bottle of cold coffee in.

"It was a joyous home that day, if you don't care how you talk. All itneeded was a crêpe necktie on the knob of the front door. That orneryold hound, Angus, got in from his work at six, spotty with paint andsmelling of oil and turpentine, but cheerful as a new father. He washedup, ridding himself of at least a third of the paint smell, looked in atEllabelle's door to say, 'What! Not feeling well, mamma? Now, that's toobad!' ate a hearty dinner with me, young Angus not having been heardfrom further, and fell asleep in a gold armchair at ten minutes pastnine.

"He was off again next morning. Ellabelle's health was still breakingdown, but young Angus sneaked in and partook of a meagre lunch with me.He was highly vexed with his pa. 'He's nothing but a scoundrelly oldliar,' he says to me, 'saying that he gives me but a pittance. He'salways given me a whale of an allowance. Why, actually, I've more thanonce had money left over at the end of the quarter. And now his talkabout saving money! I tell you he has some other reason than money forbreaking the mater's heart.' The boy looked very shrewd as he said this.

"That night at quitting time he was strangely down at the place with hisown car to fetch his father home. 'I'll trust you this once,' says theold man, getting in and looking more then ever like a dissolute workingman. On the way they passed this here yellow-haired daughter of the oldtrain-robber that there had been talk of the boy making a match with.She was driving her own car and looked neither to right nor left.

"'Not speaking?' says old Angus.

"'She didn't see us,' says the boy.

"'She's ashamed of your father,' says the old man.

"'She's not,' says the boy.

"'You know it,' says the old scoundrel.

"'I'll show her,' says his son.

"Well, we had another cheerful evening, with Ellabelle sending word toold Angus that she wanted me to have the necklace of brilliants with thesapphire pendant, and the two faithful maids was to get suitablekeepsakes out of the rest of her jewels, and would her son always wearthe seal ring with her hair in it that she had given him when he wastwenty? And the old devil started in to tell how much he could havesaved by taking charge of the work in his own house, and how a union mannowadays would do just enough to keep within the law, and so on; but hegot to yawning his head off and retired at nine, complaining that hisvalet that morning had cleaned and pressed his overalls. Young Anguslooked very shrewd at me and again says: 'The old liar! He has someother reason than money. He can't fool me.'

"I kind of gathered from both of them the truth of what happened thenext day. Young Angus himself showed up at the job about nine A.M., witha bundle under his arm. 'Where's the old man?' his father heard himdemand of the carpenter, he usually speaking of old Angus as thegovernor.

"'Here,' says he from the top of a stepladder in the entry which lookedas if a glacier had passed through it.

"'Could you put me to work?' says the boy.

"'Don't get me to shaking with laughter up here,' says the old brute.'Can't you see I'd be in peril of falling off?'

"Young Angus undoes his bundle and reveals overalls and a jumper whichhe gets into quickly. 'What do I do first?' says he.

"His father went on kalsomining and took never a look at him more. 'Thetime has largely passed here,' says he, 'for men that haven't learned todo something, but you might take some of the burnt umber there and workit well into a big gob of that putty till it's brown enough to match thewoodwork. Should you display the least talent for that we may see laterif you've any knack with a putty knife.'

"The new hand had brought no lunch with him, but his father spared him afew scraps from his own, and they all swigged beer from a pail of itthey sent out for. So the scandal was now complete in all its details.The palatial dining-room that night, being a copy of a good church orsomething from ancient Italy, smelled like a paint shop indeed—andsounded like one through dinner. 'That woodwork will be fit tosecond-coat first thing in the morning,' says old Angus. 'I'll have itsandpapered in no time,' says the boy. 'Your sandpapering ain't bad,'says the other, 'though you have next to no skill with a brush.' 'Ithought I was pretty good with that flat one though.' 'Oh, fair; justfair! First-coating needs little finesse. There! I forgot to order morerubbing varnish. Maybe the men will think of it.' And so on till theyboth yawned themselves off to their Scotch Renaysence apartments.Ellabelle had not yet learned the worst. It seemed to be felt that shehad a right to perish without suffering the added ignominy of knowingher son was acting like a common wage slave.

"They was both on the job next day. Of course the disgraceful affair hadby now penetrated to the remotest outlying marble shack. Several malemillionaires this day appeared on the scene to josh Angus, peer, andAngus, fills, as they toiled at their degrading tasks. Not muchattention was paid to 'em, it appears, not even to the old train-robberwho come to jest and remained to cross-examine Angus about how much hewas really going to clear on the job, seriously now. Anything like thatwas bound to fascinate the old crook.

"And next day, close to quitting time, what happens but this here robberchieftain's petted daughter coming in and hanging round and begging tobe let to help because it was such jolly fun. I believe she did get holdof a square of sandpaper with which she daintily tried to remove somefresh varnish that should have been let strictly alone; and when theyboth ordered her out in a frenzy of rage, what does she do but wait for'em with her car which she made them enter and drove them to their abodelike they belonged to the better class of people that one would care toknow. The two fools was both kind of excited about this that night.

"The next day she breezes in again and tries to get them to knock off anhour early so she can take them to the country club for tea, but theyrefuse this, so she makes little putty statues of them both and drove afew nails where they would do no good and upset a bucket of paste andleaned a two-hundred-dollar lace thing against a varnished wall to thedetriment of both, and fell off a stepladder. Old Angus caught her andboxed her ears soundly. And again she drove them through the avenues ofa colony of fine old families with money a little bit older, by a fewdays, and up the drive to their own door.

"Ellabelle was peeking between the plush curtains on this occasion, forsome heartless busybody during the day had told her that her son andhusband was both renegades now. And strangely enough, she begun to getback her strength from that very moment—seeing that exclusive andwell-known young debby-tant consorting in public with the reprobates.I'm darned if she didn't have the genius after that to treat the wholething as a practical joke, especially when she finds out that none ofthem exclusives had had it long enough to look down on anothermillionaire merely for pinching a penny now and then. Old Angus as amatter of fact had become just a little more important than she had everbeen and could have snubbed any one he wanted to. The only single one inthe whole place that throwed him down was his own English valet. He wasfound helpless drunk in a greenhouse the third day, having ruined ninethousand dollars' worth of orchids he'd gone to sleep amongst, and heresigned his position with bitter dignity the moment he recoveredconsciousness.

"Moreover, young Angus and this girl clenched without furtheropposition. Her train-robber father said the boy must have something inhim even if he didn't look it, and old Angus said he still believed thegirl to be nothing but a yellow-haired soubrette; but what should weexpect of a woman, after all?

"The night the job was finished we had the jolliest dinner of my visit,with a whole gang of exclusive-setters at the groaning board, includingthis girl and her folks, and champagne, of which Angus, peer, consumednear one of the cut-glass vases full.

"I caught him with young Angus in the deserted library later, while therest was one-stepping in the Henry Quatter ballroom or dance hall. Theold man had his arms pretty well upon the boy's shoulders. Yes, sir, hewas almost actually hugging him. The boy fled to this gilded café wherethe rest was, and old Angus, with his eyes shining very queer, he grabsme by the arm and says, 'Once when he was very small—though unusuallylarge for his age of three, mind you—he had a way of scratching my facesomething painful with his little nails, and all in laughing play, youknow. I tried to warn him, but he couldn't understand, of course; so,not knowing how else to instruct him, I scratched back one day, laughingmyself like he was, but sinking my nails right fierce into the back ofhis little fat neck. He relaxed the tension in his own fingers. He washurt, for the tears started, but he never cried. He just looked puzzledand kept on laughing, being bright to see I could play the game, too.Only he saw it wasn't so good a game as he'd thought. I wonder whatmade me think of that, now! I don't know. Come—from yonder doorway wecan see him as he dances.'

"And Ellabelle was saying gently to one and all, with her merry peal oflaughter, 'Ah, yes—once a Scotchman, always—'

"My land! It's ten o'clock. Don't them little white-faced beauties makethe music! Honestly I'd like to have a cot out in the corral. We miss alot of it in here."

V

NON PLUSH ULTRA

Sunday and a driving rain had combined to keep Ma Pettengill within theArrowhead ranch house. Neither could have done this alone. The rainwould merely have added a slicker to her business costume of khakiriding breeches, laced boots, and flannel shirt as she rode abroad;while a clement Sabbath would have seen her "resting," as she would putit, in and round the various outbuildings, feeding-pens, blacksmithshop, harness-room, branding-chute, or what not, issuing orders toattentive henchmen from time to time; diagnosing the gray mule'sbarbed-wire cut; compounding a tonic for Adolph, the big milk-strainDurham bull, who has been ailing; wishing to be told why in somethingthe water hadn't been turned into that south ditch; and, like acompetent general, disposing her forces and munitions for the campaignof the coming week. But Sunday—and a wildly rainy Sunday—had housedher utterly.

Being one who can idle with no grace whatever she was engaged in whatshe called putting the place to rights. This meant taking out thecontents of bureau drawers and wardrobes and putting them back again,massing the litter on the big table in the living-room into an involvedgeometry of neat piles that would endure for all of an hour,straightening pictures on the walls, eliminating the home-circles ofspiders long unmolested, loudly calling upon Lew Wee, the Chinaman, whoaffrightedly fled farther and farther after each call, and ever andagain booming pained surmises through the house as to what fearful stateit would get to be in if she didn't fight it to a clean finish once in adog's age.

The woman dumped a wastebasket of varied rubbish into the open fire,leaned a broom against the mantel, readjusted the towel that protectedher gray hair from the dust—hair on week days exposed with never aqualm to all manner of dust—cursed all Chinamen on land or sea with anespecial and piquant blight invoked upon the one now in hiding, thentook from the back of a chair where she had hung it the moment before ariding skirt come to feebleness and decrepitude. She held it up beforecritical eyes as one scanning the morning paper for headlines ofsignificance.

"Ruined!" she murmured. Even her murmur must have reached Lew Wee, howremote soever his isle of safety. "Worn one time and all ruined up!That's what happens for trying to get something for nothing. You'd thinkwomen would learn. You would if you didn't know a few. Hetty Daggett,her that was Hetty Tipton, orders this by catalogue, No. 3456 orsomething, from the mail-order house in Chicago. I was down in Red Gapwhen it come. 'Isn't it simply wonderful what you can get for threethirty-eight!' says she with gleaming eyes, laying this thing out beforeme. 'I don't see how they can ever do it for the money.' She found outthe next day when she rode up here in it with me and Mr. BurchellDaggett, her husband. Nothing but ruin! Seams all busted, sleazy clothwore through. But Hetty just looks it over cheerfully and says: 'Oh,well, what can you expect for three thirty-eight?' Is that like a womanor is it like something science has not yet discovered?

"That Hetty child is sure one woman. This skirt would never have heldtogether to ride back in, so she goes down as far as the narrow gauge inthe wagon with Buck Devine, wearing a charming afternoon frock of paleblue charmeuse rather than get into a pair of my khakis and ride backwith her own lawful-wedded husband; yes, sir; married to him safe asanything, but wouldn't forget her womanhood. Only once did she ever comenear it. I saved her then because she hadn't snared Mr. Burchell Daggettyet, and of course a girl has to be a little careful. And she took mycounsels so much to heart she's been careful ever since. 'Why, I shouldsimply die of mortification if my dear mate were to witness me inthose,' says she when I'm telling her to take a chance for once and getinto these here riding pants of mine because it would be uncomfortablegoing down in that wagon. 'But what is my comfort compared to dearBurchell's peace of mind?' says she.

"Ain't we the goods, though, when we do once learn a thing? Of coursemost of us don't have to learn stuff like this. Born in us. I shouldn'twonder if they was something in the talk of this man Shaw or Shavian—Isee the name spelled both ways in the papers. I can't read his piecesmyself because he rasps me, being not only a smarty but a vegetarian. Idon't know. I might stand one or the other purebred, but the cross seemsto bring out the worst strain in both. I once got a line on his beliefsand customs though—like it appears he don't believe anything ought tobe done for its own sake but only for some good purpose. It was one dayI got caught at a meeting of the Onward and Upward Club in Red Gap andMrs. Alonzo Price read a paper about his meaning. I hope she didn'twrong him. I hope she was justified in all she said he really means inhis secret heart. No one ought to talk that way about any one if theyain't got the goods on 'em. One thing I might have listened to with somepatience if the man et steaks and talked more like some one you'd careto have in your own home. In fact, I listened to it anyway. Maybe hetook it from some book he read—about woman and her true nature.According to Henrietta Templeton Price, as near as I could get her, thisShaw or Shavian believes that women is merely a flock of men-hawkscircling above the herd till they see a nice fat little lamb of a man,then one fell swoop and all is over but the screams of the victim dyingout horribly. They bear him off to their nest in a blasted pine and pickthe meat from his bones at leisure. Of course that ain't the way ladieswas spoken of in the Aunt Patty Little Helper Series I got out of thePresbyterian Sabbath-school library back in Fredonia, New York, when Iwas thirteen—and yet—and yet—as they say on the stage in these playsof high or English life."

It sounded promising enough, and the dust had now settled so that Icould dimly make out the noble lines of my hostess. I begged for more.

"Well, go on—Mrs. Burchell Daggett once nearly forgot her womanhood.Certainly, go on, if it's anything that would be told outside of asmoking-car."

The lady grinned.

"Many of us has forgot our womanhood in the dear, dead past," sheconfessed. "Me? Sure! Where's that photo album. Where did I put thatalbum anyway? That's the way in this house. Get things straightened uponce, you can't find a single one you want. Look where I put it now!"She demolished an obelisk of books on the table, one she had latelyconstructed with some pains, and brought the album that had been itspedestal. "Get me there, do you?"

It was the photograph of a handsome young woman in the voluminous ridingskirt of years gone by, before the side-saddle became extinct. She helda crop and wore an astoundingly plumed bonnet. Despite the offensivedisguise, one saw provocation for the course adopted by the lateLysander John Pettengill at about that period.

"Very well—now get me here, after I'd been on the ranch only a month."It was the same young woman in the not too foppish garb of a cowboy. Inwide-brimmed hat, flannel shirt, woolly chaps, quirt in hand, shebestrode a horse that looked capable and daring.

"Yes, sir, I hadn't been here only a month when I forgot my womanhoodlike that. Gee! How good it felt to get into 'em and banish thatsideshow tent of a skirt. I'd never known a free moment before and Iblessed Lysander John for putting me up to it. Then, proud as Punch,what do I do but send one of these photos back to dear old AuntWaitstill, in Fredonia, thinking she would rejoice at the wild, freelife I was now leading in the Far West. And what do I get for it but atear-spotted letter of eighteen pages, with a side-kick from her pastor,the Reverend Abner Hemingway, saying he wishes to indorse every word ofSister Baxter's appeal to me—asking why do I parade myself shamelesslyin this garb of a fallen woman, and can nothing be said to recall me tothe true nobility that must still be in my nature but which I amforgetting in these licentious habiliments, and so on! The picture hadbeen burned after giving the Reverend his own horrified flash of it, andthey would both pray daily that I might get up out of this degradationand be once more a good, true woman that some pure little child wouldnot be ashamed to call the sacred name of mother.

"Such was Aunt Waitstill—what names them poor old girls had to standfor! I had another aunt named Obedience, only she proved to be a regularcinch-binder. Her name was never mentioned in the family after she sliddown a rainspout one night and eloped to marry a depraved scoundrel whodrove through there on a red wagon with tinware inside that he wouldtrade for old rags. I'm just telling you how times have changed in spiteof the best efforts of a sanctified ministry. I cried over that letterat first. Then I showed it to Lysander John, who said 'Oh, hell!' beinga man of few words, so I felt better and went right on forgetting mywomanhood in that shameless garb of a so-and-so—though where aunty hadgot her ideas of such I never could make out—and it got to be so much amatter of course and I had so many things to think of besides mywomanhood that I plumb forgot the whole thing until this social upheavalin Red Gap a few years ago.

"I got to tell you that the wild and lawless West, in all mattersrelating to proper dress for ladies, is the most conservative andhidebound section of our great land of the free and home of thebrave—if you can get by with it. Out here the women see by the Sundaypapers that it's being wore that way publicly in New York and no onearrested for it, but they don't hardly believe it at that, and theywouldn't show themselves in one, not if you begged them to on yourbended knees, and what is society coming to anyway? You might as welldress like one of them barefooted dancers, only calling 'em barefootedmust be meant like sarcasm—and they'd die before they'd let a daughterof theirs make a show of herself like that for odious beasts of men toleer at, and so on—until a couple years later Mrs. Henrietta TempletonPrice gets a regular one and wears it down Main Street, and nothingobjectionable happens; so then they all hustle to get one—not quite soextreme, of course, but after all, why not, since only the evil-mindedcould criticise? Pretty soon they're all wearing it exactly like NewYork did two years ago, with mebbe the limit raised a bit here and thereby some one who makes her own. But again they're saying that the latestone New York is wearing is so bad that it must be confined to a certainclass of women, even if they do get taken from left to right at AsburyPark and Newport and other colonies of wealth and fashion, because thevilest dregs can go there if they have the price, which they often do.

"Red Gap is like that. With me out here on the ranch it didn't matterwhat I wore because it was mostly only men that saw me; but I can wellremember the social upheaval when our smartest young matrons andwell-known society belles flung modesty to the chinook wind and took todivided skirts for horseback riding. My, the brazen hussies! It ain't somany years ago. Up to that time any female over the age of nine caughtriding a horse cross-saddle would have lost her character good andquick. And these pioneers lost any of theirs that wasn't cemented goodand hard with proved respectability. I remember hearing Jeff Tuttle tellwhat he'd do to any of his womenfolks that so far forgot the sacrednames of home and mother. It was startling enough, but Jeff somehownever done it. And if he was to hear Addie or one of the girls talkingabout a side-saddle to-day he'd think she was nutty or mebbe wanting onefor the state museum. So it goes with us. My hunch is that so it willever go.

"The years passed, and that thrill of viciousness at wearing dividedskirts in public got all rubbed off—that thrill that every last one ofus adores to feel if only it don't get her talked about—too much—byevil-minded gossips. Then comes this here next upheaval over ridingpants for ladies—or them that set themselves up to be such. Of coursewe'd long known that the things were worn in New York and even in suchmodern Babylons as Spokane and Seattle; but no woman in Red Gap had everforgot she had a position to keep up, until summer before last, when wesaw just how low one of our sex could fall, right out on the publicstreet.

"She was the wife of a botanist from some Eastern college and him andher rode a good bit and dressed just alike in khaki things. My, theinfamies that was intimated about that poor creature! She was bony andhad plainly seen forty, very severe-featured, with scraggly hair and asharp nose and spectacles, and looked as if she had never had a momentof the most innocent pleasure in all her life; but them riding pantsfixed her good in the minds of our lady porch-knockers. And the men justas bad, though they could hardly bear to look twice at her, she was thatdiscouraging to the eye; they agreed with their wives that she must beone of that sort.

"But things seem to pile up all at once in our town. That very summerthe fashion magazines was handed round with pages turned down at themore daring spots where ladies were shown in such things. It wasn't feltthat they were anything for the little ones to see. But still, afterall, wasn't it sensible, now really, when you come right down to it? andas a matter of fact isn't a modest woman modest in anything?—it isn'twhat she wears but how she conducts herself in public, or don't youthink so, Mrs. Ballard?—and you might as well be dead as out of style,and would Lehman, the Square Tailor, be able to make up anything likethat one there?—but no, because how would he get your measure?—andsurely no modest woman could give him hers even if she did take itherself—anyway, you'd be insulted by all the street rowdies as you rodeby, to say nothing of being ogled by men without a particle of finenessin their natures—but there's always something to be said on both sides,and it's time woman came into her own, anyway, if she is ever to beanything but man's toy for his idle moments—still it would never do togo to extremes in a narrow little town like this with every one justlooking for an excuse to talk—but it would be different if all the bestpeople got together and agreed to do it, only most of them wouldprobably back out at the last moment and that smarty on the Recorderwould try to be funny about it—now that one with the long coat doesn'tlook so terrible, does it? or do you think so?—of course it's almostthe same as a skirt except when you climb on or something—a woman hasto think of those things—wouldn't Daisy Estelle look rather stunning inthat?—she has just the figure for it. Here's this No. 9872 with theNorfolk jacket in this mail-order catalogue—do you think that looks tootheatrical, or don't you? Of course for some figures, but I've alwaysbeen able to wear—And so forth, for a month or so.

"Late in the fall Henrietta Templeton Price done it. You may not knowwhat that meant to Alonzo Price, Choice Villa Sites and Price's Additionto Red Gap. Alonzo is this kind: I met him the day Gussie Himebaugh hadher accident when the mules she was driving to the mowing machine runaway out on Himebaugh's east forty. Alonzo had took Doc Maybury out andpasses me coming back. 'How bad was she hurt?' I asks. The poor thinglooks down greatly embarrassed and mumbles: 'She has broken a limb.''Leg or arm?' I blurts out, forgetting all delicacy. You'd think I hadhim pinned down, wouldn't you? Not Lon, though. 'A lower limb,' says he,coughing and looking away.

"You see how men are till we put a spike collar and chain on 'em. WhenHenrietta declared herself Alonzo read the riot act and declared maritallaw. But there was Henrietta with the collar and chain and pretty soonLon was saying: 'You're quite right, Pettikins, and you ought to havethe thanks of the community for showing our ladies how to dressrationally on horseback. It's not only sensible and safe but it'smodest—a plain pair of riding breeches, no coquetry, no frills, nothingbut stern utility—of course I agree.'

"'I hoped you would, darling,' says Henrietta. She went to MissGunslaugh and had her make the costume, being one who rarely does thingsby halves. It was of blue velvet corduroy, with a fetching little bolerojacket, and the things themselves were fitted, if you know what I mean.And stern utility! That suit with its rosettes and bows and frogs andbraid had about the same stern utility as those pretty little tin tongsthat come on top of a box of candy—ever see anybody use one of those?When Henrietta got dressed for her first ride and had put on the CubanPink Face Balm she looked like one of the gypsy chorus in the BohemianGirl opera.

"Alonzo gulped several times in rapid succession when he saw her, butthe little man never starts anything he don't aim to finish, and it wastoo late to start it then. Henrietta brazened her way through MainStreet and out to the country club and back, and next day she put themon again so Otto Hirsch, of the E-light Studio, could come up and takeher standing by the horse out in front of the Price mansion. Then theywas laid away until the Grand Annual Masquerade Ball of the Order of theEastern Star, which is a kind of hen Masons, when she again gave us aflash of what New York society ladies was riding their horse in. As amatter of fact, Henrietta hates a horse like a rattlesnake, but she haddone her pioneer work for once and all.

"Every one was now laughing and sneering at the old-fashioned dividedskirt with which woman had endangered her life on a horse, and wonderinghow they had endured the clumsy things so long; and come spring all theprominent young society buds and younger matrons of the most exclusiveset who could stay on a horse at all was getting theirs ready for theapproaching season, Red Gap being like London in having its gayestseason in the summer, when people can get out more. Even Mis' JudgeBallard fell for it, though hers was made of severe black with a longcoat. She looked exactly like that Methodist minister, the old one, thatwe had three years ago.

"Most of the younger set used the mail-order catalogue, their figuresstill permitting it. And maybe there wasn't a lot of trying on behinddrawn blinds pretty soon, and delighted giggles and innocent girlishwonderings about whether the lowest type of man really ogles as muchunder certain circ*mstances as he's said to. And the minute the roadsgot good the telephone of Pierce's Livery, Feed, and Sale Stable waskept on the ring. Then the social upheaval was on. Of course any of 'emlooked quiet after Henrietta's costume, for none of the girls but BerylMae Macomber, a prominent young society bud, aged seventeen, had doneanything like that. But it was the idea of the thing.

"A certain element on the South Side made a lot of talk and stirredthings up and wrote letters to the president of the Civic Purity League,who was Mis' Judge Ballard herself, asking where this unspeakabledisrobing business was going to end and calling her attention to thefate that befell Sodom and Gomorrah. But Mis' Ballard she's mixed onnames and gets the idea these parties mean Samson and Delilah instead ofa couple of twin cities, like St. Paul and Minneapolis, and she writesback saying what have these Bible characters got to do with a ladyriding on horseback—in trousers, it is true, but with a coat fallingmodestly to the knee on each side, and certain people had better be alittle more fussy about things that really matter in life before theybegin to talk. She knew who she was hitting at all right, too. TrustMis' Ballard!

"It was found that there was almost the expected amount of ogling fromsidewalk loafers, at first. As Daisy Estelle Maybury said, it seemed asif a girl couldn't show herself on the public thoroughfare without beingsubjected to insult. Poor Daisy Estelle! She had been a very popularyoung society belle, and was considered one of the most attractive girlsin Red Gap until this happened. No one had ever suspected it of her inthe least degree up to that time. Of course it was too late after shewas once seen off her horse. Them that didn't see was told in fulldetail by them that did. Most of the others was luckier. Beryl MaeMacomber in her sport shirt and trouserettes complained constantly aboutthe odious wretches along Main Street and Fourth, where the post officewas. She couldn't stop even twenty minutes in front of the post office,minding her own business and waiting for some one she knew to come alongand get her mail for her, without having dozens of men stop and ogleher. That, of course, was during the first two weeks after she took togoing for the mail, though the eternal feminine in Beryl Mae probablythought the insulting glances was going to keep up forever.

"I watched the poor child one day along in the third week, waiting therein front of the post office after the four o'clock mail, and no onehardly ogled her at all except some rude children out from school. Whatmade it more pitiful, leaning right there against the post office frontwas Jack Shiels, Sammie Hamilton, and little old Elmer Cox, Red Gap'sthree town rowdies that ain't done a stroke of work since the canningfactory closed down the fall before, creatures that by rights shouldhave been leering at the poor child In all her striking beauty. But, no;the brutes stand there looking at nothing much until Jack Shiels staresa minute at this horse Beryl Mae is on and pipes up: 'Why, say, Ithought Pierce let that little bay runt go to the guy that was in hereafter polo ponies last Thursday. I sure did.' And Sam Hamilton wakes upand says: 'No, sir; not this one. He got rid of a little mare that hadshoulders like this, but she was a roan with kind of mule ears and onefroze off.' And little old Elmer Cox, ignoring this defenceless younggirl with his impudent eyes, he says: 'Yes, Sam's right for once. Piercetried to let this one go, too, but ain't you took a look at his hocks!'Then along comes Dean Duke, the ratty old foreman in Pierce's stable,and he don't ogle a bit, either, like you'd expect one of his debasedcalibre to, but just stops and talks this horse over with 'em and saysyes, it was his bad hocks that lost the sale, and he tells 'em how hehad told Pierce just what to do to get him shaped up for a quick sale,but Pierce wouldn't listen to him, thinking he knew it all himself; andthere the four stood and gassed about this horse without even seeingBeryl Mae, let alone leering at her. I bet she was close to sheddingtears of girlish mortification as she rode off without ever waiting forthe mail. Things was getting to a pretty pass. If low creatures lost toall decent instincts, like these four, wouldn't ogle a girl when she wasout for it, what could be expected of the better element of the town?Still, of course, now and then one or the other of the girls would havea bit of luck to tell of.

"Well, now we come to the crookedest bit of work I ever been guilty of,though first telling you about Mr. Burchell Daggett, an Eastern societyman from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, that had come to Red Gap that spring to beassistant cashier in the First National, through his uncle having stockin the thing. He was a very pleasant kind of youngish gentleman, aboutthirty-four, I reckon, with dark, parted whiskers and gold eyeglassesand very good habits. He took his place among our very best people rightoff, teaching the Bible class in the M.E. Sabbath-school and belongingto the Chamber of Commerce and the City Beautiful Association, of whichhe was made vice-president, and being prominent at all functions held inour best homes. He wasn't at all one of them that lead a double life bystopping in at the Family Liquor Store for a gin fizz or two after workhours, or going downtown after supper to play Kelly pool at theTemperance Billiard Parlours and drink steam beer, or getting in withthe bunch that gathers in the back room of the Owl Cigar Store of anevening and tells these here suggestive stories. Not that he washide-bound. If he felt the need for a shot of something he'd go into theUnited States Grill and have a glass of sherry and bitters brought tohim at a table and eat a cracker with it, and he'd take in every show,even the Dizzy Belles of Gotham Big Blonde Beauty Show. He was refinedand even moral in the best sense of the word, but still human.

"Our prominent young society buds took the keenest notice of him atonce, as would naturally happen, he being a society bachelor of meansand by long odds the best catch in Red Gap since old Potter Knapp, ofthe Loan and Trust Company, had broke his period of mourning for histhird wife by marrying Myrtle Wade that waited on table at theOccidental Hotel, with the black band still on his left coat sleeve.It's no exaggeration to say that Mr. Burchell Daggett became the mostsought-after social favourite among Reg Gap's hoot mondy in less than aweek after he unpacked his trunk. But it was very soon discovered by thebright-eyed little gangsters of the best circles that he wasn't going tobe an easy one to disable. Naturally when a man has fought 'em off tohis age he has learned much of woodcraft and the hunter's cunning wiles,and this one had sure developed timber sense. He beat 'em at their owngame for three months by the simple old device of not playing anyfavourite for one single minute, and very, very seldom getting alonewith one where the foul stroke can be dealt by the frailest hand withmuscular precision. If he took Daisy Estelle Maybury to the chicken piesupper to get a new carpet for the Presbyterian parsonage, he'd up andtake Beryl Mae and her aunt, or Gussie Himebaugh, or Luella Stultz, tothe lawn feet at Judge Ballard's for new uniforms for the band boys. Atthe Bazaar of All Nations he bought as many chances of one girl as hedid of another, and if he hadn't any more luck than a rabbit and wonsomething—a hanging lamp or a celluloid manicure set in a plush-linedbox—he'd simply put it up to be raffled off again for the good of thecause. And none of that moonlight loitering along shaded streets forhim, where the dirk is so often drove stealthily between a man's ribs,and him thinking all the time he's only indulging in a little playfulnonsense. Often as not he'd take two girls at once, where all could bemerry without danger of anything happening.

"It was no time at all till this was found out on him. It was seen thatunder a pleasing exterior, looking all too easy to overcome by any girlin her right mind, he had powers of resistance and evasion that was likesteel. Of course this only stirred the proud beauties on to renewed andcrookeder efforts. Every darned one of 'em felt that her innocent younggirlhood was challenged, and would she let it go at that? Not so. Mylands! What snares and deadfalls was set for this wise old timber wolfthat didn't look it, with his smiling ways and seemingly carelessresponse to merry banter, and so forth!

"And of course every one of these shrinking little scoundrels thought atonce of her new riding costume, so no time at all was lost in organizingthe North Side Riding and Sports Club, which Mr. Burchell Daggett gladlyjoined, having, as he said, an eye for a horse and liking to get outafter banking hours to where all Nature seems to smile and you can letyour mount out a bit over the firm, smooth road. Them that had held offuntil now, on account of the gossip and leering, hurried up and got intoline with No. 9872 in the mail-order catalogue, or went to MissGunslaugh, who by this time had a female wax dummy in her window in aneat brown suit and puttees, with a coat just opening and one footadvanced carelessly, with gauntlets and a riding crop, and a fetchinglittle cap over the wind-blown hair and the clear, wonderful blue eyes.Oh, you can bet every last girl of the bunch was seeing herself sendback picture postals to her rivals telling what a royal time they washaving at Palm or Rockaway Beach or some place, and seeing the engravedcards—'Mr. and Mrs. Burchell Daggett, at Home After the Tenth, OphirAvenue, Red Gap, Wash.'

"Ain't we good when you really get us, if you ever do—because somedon't. Many, indeed! I reckon there never was a woman yet outside of afeeb' home that didn't believe she could be an A. No. 1 siren if she onlyhad the nerve to dress the part; never one that didn't just ache to swaymen to her lightest whim, and believe she could—not for any evilpurpose, mind you, but just to show her power. Think of the tenderhearts that must have shuddered over the damage they could and actuallymight do in one of them French bathing suits like you are said towitness in Paris and Atlantic City and other sinks of iniquity. And herewas these well-known society favourites wrought up by this legibleparty, as the French say, till each one was ready to go just as far asthe Civic Purity League would let her in order to sweep him off his feetin one mad moment. Quite right, too. It all depends on what the objectis, don't it; and wasn't theirs honourable matrimony with anestablishment and a lawn in front of it with a couple of cast-ironmoose, mebbe?

"And amid all this quaint girlish enterprise and secret infamy was theproblem of Hetty Tipton. Hetty had been a friend and a problem of minefor seven years, or ever since she come back from normal to teach in thethird-grade grammar school; a fine, clean, honest, true-blue girl, mebbenot as pretty you'd say at first as some others, but you like her betterafter you look a few times more, and with not the slightest nonsenseabout her. That last was Hetty's one curse. I ask you, what chance has agirl got with no nonsense about her? Hetty won my sympathy right at thestart by this infirmity of hers, which was easily detected, and forseven years I'd been trying to cure her of it, but no use. Oh, she wasalways took out regular enough and well liked, but the gilded youth ofRed Gap never fought for her smiles. They'd take her to parties anddances, turn and turn about, but they always respected her, which is thegreatest blight a man can put on one of us, if you know what I mean.Every man at a party was always careful to dance a decent number oftimes with Hetty and see that she got back to her seat; and wasn't itwarm in here this evening, yes, it was; and wouldn't she have a glass ofthe punch—No, thank you—then he'd gallop off to have some fun with amere shallow-pated fool that had known how from the cradle. It wasalways a puzzle to me, because Hetty dressed a lot better than most ofthem, knowing what to wear and how, and could take a joke if it comeslow, and laid herself out to be amiable to one and all. I kind of thinkit must be something about her mentality. Maybe it is too mental. Ican't put her to you any plainer than to say that every single girl intown, young and old, just loved her, and not one of them up to this timehad ever said an unkind or feminine thing about her. I guess you knowwhat that would mean of any woman.

"Hetty was now coming twenty-nine—we never spoke of this, but I couldcount back—and it's my firm belief that no man had ever proposedmarriage or anything else on earth to her. Wilbur Todd had onceendeavoured to hold her hand out on the porch at a country-club danceand she had repulsed him in all kindness but firmly. She told him shecouldn't bring herself to permit a familiarity of that sort except tothe man who would one day lead her to the altar, which is something Ibelieve she got from writing to a magazine about a young girl'sperplexities. And here, in spite of her record, this poor thing haddared to raise her eyes to none other than this Mr. Burchell Daggett.There was something kind of grand and despairing about the impudence ofit when you remember these here trained efficiency experts she wascompeting with. Yet so it was. She would drop in on me after school fora cup of tea and tell me frankly how distinguished his manner was andwhat shapely features he had and what fine eyes, and how there was acertain note in his voice at times, and had I ever noticed that onestubborn lock of hair that stuck out back of his left ear? Of coursethat last item settled it. When they notice that lock of hair you knowthe ship has struck the reef and all hands are perishing.

"And it seemed that the cuss had not only shown her more than a littleattention at evening functions but had escorted her to the midspringproduction of 'Hamlet' by the Red Gap Amateur Theatrical and DramaticSociety. True, he had conducted himself like a perfect gentleman everyminute they was alone together, even when they had to go home in EddiePierce's hack because it was raining when the show let out—but would I,or would I not, suspect from all this that he was in the least degreethinking of her in a way that—you know!

"Poor child of twenty-eight, with her hungry eyes and flushed face whileshe was showing down her hand to me! I seen the scoundrel's play atonce. Hetty was the one safe bet for him in Red Gap's social whirl. Hewas wise, all right—this Mr. D. He'd known in a second he could trusthimself alone with that girl and be as safe as a babe in its mother'sarms. Of course I couldn't say this to Hetty. I just said he was a manthat seemed to know his own mind very clearly, whatever it was, andHetty blushed some more and said that something within her responded toa certain note in his voice. We let it go at that.

"So I think and ponder about poor Hetty, trying to invent someconspiracy that would fix it right, because she was the ideal mate foran assistant cashier that had a certain position to keep up. For thatmatter she was good enough for any man. Then I hear she has joined theriding club, and an all day's ride has been planned for the nextSaturday up to Stender's Spring, with a basket lunch and a romantic rideback by moonlight. Of course, I don't believe in any of thisspiritualist stuff, but you can't tell me there ain't something in it,mind-reading or something, with the hunches you get when parties is insome grave danger.

"Stella Ballard it was tells me about the picnic, calling me in as Ipassed their house to show me her natty new riding togs that had justcome from the mail-order house. She called from back of a curtain, andwhen I got into the parlour she had them on, pleased as all get-out.Pretty they was, too—riding breeches and puttees and a man's flannelshirt and a neat-fitting Norfolk jacket, and Stella being a fine,upstanding figure.

"'They may cause considerable talk,' says she, smoothing down one legwhere it wrinkled a bit, 'but really I think they look perfectlystunning on me, and wasn't it lucky they fit me so beautifully? They'recalled the Non Plush Ultra.'

"'The what?' I says.

"'The Non Plush Ultra,' she answers. 'That's the name of them sewed inthe band.'

"'What's that mean?' I wanted to know.

"'Why,' says Stella, 'that's Latin or Greek, I forget which, and itmeans they're the best, I believe. Oh, let me see! Why, it means nothingbeyond, or something like that; the farthest you can go, I think. Oneforgets all that sort of thing after leaving high school.'

"'Well,' I says, 'they fit fine, and it's the only modest rig for awoman to ride a horse in, but they certainly are non plush, all right.That thin goods will never wear long against saddle leather, take myword for it.'

"But of course this made no impression on Stella—she was standing onthe centre table by now, so she could lamp herself in the glass over themantel—and then she tells me about the excursion for Saturday and howMr. Burchell Daggett is enthused about it, him being a superb horsemanhimself, and, if I know what she means, don't I think she carriesherself in the saddle almost better than any girl in her set, and won'ther style show better than ever in this duck of a costume, and she mustget her tan shoes polished, and do I think Mr. Daggett really meantanything when he said he'd expect her some day to return the masonic pinshe had lifted off his vest the other night at the dance, and so on.

"It was while she was babbling this stuff that I get the strange hunchthat Hetty Tipton is in grave danger and I ought to run to her; itseemed almost I could hear her calling on me to save her from somehorrible fate. So I tell Stella yes, she's by far the finest rider inthe whole Kulanche Valley, and she ought to get anything she wants withthat suit on, and then I beat it quick over to the Ezra Button housewhere Hetty boards.

"You can laugh all you want to, but that hunch of mine was the God'struth. Hetty was in the gravest danger she'd faced since one time inearly infancy when she got give morphine for quinine. What made it morehorrible, she hadn't the least notion of her danger. Quite the contrary.

"'Thank the stars I've come in time!' I gasps as I rushes in on her, forthere's the poor girl before her mirror in a pair of these same NonPlush Ultras and looking as pleased with herself as if she had somereason to be.

"'Back into your skirts quick!' I says. 'I'm a strong woman and allthat, but still I can be affected more than you'd think.'

"Poor Hetty stutters and turns red and her chin begins to quiver, so Igentled her down and tried to explain, though seeing quick that I musttell her everything but the truth. I reckon nothing in this world canlook funnier than a woman wearing them things that had never ought tofor one reason or another. There was more reasons than that in Hetty'scase. Dignity was the first safe bet I could think of with her, so Itried that.

"'I know all you would say,' says the poor thing in answer, 'but isn'tit true that men rather like one to be—oh, well, you know—just theleast bit daring?'

"'Truest thing in the world,' I says, 'but bless your heart, did yoususpicion riding breeches was daring on a woman? Not so. A girl wearing'em can't be any more daring after the first quick shock is overthan—well, you read the magazines, don't you? You've seen thosepictures of family life in darkest Africa that the explorers and monkeyhunters bring home, where the wives, mothers, and sweethearts, God bless'em! wear only what the scorching climate demands. Didn't it strike youthat one of them women without anything on would have a hard time if shetried to be daring—or did it? No woman can be daring without the properclothes for it,' I says firmly, 'and as for you, I tell you plain, getinto the most daring and immodest thing that was ever invented forwoman—which is the well-known skirt.'

"'Oh, Ma Pettengill,' cries the poor thing, 'I never meant anythinghorrid and primitive when I said daring. As a matter of fact, I thinkthese are quite modest to the intelligent eye.'

"'Just what I'm trying to tell you,' I says. 'Exactly that; they'remodest to any eye whatever. But here you are embarked on a difficultenterprise, with a band of flinty-hearted cutthroats trying to beat youto it, and, my dear child, you have a staunch nature and a heart ofgold, but you simply can't afford to be modest.'

"'I don't understand,' says she, looking at herself in the glass again.

"'Trust me, anyway,' I implores. 'Let others wear their Non PlushUltras which are No. 9872'—she tries to correct my pronunciation, but Iwouldn't stop for that. 'Never mind how it's pronounced,' I says,'because I know well the meaning of it in a foreign language. It meansthe limit, and it's a very desirable limit for many, but for you,' Isays plainly, 'it's different. Your Non Plush Ultra will have to be aneat, ankle-length riding skirt. You got one, haven't you?'

"'I have,' says she, 'a very pretty one of tan corduroy, almost new, butI had looked forward to these, and I don't see yet—'

"Then I thought of another way I might get to her without blurting outthe truth. 'Listen, Hetty,' I says, 'and remember not only that I'm yourfriend but that I know a heap more about this fool world than you do.I've had bitter experiences, and one of them got me at the time I firstbegun to wear riding pants myself, which must have been about the timeyou was beginning to bite dents into your silver mug that Aunt Carolinesent. I was a handsome young hellion, I don't mind telling you, and theylooked well on me, and when Lysander John urged me to be brave and wear'em outside I was afraid all the men within a day's ride was going tosneak round to stare at me. My! I was so embarrassed, also with thatsame feeling you got in your heart this minute that it was taking anunfair advantage of any man—you know! I felt like I was using all thepower of my young beauty for unworthy ends.

"'Well, do you know what I got when I first rode out on the ranch? Igot just about the once-over from every brute there, and that was all.If one of them ranch hands had ever ogled me a second time I'd haveknown it all right, but I never caught one of the scoundrels at it.First I said: "Now, ain't that fine and chivalrous?" Then I got wise. Itwasn't none of this here boasted Western chivalry, but just plain lackof interest. I admit it made me mad at first. Any man on the place wasonly too glad to look me over when I had regular clothes on, but dressme like Lysander John and they didn't look at me any oftener than theydid him. Not as often, of course, because as a plain human being andman's equal I wasn't near as interesting as he was.'

"'But then, too,' says Hetty, who had only been about half listening tomy lecture, 'I thought it might be striking a blow at the same time forthe freedom of woman.'

"Well, you know how that freedom-of-the-sex talk always gets me going. Iwas mad enough for a minute to spank her just as she stood there in themNon Plush Ultras she was so proud of. And I did let out some high talk.Mrs. Dutton told her afterward she thought sure we was having words.

"'Freedom from skirts,' I says, 'is the last thing your sex wants.Skirts is the final refuge of immodesty, to which women will cling likegrim death. They will do any possible thing to a skirt—slit it, thinit, shorten it, hike it up one side—people are setting up nights rightnow thinking up some new thing to do to it—but women won't give it upand dress modestly as men do because it's the only unfair drag they gotleft with the men. I see one of our offended sex is daily asking rightout in a newspaper: "Are women people?" I'd just like to whisper to herthat no one yet knows.

"'If they'll quit their skirts, dress as decently as a man does so theywon't have any but a legitimate pull with him, we'd have a chance tofind out if they're good for anything else. As a matter of fact, theydon't want to be people and dress modestly and wear hats you couldn'tpay over eight dollars for. I believe there was one once, but the poorthing never got any notice from either sex after she became—a people,as you might say.'

"Well, I was going on to get off a few more things I'd got madded up to,but I caught the look in poor Hetty's face, and it would have melted astone. Poor child! There she was, wanting a certain man and willing towear or not wear anything on earth that would nail him, and not knowingwhat would do it, and complicating her ignorance with meaninglessworries about modesty and daringness and the freedom of her poor sex,that ain't ever even deuce-low with one woman in a million.

"And right then, watching her distress, all at once I get my biginspiration—it just flooded me like the sun coming up. I don't know ifI'm like other folks, but things do come to me that way. And not onlywas it a great truth, but it got me out of the hole of having to tellHetty certain truths about herself that these Non Plush Ultras made alltoo glaring.

"'Listen,' I says: 'You believe I'm your friend, don't you? And youbelieve anything I tell you is from the heart out and will probably havea grain of sense in it. Well, here is an inspired thought: Women won'tever dress modestly like men do because men don't want 'em to. I neversaw a man yet that did if he'd tell the truth, and so this here darkcity stranger won't be any exception. Now, then, what do we see onSaturday next? Why, we see this here gay throng sally forth forStender's Spring, the youth and beauty of Red Gap, including Mr. D.,with his nice refined odour of Russia leather and bank bills of largesize—from fifties up—that haven't been handled much. The crowd is ofall sexes, technically, like you might say; a lot of nice, sweet girlsalong but dressed to be mere jolly young roughnecks, and just asinteresting to the said stranger as the regular boys that will bepresent—hardly more so. And now, as for poor little meek you—you willlook wild and Western, understand me, but feminine; exactly like thecoloured cigarette picture that says under it "Rocky Mountain Cow Girl."You will be in your pretty tan skirt—be sure to have it pressed—and ablue-striped sport bloose that I just saw in the La Mode window, andyou'll get some other rough Western stuff there, too: a blue silkneckerchief and a natty little cow-girl sombrero—the La Mode is showinga good one called the La Parisienne for four fifty-eight—and thedaintiest pair of tan kid gauntlets you can find, and don't forget apair of tan silk stockings—'

"'They won't show in my riding boots,' says Hetty, looking as if she wascoming to life a little.

"'Tush for the great, coarse, commonsense riding boots,' I says firmly;'you will wear precisely that neat little pair of almost new tan pumpswith the yellow bows that you're standing in now. Do you get me?'

"'But that would be too dainty and absurd,' says Hetty.

"'Exactly!' I says, shutting my mouth hard.

"'Why, I almost believe I do get you,' says she, looking religiously upinto the future like that lady saint playing the organ in the picture.

"'Another thing,' I says: 'You are deathly afraid of a horse and washardly ever on one but once when you were a teeny girl, but you do lovethe open life, so you just nerved yourself up to come.'

"'I believe I see more clearly than ever,' says Hetty. She grew up on aranch, knows more about a horse than the horse himself does, and wouldbe a top rider most places, with the cheap help we get nowadays that canhardly set a saddle.

"'Also from time to time,' I goes on, 'you want to ask this Mr. D.little, timid, silly questions that will just tickle him to death andmake him feel superior. Ask him to tell you which legs of a horse thechaps go on, and other things like that; ask him if the sash that holdsthe horrid old saddle on isn't so tight it's hurting your horse. Afterthe lunch is et, go over to the horse all alone and stroke his nose andcall him a dear and be found by the gent when he follows you over tryingto feed the noble animal a hard-boiled egg and a couple of pickles orsomething. Take my word for it, he'll be over all right and have ahearty laugh at your confusion, and begin to wonder what it is aboutyou.

"'How about falling off and spraining my ankle on the way back?' demandsthe awakening vestal with a gleam in her eye.

"'No good,' I says; 'pretty enough for a minute, but it would maketrouble if you kept up the bluff, and if there's one thing a man hatesmore than another it's to have a woman round that makes any trouble.'

"'You have me started on a strange new train of thought,' says Hetty.

"'I think it's a good one,' I tells her, 'but remember there are risks.For one thing, you know how popular you have always been with all thegirls. Well, after this day none of 'em will hardly speak to you becauseof your low-lifed, deceitful game, and the things they'll say ofyou—such things as only woman can say of woman!'

"'I shall not count the cost,' says she firmly. 'And now I must hurrydown for that sport bloose—blue-striped, you said?'

"'Something on that order,' I says, 'that fits only too well. You cando almost anything you want to with your neck and arms, but rememberstrictly—a skirt is your one and only Non Plush Ultra.'

"So I went home all flushed and eager, thinking joyously how littlemen—the poor dubs—ever suspect how it's put over on 'em, and the nextday, which was Friday, I thought of a few more underhand things shecould do. So when she run in to see me that afternoon, the excitement ofthe chase in her eye, she wanted I should go along on this picnic. Isays yes, I will, being that excited myself and wanting to see really ifI was a double-faced genius or wasn't I? Henrietta Price couldn't go onaccount of being still lame from her ride of a week ago, so I could goas chaperone, and anyway I knew the dear girls would all be glad to haveme because I would look so different from them—like a genial old ranchforeman going out on rodeo—and the boys was always glad to see me alonganyway. 'I'll be there,' I says to Hetty. 'And here—don't forget at alltimes to-morrow to carry this little real lace handkerchief I'm givingyou.'

"I was at the meeting-place next morning at nine. None of the othergirls was on time, of course, but that was just as well, because AggieTuttle had got her father to come down to the sale yard to pack a mulewith the hampers of lunch. Jeff Tuttle is a good packer all right, buttoo inflamed in the case of a mule, which he hates. They always know upand down that street when he's packing one; ladies drag their childrenby as fast as they can. But Jeff had the hitch all throwed before any ofthe girls showed up, and all began in a lovely manner, the crowd ofabout fifteen getting off not more than an hour late; Mr. Burchell inthe lead and a bevy of these jolly young rascals in their Non PlushUltras riding herd on him.

"Every girl cast cordial glances of pity at poor Hetty when she showedup in her neat skirt and silly tan pumps with the ridiculous silkstockings and the close-fitting blue-striped thing, free at the neck,and her pretty hair all neated under the La Parisienne cow-girl hat. Oh,they felt kinder than ever before to poor old Hetty when they saw her aslittle daring as that, cheering her with a hearty uproar, slapping theirNon Plush Ultras with their caps or gloves, and then gigglingconfidentially to one another. Hetty accepted their applause with whatthey call a pretty show of confusion and gored her horse with her heelon the off side so it looked as if the vicious brute was running awayand she might fall off any minute, but somehow she didn't, and got himsoothed with frightened words and by taking the hidden heel out of hisslats—though not until Mr. D. had noticed her good and then lookedagain once or twice.

"And so the party moved on for an hour or two, with the roguish youngroughnecks cutting up merrily at all times, pretending to be cowboyscoming to town on pay day, swinging their hats, giving the long yell,and doing roughriding to cut each other away from the side of Mr. D.every now and then, with a noisy laugh of good nature to hide thepoisoned dagger. Daisy Estelle Maybury is an awful good rider, too, andgot next to the hero about every time she wanted to. Poor thing, if sheonly knew that once she gets off a horse in 'em it makes all thedifference in the world.

"The dark city stranger seemed to enjoy it fine, all this noise andcutting up and cowboy antics like they was just a lot of high-spiritedyoung men together, but I never weakened in my faith for one minute.'Laugh on, my proud beauties,' I says, 'but a time will come, just assure as you look and act like a passel of healthy boys.' And you bet itdid.

"We hadn't got halfway to Stender's Spring till Mr. D. got off totighten his cinch, and then he sort of drifted back to where Hetty and Iwas. I dropped back still farther to where a good chaperone ought to beand he rode in beside Hetty. The trail was too narrow then for the restto come back after their prey, so they had to carry on the rough workamong themselves.

"Hetty acted perfect. She had a pensive, withdrawn look—'aloof,' Iguess the word is—like she was too tender a flower, too fine for thisrough stuff, and had ought to be in the home that minute telling a fairystory to the little ones gathered at her decently clad knee. I don'tknow how she done it, but she put that impression over. And she tellsMr. D. that in spite of her quiet, studious tastes she had resolved tocome on this picnic because she loves Nature oh! so dearly, the birdsand the wild flowers and the great rugged trees that have their messagefor man if he will but listen with an understanding heart—didn't Mr. D.think so, or did he? But not too much of this dear old Nature stuff,which can be easy overdone with a healthy man; just enough to show therewas hidden depths in her nature that every one couldn't find.

"Then on to silly questions about does a horse lie down when it goes tosleep each night after its hard day's labour, and isn't her horse's sashtoo tight, and what a pretty fetlock he has, so long and thick andbrown—Oh, do you call that the mane? How absurd of poor little me! Mr.Daggett knows just everything, doesn't he? He's perfectly terrifying.And where in the world did he ever learn to ride so stunningly, like oneof those dare-devils in a Wild West entertainment? If her own naughty,naughty horse tries to throw her on the ground again where he can biteher she'll just have Mr. D. ride the nassy ole sing and teach him bettermanners, so she will. There now! He must have heard that—just see himmove his funny ears—don't tell her that horses can't understand thingsthat are said. And, seriously now, where did Mr. D. ever get his superbathletic training, because, oh! how all too rare it is to see abrain-worker of strong mentality and a splendid athlete in one and thesame man. Oh, how pathetically she had wished and wished to be a man andtake her place out in the world fighting its battles, instead of poorlittle me who could never be anything but a homebody to worship thegreat, strong, red-blooded men who did the fighting and carried on greatindustries—not even an athletic girl like those dear things upahead—and this horse is bobbing up and down like that on purpose, justto make poor little me giddy, and so forth. Holding her bridle reindaintily she was with the lace handkerchief I'd give her that cost metwelve fifty.

"Mr. D. took it all like a real man. He said her ignorance of a horsewas adorable and laughed heartily at it. And he smiled in a deeplymodest and masterful way and said 'But, really, that's nothing—nothingat all, I assure you,' when she said about how he was a corkingathlete—and then kept still to see if she was going on to say moreabout it. But she didn't, having the God-given wisdom to leave himwanting. And then he would be laughing again at her poor-little-me horsetalk.

"I never had a minute's doubt after that, for it was the eyes of onefascinated to a finish that he turned back on me half an hour later ashe says: 'Really, Mrs. Pettengill, our Miss Hester is feminine to herfinger tips, is she not?' 'She is, she is,' I answers. 'If you only knewthe trouble I had with the chit about that horrible old riding skirt ofhers when all her girl friends are wearing a sensible costume!' Hettyblushed good and proper at this, not knowing how indecent I mightbecome, and Mr. D. caught her at it. Aggie Tuttle and Stella Ballard atthis minute is pretending to be shooting up a town with the couple ofrevolvers they'd brought along in their cunning little holsters. Mr. D.turns his glazed eyes to me once more. 'The real womanly woman,' says hein a hushed voice, 'is God's best gift to man.' Just like that.

"'Landed!' I says to myself. 'Throw him up on the bank and light afire.'

"And mebbe you think this tet-à-tet had not been noticed by the merrythrong up front. Not so. The shouting and songs had died a naturaldeath, and the last three miles of that trail was covered in a gloomysilence, except for the low voices of Hetty and the male she had soneatly pronged. I could see puzzled glances cast back at them and catchmutterings of bewilderment where the trail would turn on itself. But thepoor young things didn't yet realize that their prey was hanging backthere for reasons over which he hadn't any control. They thought, ofcourse, he was just being polite or something.

"When we got to the picnic place, though, they soon saw that all was notwell. There was some resumption of the merrymaking as they dismountedand the girls put one stirrup over the saddle-horn and eased the cinchlike the boys did, and proud of their knowledge, but the glances theynow shot at Hetty wasn't bewildered any more. They was glances of purefright. Hetty, in the first place, had to be lifted off her horse, andMr. D. done it in a masterly way to show her what a mere feather shewas in his giant's grasp. Then with her feet on the ground she reeled amite, so he had to support her. She grasped his great strong arm firmlyand says: 'It's nothing—I shall be right presently—leave me please, goand help those other girls.' They had some low, heated language abouthis leaving her at such a crisis, with her gripping his arm till I betit showed for an hour. But finally they broke and he loosened herhorse's sash, as she kept quaintly calling it, and she recoveredcompletely and said it had been but a moment's giddiness anyway, andwhat strength he had in those arms, and yet could use it so gently, andhe said she was a brave, game little woman, and the picnic was served toone and all, with looks of hearty suspicion and rage now being shot atHetty from every other girl there.

"And now I see that my hunch has been even better than I thought. Notonly does the star male hover about Hetty, cutely perched on a fallenlog with her dainty, gleaming ankles crossed, and looking so fresh andnifty and feminine, but I'm darned if three or four of the other malesdon't catch the contagion of her woman's presence and hang round her,too, fetching her food of every kind there, feeding her spoonfuls ofa*ggie Tuttle's plum preserves, and all like that, one comical thingafter another. Yes, sir; here was Mac Gordon and Riley Hardin andCharlie Dickman and Roth Hyde, men about town of the younger dancingset, that had knowed Hetty for years and hardly ever looked ather—here they was paying attentions to her now like she was some prizebeauty, come down from Spokane for over Sunday, to say nothing of Mr.D., who hardly ever left her side except to get her another sardinesandwich or a paper cup of coffee. It was then I see the scientificexplanation of it, like these high-school professors always say thatscience is at the bottom of everything. The science of this here wasthat they was all devoting themselves to Hetty for the simple reasonthat she was the one and only woman there present.

"Of course these girls in their modest Non Plush Ultras didn't get thescientific secret of this fact. They was still too obsessed with theidea that they ought to be ogled on account of them by any male beast inhis right senses. But they knew they'd got in wrong somehow. By thistime they was kind of bunching together and telling each other things inlow tones, while not seeming to look at Hetty and her dupes, at whichall would giggle in the most venemous manner. Daisy Estelle left thebunch once and made a coy bid for the notice of Mr. D. by snatching hiscap and running merrily off with it about six feet. If there was any onein the world—except Hetty—could make a man hate the idea of ridingpants for women, she was it. I could see the cold, flinty look come intohis eyes as he turned away from her to Hetty with the pitcher oflemonade. And then Beryl Mae Macomber, she gets over close enough forMr. D. to hear it, and says conditions is made very inharmonious at homefor a girl of her temperament, and she's just liable any minute to chuckeverything and either take up literary work or go into the movies, shedon't know which and don't care—all kind of desperate so Mr. D. willfeel alarmed about a beautiful young thing like that out in the worldalone and unprotected and at the mercy of every designing scoundrel. ButI don't think Mr. D. hears a word of it, he's so intently listening toHetty who says here in this beautiful mountain glade where all is peacehow one can't scarcely believe that there is any evil in the worldanywhere, and what a difference it does make when one comes to see lifetruly. Then she crossed and recrossed her silken ankles, slightlyadjusted her daring tan skirt, and raised her eyes wistfully to thetreetops, and I bet there wasn't a man there didn't feel that shebelonged in the home circle with the little ones gathered about, telling'em an awfully exciting story about the naughty, naughty, bad littlewhite kitten and the ball of mamma's yarn.

"Yes, sir; Hetty was as much of a revelation to me in one way as shewould of been to that party in another if I hadn't saved her from it.She must have had the correct female instinct all these years, only noone had ever started her before on a track where there was no otherentries. With those other girls dressed like she was Hetty would of beenleaning over some one's shoulder to fork up her own sandwiches, and noone taking hardly any notice whether she'd had some of the hot coffee orwhether she hadn't. And the looks she got throughout the afternoon! Say,I wouldn't of trusted that girl at the edge of a cliff with a singlepair of those No. 9872's anywhere near.

"After the lunch things was packed up there was faint attempts at funand frolic with songs and chorus—Riley Hardin has a magnificent bassvoice at times and Mac Gordon and Charlie Dickman and Roth Hyde wouldn'tbe so bad if they'd let these Turkish cigarettes alone—and the boys gottogether and sung some of their good old business-college songs, withthe girls coming in while they murdered Hetty with their beautiful eyes.But Hetty and Mr. D. sort of withdrew from the noisy enjoyment andtalked about the serious aspects of life and how one could get alongalmost any place if only they had their favourite authors. And Mr. D.says doesn't she sing at all, and she says, Oh! in a way; that her voicehas a certain parlour charm, she has been told, and she sings at—youcan't really call it singing—two or three of the old Scotch songs ofhomely sentiment like the Scotch seem to get into their songs as noother nation can, or doesn't he think so, and he does, indeed. And he'sreading a wonderful new novel in which there is much of Nature with itslessons for each of us, but in which love conquers all at the end, andthe girl in it reminds him strongly of her, and perhaps she'll be goodenough to sing for him—just for him alone in the dusk—if he bringsthis book up to-morrow night so he can show her some good places in it.

"At first she is sure she has a horrid old engagement for to-morrownight and is so sorry, but another time, perhaps—Ain't it a marvel thecrooked tricks that girl had learned in one day! And then she remembersthat her engagement is for Tuesday night—what could she have beenthinking of!—and come by all means—only too charmed—and how rarelynowadays does one meet one on one's own level of culture, or perhapsthat is too awful a word to use—so hackneyed—but anyway he knows whatshe means, or doesn't he? He does.

"Pretty soon she gets up and goes over to her horse, picking her waydaintily in the silly little tan pumps, and seems to be offering thebeast something. The stricken man follows her the second he can withoutbeing too raw about it, and there is the adorably feminine thing with abig dill pickle, two deviled eggs, and a half of one of these Camelbertcheeses for her horse. Mr. D. has a good masterly laugh at her idea ofhorse fodder and calls her 'But, my dear child!' and she looks prettilyoffended and offers this chuck to the horse and he gulps it all down andnoses round for more of the same. It was an old horse named Croppy thatshe'd known from childhood and would eat anything on earth. She rode himup here once and he nabbed a bar of laundry soap off the back porch andchewed the whole thing down with tears of ecstasy in his eyes andfrothing at the mouth like a mad dog. Well, so Hetty gives mister man alook of dainty superiority as she flicks crumbs from her white fingerswith my real lace handkerchief, and he stops his hearty laughter andjust stares, and she says what nonsense to think the poor horses don'tlike food as well as any one. Them little moments have their effect on aman in a certain condition. He knew there probably wasn't another horsein the world would touch that truck, but he couldn't help feeling astrange new respect for her in addition to that glorious masculineprotection she'd had him wallowing in all day.

"The ride home, at least on the part of the Non Plush Ultra cut-ups, waslike they had laid a loved one to final rest out there on the lonemountainside. The handsome stranger and Hetty brought up the rear,conversing eagerly about themselves and other serious topics. I believehe give her to understand that he'd been pretty wild at one time in hislife and wasn't any too darned well over it yet, but that some goodwomanly woman who would study his ways could still take him and make aman of him; and her answering that she knew he must have suffered beyondhuman endurance in that horrible conflict with his lower nature. He saidhe had.

"Of course the rabid young hoydens up ahead made a feeble effort now andthen to carry it off lightly, and from time to time sang 'My Bonnie LiesOver the Ocean,' or 'Merrily We Roll Along,' with the high, squeakytenor of Roth Hyde sounding above the others very pretty in themoonlight, but it was poor work as far as these enraged vestals wasconcerned. If I'd been Hetty and had got a strange box of candy throughthe mail the next week, directed in a disguised woman's hand, I'd ofrushed right off to the police with it, not waiting for any analysis.And she, poor thing, would get so frightened at bad spots, with thefierce old horse bobbing about so dangerous, that she just has to beheld on. And once she wrenched her ankle against a horrid old tree onthe trail—she hadn't been able to resist a little one—and bit herunder lip as the spasm of pain passed over her refined features. But shewas all right in a minute and begged Mr. D. not to think of bathing itin cold water because it was nothing—nothing at all, really now—and hewould embarrass her frightfully if he said one more word about it. AndMr. D. again remarked that she was feminine to her finger tips, a brave,game little woman, one of the gamest he ever knew. And pretty soon—whatwas she thinking about now? Why, she was merely wondering if horsesthink in the true sense of the word or only have animal instinct, as itis called. And wasn't she a strange, puzzling creature to be thinking ondeep subjects like that at such a time! Yes, she had been calledpuzzling as a child, but she didn't like it one bit. She wanted to belike other girls, if he knew what she meant. He seemed to.

"They took Hetty home first on account of her poor little ankle andsung 'Good Night, Ladies,' at the gate. And so ended a day that waswreck and ruin for most of our sex there present.

"And to show you what a good, deep, scientific cause I had discovered,the next night at Hetty's who shows up one by one but these four menabout town, each with a pound of mixed from the Bon Ton Handy Kitchen,and there they're all setting at the feet of Hetty, as it were, in hernew light summer gown with the blue bows, when Mr. D. blows in with atwo-pound box and the novel in which love conquered all. So excited shewas when she tells me about it next day. The luck of that girl! Butafter all it wasn't luck, because she'd laid her foundations the daybefore, hadn't she? Always look a little bit back of anything that seemsto be luck, say I.

"And Hetty with shining eyes entertained one and all with the wit andsparkle a woman can show only when there's four or five men at her atonce—it's the only time we ever rise to our best. But she got a chancefor a few words alone with Mr. D., who took his hat finally when he seesthe other four was going to set him out; enough words to confide to himhow she loathed this continual social racket to which she was constantlysubjected, with never a let-up so one could get to one's books and toone's real thoughts. But perhaps he would venture up again some timenext week or the week after—not getting coarse in her work, understand,even with him flopping around there out on the bank—and he give her onelong, meaning look and said why not to-morrow night, and she carelesslysaid that would be charming, she was sure—she didn't think of anyengagement at this minute—and it was ever so nice of him to think ofpoor little me.

"Then she went back and gave the social evening of their life to themfour boys that had stayed. She said she couldn't thank them enough forcoming this evening—which is probably the only time she had told thetruth in thirty-six hours—and they all made merry. Roth Hyde sang'Sally in Our Alley' so good on the high notes that the Duttons was allout in the hall listening; and Riley Hardin singing 'Down, Diver, Down,'Neath the Deep Blue Waves!' and Mac Gordon singing his everlastingGerman songs in their native language, and Charlie Dickman singing a newsentimental one called 'Ain't There at Least One Gentleman Here?' abouta fair young lady dancer being insulted in a gilded café in some largecity; and one and all voted it was a jolly evening and said how aboutcoming back to-morrow night, but Hetty said no, it was her one eveningfor study and she couldn't be bothered with them, which was a plain,downright so-and-so and well she knew it, because that girl's study wasover for good and all.

"Well, why string it out? I've give you the facts. And my lands! Willyou look at that clock now? Here's the morning gone and this room stilllooking like the inside of a sheep-herder's wagon! Oh, yes, and whenHetty was up here this time that she wouldn't wear my riding pantsdown, she says. 'Not only that, but I'm scrupulously careful in allways. Why, I never even allow dear Burchell to observe me in one ofthose lace boudoir caps that so many women cover up their hair with whenit's their best feature but they won't take time to do it.'

"Now was that spoken like a wise woman or like the two-horned GalumpsisCaladensis of East India, whose habits are little known to man? My Lord!Won't I ever learn to stop? Where did I put that dusting cloth?"

VI

COUSIN EGBERT INTERVENES

"It takes all kinds of foreigners to make a world," said MaPettengill—irrelevantly I thought, because the remark seemed to beinspired merely by the announcement of Sandy Sawtelle that the muleJerry's hip had been laid open by a kick from the mule Alice, and thatthe bearer of the news had found fourteen stitches needed to mend therent.

Sandy brought his news to the owner of the Arrowhead as she relaxed inmy company on the west veranda of the ranch house and scented the goldendusk with burning tobacco of an inferior but popular brand. I listenedbut idly to the minute details of the catastrophe, discovering moreentertainment in the solemn wake of light a dulled sun was leaving as itslipped over the sagging rim of Arrowhead Pass. And yet, through myabsorption with the shadows that now played far off among the foldedhills, there did come sharply the impression that this Sawtelle personwas dwelling too insistently upon the precise number of stitchesrequired by the breach in Jerry's hide.

"Fourteen—yes, ma'am; fourteen stitches. That there Alice mule sureneeds handling. Fourteen regular ones. I'd certainly show her where tohead in at, like now she was my personal property. Me, I'd abuse hershamefully. Only eleven I took last time in poor old Jerry; and here nowit's plumb fourteen—yes, ma'am; fourteen good ones. Say, you getfourteen of them stitches in your hide, and I bet—thought, at first, Icould make twelve do, but it takes full fourteen, with old Jerry nearlytearing the chute down while I was taking these fourteen—"

I began to see numbers black against that glowing panorama in the west.A monstrous 14 repeated itself stubbornly along the gorgeous reach ofit.

"Yes, ma'am—fourteen; you can go out right now and count 'em yourself.And like mebbe I'll have to go down to town to-morrow for some more ofthat King of Pain Liniment, on account of Lazarus and Bryan getting goodand lamed in this same mix-up, and me letting fall the last bottle wehad on the place and busting her wide open—"

"Don't you bother to bust any more!" broke in his employer in a tonethat I found crisp with warning. "There's a whole new case of King ofPain in the storeroom."

"Huh!" exclaimed the surgeon, ably conveying disappointment thereby."And like now if I did go down I could get the new parts for that theremower—"

"That's something for me to worry about exclusively. I'll begin when wegot something to mow." There was finished coldness in this.

"Huh!" The primitive vocable now conveyed a lively resentment, butthere was the pleading of a patient sufferer in what followed. "And likeat the same time, having to make the trip anyway for these here suppliesand things, I could stop just a minute at Doc Martingale's and have thisold tooth of mine took out, that's been achin' like a knife stuck in mefur the last fourteen—well, fur about a week now—achin' night andday—no sleep at all now fur seven, eight nights; so painful I getregular delirious, let me tell you. And, of course, all wore out the wayI am, I won't be any good on the place till my agony's relieved. Why,what with me suffering so horrible, I just wouldn't hardly know my ownname sometimes if you was to come up and ask me!"

The woman's tone became more than ever repellent.

"Never you mind about not knowing your own name. I got it on the payroll, and it'll still be there to-morrow if you're helping Buck get outthe rest of them fence posts like I told you. If you happen to get stuckfor your name when I ain't round, and the inquiring parties won't wait,just ask the Chinaman; he never forgets anything he's learned once. OrI'll write it out on a card, so you can show it to anybody who rides upand wants to know it in a hurry!"

"Huh!"

The powers of this brief utterance had not yet been exhausted. It nowconveyed despair. With bowed head the speaker dully turned and withdrewfrom our presence. As he went I distinctly heard him mutter:

"Huh! Four-teen! Four-teen! And seven! And twenty-eight!"

"Say, there!" his callous employer called after him. "Why don't you getBoogles to embroider that name of yours on the front of your shirt? He'dadore to do it. And you can still read, can't you, in the midst of youragonies?"

There was no response to this taunt. The suffering one faded slowly downthe path to the bunk house and was lost in its blackness. A light shoneout and presently came sombre chords from a guitar, followed by thevoice of Sandy in gloomy song: "There's a broken heart for every lighton Broadway—"

I was not a little pained to discover this unsuspected vein of crueltyin a woman I had long admired. And the woman merely became irrelevantwith her apothegm about foreigners. I ignored it.

"What about that sufferer down there in the bunk house?" I demanded."Didn't you ever have toothache?"

"No; neither did Sandy Sawtelle. He ain't a sufferer; he's just a liar."

"Why?"

"So I'll let him go to town and play the number of them stitches on thewheel. Sure! He'd run a horse to death getting there, make for the backroom of the Turf Club Saloon, where they run games whenever the townain't lidded too tight, and play roulette till either him or the gamehad to close down. Yes, sir; he'd string his bets along on fourteen andseven and twenty-eight and thirty-five, and if he didn't make a killinghe'd believe all his life that the wheel was crooked. Stitches in amule's hide is his bug. He could stitch up any horse on the place andnever have the least hunch; but let it be a mule—Say! Down there rightnow he's thinking about the thousand dollars or so I'm keeping him outof. I judge from his song that he'd figured on a trip East to New YorkCity or Denver. At that, I don't know as I blame him. Yes, sir; that'swhat reminded me of foreigners and bazaars and vice, and so on—and poorEgbert Floud."

My hostess drew about her impressive shoulders a blanket of Indian weavethat dulled the splendours of the western sky, and rolled a slendercigarette from the tobacco and papers at her side. By the ensuing flameof a match I saw that her eyes gleamed with the light of pure narration.

"Foreigners, bazaars, vice, and Egbert Floud?" I murmured, wishing theseto be related more plausibly one to another.

"I'm coming to it," said the lady; and, after two sustaining inhalationsfrom the new cigarette, forthwith she did:

It was late last winter, while I was still in Red Gap. The talk wentround that we'd ought to have another something for the Belgians. We'dhad a concert, the proceeds of which run up into two figures after allexpenses was paid; but it was felt something more could bedone—something in the nature of a bazaar, where all could get together.The Mes-dames Henrietta Templeton Price and Judge Ballard were appointeda committee to do some advance scouting.

That was where Egbert Floud come in, though after it was all over anyone could see that he was more to be pitied than censured. Thesewell-known leaders consulted him among others, and Cousin Egbert saysright off that, sure, he'll help 'em get up something if they'll agreeto spend a third of the loot for tobacco for the poor soldiers, becausea Belgian or any one else don't worry so much about going hungry if theycan have a smoke from time to time, and he's been reading about wheretobacco is sorely needed in the trenches. He felt strong about it,because one time out on the trail he lost all his own and had to smokepoplar bark or something for two weeks, nearly burning his flues out.

The two Mes-dames agreed to this, knowing from their menfolk thattobacco is one of the great human needs, both in war and in peace, andknowing that Cousin Egbert will be sure to donate handsomely himself, healways having been the easiest mark in town; so they said they was muchobliged for his timely suggestion and would he think up some novelfeature for the bazaar; and he said he would if he could, and they wenton to other men of influence.

Henrietta's husband, when he heard the money wouldn't all be spent formere food, said he'd put up a choice lot in Price's Addition to beraffled off—a lot that would at some future date be worth five thousanddollars of anybody's money, and that was all right; and some of themerchants come through liberal with articles of use and adornment to betook chances on.

Even old Proctor Knapp, the richest man in town, actually give upsomething after they pestered him for an hour. He owns the People'sTraction Company and he turned over a dollar's worth of street-cartickets to be raffled for, though saying he regarded gambling as a veryobjectionable and uncertain vice, and a person shouldn't go intoanything without being sure they was dead certain to make something outof it, war or no war, he knowing all about it. Why wouldn't he, havingstarted life as a poor, ragged boy and working his way up to whereparties that know him is always very careful indeed when they do anybusiness with him?

Some of the ladies they consulted was hostile about the tobacco end ofit. Mrs. Tracy Bangs said that no victim of the weed could keep up hismentality, and that she, for one, would rather see her Tracy lying inhis casket than smoking vile tobacco that would destroy his intellectand make him a loathsome object in the home. She said she knew perfectlywell that if the countries at war had picked their soldiers fromnon-smokers it would have been all over in just a few days—and didn'tthat show you that the tobacco demon was as bad as the rum demon?

Mrs. Leonard Wales was not only bitter about tobacco but about any helpat all. She said our hard storms of that winter had been caused by thegeneral hatred in Europe which created evil waves of malignity; so let'em shoot each other till they got sense enough to dwell together inlove and amity—only we shouldn't prolong the war by sending 'em soupand cigarettes, and so on. Her idea seemed to be that if Red Gap wouldjust stand firm in the matter the war would die a natural death. Still,if a bazaar was really going to be held, she would consent to pose in atableau if they insisted on it, and mebbe she could thus inject into theevil atmosphere of Europe some of the peace and good will that sets theUnited States apart from other nations.

Trust Cora Wales not to overlook a bet like that. She's a tall,sandy-haired party, with very extravagant contours, and the thing sheloves best on earth is to get under a pasteboard crown, with gilt starson it, and drape herself in the flag of her country, with one fat armbare, while Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, and the restis gathered about and looking up to her for protection. Mebbe she don'tlook so bad as the Goddess of Liberty on a float in the middle of one ofour wide streets when the Chamber of Commerce is giving a Greater RedGap pageant; but take her in a hall, where you set close up to theplatform, and she looks more like our boasted liberty has degeneratedinto license, or something like that. Anyway, the committee had topromise her she could do something in her flag and crown and talcumpowder, because they knew she'd knock the show if they didn't.

This reminded 'em they had to have a program of entertainment; so theygot me on the committee with the other Mes-dames to think up things, mealways being an easy mark. I find out right off that we're a lot offoreigners and you got to be darned careful not to hurt anybody'sfeelings. Little Bertha Lehman's pa would let her be a state—Coloradoor Nebraska, or something—but he wouldn't let her sing unless it wouldbe a German song in the original; and Hobbs, the English baker, said hisTillie would have to sing "Britannia Rules the Waves," or nothing; andtwo or three others said what they would and wouldn't do, and it lookedlike Red Gap itself was going to be dug up into trenches. I had to getlittle Magnesia Waterman, daughter of the coons that work in the U.S.Grill, to do the main singing. She seemed to be about the only Americanchild soprano we had. She sings right well for a kid, mostly these sadsongs about heaven; but we picked out a good live one for her thatseemed to be neutral.

It was delicate work, let me tell you, turning down folks that wanted tosing patriotic songs or recite war poetry that would be sure to startsomething, with Professor Gluckstein wishing to get up and tell how thecowardly British had left the crew of a German submarine to perish aftershooting it up when it was only trying to sink their cruiser by fairand lawful methods; and Henry Lehman wanting to read a piece from aGerman newspaper about how the United States was a nation of vilemoney-grubbers that would sell ammunition to the enemy just because theyhad the ships to take it away, and wouldn't sell a dollar's worth to theFatherland, showing we had been bought up by British gold—and so on.

But I kept neutral. I even turned down an Englishman named Ruggles, thatkeeps the U.S. Grill and is well thought of, though he swore that all hewould do was to get off a few comical riddles, and such. He'd just got anew one that goes: "Why is an elephant like a corkscrew? Because there'sa 'b' in both." I didn't see it at first, till he explained with heartylaughter—because there's a "b" in both—the word "both." See? Of coursethere's no sense to it. He admitted there wasn't, but said it was ajolly wheeze just the same. I might have took a chance with him, but hewent on to say that he'd sent this wheeze to the brave lads in thetrenches, along with a lot of cigars and tobacco, and had got aboutfifty postcards from 'em saying it was the funniest thing they'd heardsince the war begun. And in a minute more he was explaining, with muchfeeling, just what low-down nation it was that started the war—it notbeing England, by any means—and I saw he wasn't to be trusted on hisfeet.

So I smoothed him down till he promised to donate all the lemonade forAggie Tuttle, who was to be Rebekkah at the Well; and I smoothed HenryLehman till he said he'd let his folks come and buy chances on things,even if the country was getting overrun by foreigners, with an Italianbarber shop just opened in the same block with his sanitary shavingparlour; though—thank goodness—the Italian hadn't had much to do yetbut play on a mandolin. And I smoothed Professor Gluckstein down till heagreed to furnish the music for us and let the war take care of itself.

The Prof's a good old scout when he ain't got his war bonnet on. He wasdarned near crying into his meerschaum pipe with a carved fat lady on itwhen I got through telling him about the poor soldiers in the wet andcold without a thing to smoke. He says: "You're right, madam; with JakeFrost in the trenches and no tobacco, all men should be brothers undertheir hides." And I got that printed in the Recorder for a slogan, andother foreigners come into line; and things looked pretty good.

Also, I got Doc Sulloway, who happened to be in town, to promise he'dcome and tell some funny anecdotes. He ain't a regular doctor—he justtook it up; a guy with long black curls and a big moustache and a bighat and diamond pin, that goes round selling Indian Snake Oil off awagon. Doc said he'd have his musician, Ed Bemis, come, too. He said Edwas known far and wide as the world's challenge cornetist. I says allright, if he'll play something neutral; and Doc says he'll play "Listento the Mocking Bird," with variations, and play it so swell you'llthink you're perched right up in the treetops listening to Nature's ownfeathered songsters.

That about made up my show, including, of course, the Spanish dance byBeryl Mae Macomber. Red Gap always expects that and Beryl Mae neverdisappoints 'em—makes no difference what the occasion is. Mebbe it's anEvening with Shakespeare, or the Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers, or thatOratorio by Elijah somebody, but Beryl Mae is right there with hergirlish young beauty and her tambourine. You see, I didn't want it along show—just enough to make the two-bits admission seem a littleshort of robbery. Our real graft, of course, was to be where the youngsociety débutantes and heiresses in charge of the booths would wheedlemoney out of the dazed throng for chances on the junk that would bedonated.

"ALL SUNNED UP LIKE A MAN THAT KNOWS THE WORLD IS HIS
OYSTER AND EVERY MONTH'S GOT AN 'R' IN IT"

Well, about three days before the show I went up to Masonic Hall to seeabout the stage decorations, and I was waiting while some one went downto the Turf Exchange to get the key off Tim Mahoney, the janitor—Timhad lately had to do janitor work for a B'nai B'rith lodge that washolding meetings there, and it had made him gloomy and dissolute—and,while I was waiting, who should come tripping along but Egbert Floud,all sunned up like a man that knows the world is his oyster and everymonth's got an "r" in it. Usually he's a kind of sad, meek coot, lookingneglected and put upon; but now he was actually giggling to himselfas he come up the stairs two at a time.

"Well, Old-Timer, what has took the droop out of your face?" I ask him.

"Why," he says, twinkling all over the place, "I'm aiming to keep it asecret, but I don't mind hinting to an old friend that my part of theevening's entertainment is going to be so good it'll make the whole showtop-heavy. Them ladies said they'd rely on me to think up somethingnovel, and I said I would if I could, and I did—that's all. I'd seenenough of these shows where you ladies pike along with pincushions andfancy lemonade and infants' wear—and mebbe a red plush chair, with goldlegs, that plays 'Alice, Where Art Thou?' when a person sets down onit—with little girls speaking a few pieces about the flowers and lambs,and so on, and cleaning up about eleven-twenty-nine on the evening'srevel—or it would be that, only you find you forgot to pay the GoldenRule Cash Store for the red-and-blue bunting, and they're howling fortheir money like a wild-cat. Yes, sir; that's been the way of it withwoman at the helium. I wouldn't wish to be a Belgian at all underpresent circ*mstances; but if I did have to be one I'd hate to think myregular meals was depending on any crooked work you ladies has done upto date."

"You'd cheer me strangely," I says, "only I been a diligent reader ofhistory, and somehow I can't just recall your name being connected upwith any cataclysms of finance. I don't remember you ever starting oneof these here panics—or stopping one, for that matter. I did hear thatyou'd had your pocket picked down to the San Francisco Fair."

I was prodding him along, understand, so he'd flare up and tell me whathis secret enterprise was that would make women's operations look sillyand feminine. I seen his eyes kind of glisten when I said this about himbeing touched.

"That's right," he says. "Some lad nicked me for my roll and my returnticket, and my gold watch and chain, and my horseshoe scarfpin with thediamonds in it."

"You stood a lot of pawing over," I says, "for a man that's the keenfinancial genius you tell about being. This lad must of been a new handat it. Likely he'd took lessons from a correspondence school. At least,with you standing tied and blinded that way, a good professional onewould have tried for your gold tooth—or, anyway, your collar button. Isee your secret though," I go on as sarcastically as possible: "You gotthe lad's address and you're going to have him here Saturday night toglide among the throng and ply his evil trade. Am I right or wrong?"

"You are not," he says. "I never thought of that. But I won't say youain't warm in your guess. Yes, you certainly are warm, because what I'mgoing to do is just as dastardly, without being so darned illegal,except to an extent."

Well, it was very exasperating, but that was all I could get out ofhim. When I ask for details he just clams up.

"But, mark my words," says the old smarty, "I'll show you it takesbrains in addition to woman's wiles and artwork to make a decentclean-up in this little one-cylinder town."

"If you just had a little more self-confidence," I says, "you might ofgone to the top; lack of faith in yourself is all that's kept you back.Too bad!"

"All right for you to kid me," he says; "but I'd be almost willing togive you two dollars for every dollar that goes out of this hallSaturday night."

Well, it was kind of pathetic and disgusting the way this poor old dubwas leaning on his certainty; so I let him alone and went on about mywork, thinking mebbe he really had framed up something crooked thatwould bring at least a few dollars to the cause.

Every time I met him for the next three days after that he'd be sopuffed up, like a toad, with importance and low remarks about womanthat, at last, I just ignored him, pretending I hadn't the leastcuriosity about his evil secret. It hurt his feelings when I quitpestering him about it, but he'd been outraging mine right along; so wesplit even.

He'd had a good-sized room just down the hall turned over to him, and alot of stuff of some kind carried in there in the night, and menworking, with the door locked all the time; so I and the other ladieswent calmly on about our own business, decorating the main hall withthe flags of all nations, fixing up the platform and the booths verypretty, and giving Mr. Smarty Egbert Floud nothing but haughty glancesabout his hidden novelty. Even when his men was hammering away in thereat their work he'd have something hung over the keyhole—as insulting tous as only a man can be.

Saturday night come and we had a good crowd. Cousin Egbert was after methe minute I got my things off to come and see his dastardly secret; butI had my revenge. I told him I had no curiosity about it and was goingto be awful busy with my show, but I'd try as a personal favour to givehim a look over before I went home. Yes, sir; I just turned him downwith one superior look, and got my curtains slid back on Mrs. LeonardWales, dressed up like a superdreadnought in a naval parade andsurrounded by every little girl in town that had a white dress. Theywasn't states this time, but Columbia's Choicest Heritage, with a secondline on the program saying, "Future Buds and Débutantes From Society'sHome Galleries." It was a line we found under some babies' photos on thesociety page of a great newspaper printed in New York City. ProfessorGluckstein and his son Rudolph played the "Star-Spangled Banner" on thepiano and fiddle during this feature.

Then little Magnesia Waterman, dressed to represent the Queen of Sheba,come forward and sung the song we'd picked out for her, with the peoplejoining in the chorus:

We're for you, Woodrow Wilson,
One Hundred Million Strong!
We put you in the White House
And we know you can't do wrong.

It was very successful, barring hisses from all the Germans and Englishpresent; but they was soon hushed up. Then Doc Sulloway come out andtold some funny anecdotes about two Irishmen named Pat and Mike, latelylanded in this country and looking for work, and imitated two cats in abackyard, and drawing a glass of soda water, and sawing a plank in two;and winding up with the announcement that he had donated a dozen bottlesof the great Indian Snake Oil Remedy for man and beast that had beenimparted to him in secret by old Rumpatunk, the celebrated medicine man,who is supposed to have had it from the Great Spirit; and Ed Bemis, theWorld's Challenge Cornetist, entertained one and all; and Beryl Mae doneher Spanish dance that I'd last seen her give at the Queen EstherCantata in the M.E. Church. And that was the end of the show; justenough to start 'em buying things at the booths.

At least, we thought it would be. But what does a lot of the crowd do,after looking round a little, but drift out into the hall and down tothis room where Cousin Egbert had his foul enterprise, whatever it was.I didn't know yet, having held aloof, as you might say, owing to the oldhound's offensive manner. But I had heard three or four parties kind ofgasping to each other, had they seen what that Egbert Floud was doing inthe other room?—with looks of horror and delight on their faces. Thatmade me feel more superior than ever to the old smarty; so I didn't gonear the place yet, but herded people back to the raffles wherever Icould.

The first thing was Lon Price's corner lot, for which a hundred chanceshad been sold. Lon had a blueprint showing the very lot; also a pictureof a choice dwelling or bungalow, like the one he has painted on thedrop curtain of Knapp's Opera House, under the line, "Price's Additionto Red Gap; Big Lots, Little Payments." It's a very fancy house withporches and bay windows and towers and front steps, and everything,painted blue and green and yellow; and a blond lady in a purple gown,with two golden-haired tots at her side, is waving good-bye to a tall,handsome man with brown whiskers as he hurries out to the waiting streetcar—though the car line ain't built out there yet by any means.

However, Lon got up and said it was a Paradise on earth, a Heaven ofHomes; that in future he would sell lots there to any native Belgian ata 20 per cent. discount; and he hoped the lucky winner of this lot wouldat once erect a handsome and commodious mansion on it, such as theartist had here depicted; and it would be only nine blocks from theswell little Carnegie Library when that, also, had been built, theplans for it now being in his office safe.

Quite a few of the crowd had stayed for this, and they cheered Lon andvoted that little Magnesia Waterman was honest enough to draw thenumbers out of a hat. They was then drawn and read by Lon in an excitingsilence—except for Mrs. Leonard Wales, who was breathing heavily andtalking to herself after each number. She and Leonard had took a chancefor a dollar and everybody there knew it by now. She was dead sure theywould get the lot. She kept telling people so, right and left. She saidthey was bound to get it if the drawing was honest. As near as I couldmake out, she'd been taking a course of lessons from a professor inChicago about how to control your destiny by the psychic force thatdwells within you. It seems all you got to do is to will things to comeyour way and they have to come. No way out of it. You step on this herepsychic gas and get what you ask for.

"I already see our little home," says Mrs. Wales in a hoarse whisper. "Isee it objectively. It is mine. I claim it out of the boundlessall-good. I have put myself in the correct mental attitude of reception;I am holding to the perfect All. My own will come to me."

And so on, till parties round her begun to get nervous. Yes, sir; shekept this stuff going in low, tense tones till she had every one inhearing buffaloed; they was ready to give her the lot right there andtear up their own tickets. She was like a crapshooter when he keepscalling to the dice: "Come, seven—come on, come on!" All right for thepsychics, but that's what she reminded me of.

And in just another minute everybody there thought she'd cheated bytaking these here lessons that she got from Chicago for twelve dollars;for you can believe it or not but her number won the lot. Yes, sir;thirty-three took the deed and Lon filled in her name on it right there.Many a cold look was shot at her as she rushed over to embrace herhusband, a big lump of a man that's all right as far up as his Adam'sapple, and has been clerking in the Owl Cigar Store ever since he canremember. He tells her she is certainly a wonder and she calls him asilly boy; says it's just a power she has developed throughconcentration, and now she must claim from the all-good a dear littlehome of seven rooms and bath, to be built on this lot; and she knows itwill come if she goes into the silence and demands it. Say! People withany valuables on 'em begun to edge off, not knowing just how thisstrange power of hers might work.

Then I look round and see the other booths ain't creating near theexcitement they had ought to be, only a few here and there takingtwo-bit chances on things if Mrs. Wales ain't going in on 'em, too;several of the most attractive booths was plumb deserted, with the girlsin charge looking mad or chagrined, as you might say. So I remember thishidden evil of Egbert Floud's and that the crowd has gone there; andwhile I'm deciding to give in and gratify my morbid curiosity, herecomes Cousin Egbert himself, romping along in his dinner-jacket suit andtan shoes, like a wild mustang.

"What was I telling you?" he demands. "Didn't I tell you the rest ofthis show was going to die standing up? Yes, sir; she's going to passout on her feet." And he waved a sneering arm round at the desertedbooths. "What does parties want of this truck when they can come down tomy joint and get real entertainment for their money? Why, they'rebreaking their ankles now to get in there!"

It sure looked like he was right for once in his life; so I says:

"What is it you've done?"

"Simple enough," says he, "to a thinking man. It comes to me like aflash or inspiration, or something, from being down to that fair in SanFrancisco, California. Yes, sir; they had a deadfall there, with everykind of vice rampant that has ever been legalized any place, and severalkinds that ain't ever been; they done everything, from strong-arm workto short changing, and they was getting by with it by reason of callingit Ye Olde Tyme Mining Camp of '49, or something poetical like that.That was where I got nicked for my roll, in addition to about fifty Ilost at a crooked wheel. I think the workers was mostly ex-convicts, andnot so darned ex- at that. Anyway, their stuff got too raw even for themanagers of an exposition, so they had to close down in spite of theirname. That's where I get my idee when these ladies said think upsomething novel and pleasing. Just come and see how I'm taking it off of'em." And, with that, he grabs me by the arm and rushes me down to thisjoint of his.

At the side of the doorway he had two signs stuck up. One says, Ye OldeTyme Saloone; and the other says, Ye Olde Tyme Gambling Denne. You couldof pushed me over with one finger when I looked in. He'd drew the crowd,all right. I knew then that Aggie Tuttle might just as well close downher Rebekkah-at-the-Well dive, and that no one was going to take anymore chances on pincushions and tidies and knitted bed slippers.

About a third of the crowd was edged up to the bar and keeping LouisMeyer and his father busy with drink orders, and the other two-thirdswas huddled round a roulette layout across the room. They was wedged inso tight I couldn't see the table, but I could hear the little ballclick when it slowed up, and the rattle of chips, and squeals from themthat won, and hoarse mutters from the losers.

Cousin Egbert rubbed his hands and giggled, waiting for me to bedeck himwith floral tributes.

"I suppose you got a crooked wheel," I says.

"Shucks, no!" says he. "I did think of it, but I'd of had to send out oftown for one and they're a lot of trouble to put in, what with theelectric wiring and all; and besides, the straightest roulette wheelever made is crooked enough for any man of decent instincts. I don'tbegrudge 'em a little excitement for their money. I got these old barfixings out of the Spilmer place that was being tore down, and we'recharging two bits a drink for whatever, and that'll be a help; and itlooks to me like you ladies would of thought you needed a man's brain inthese shows long before this. Come on in and have a shot. I'll buy."

So we squeezed in and had one. It was an old-time saloon, allright—that is, fairly old; about 1889, with a brass foot rail, and backof the bar a stuffed eagle and a cash register. A gang of ladies wastaking claret lemonades and saying how delightfully Bohemian it all was;and Miss Metta Bigler, that gives lessons in oil painting and burntwood, said it brought back very forcibly to her the Latin Quarter ofChicago, where she finished her art course. Henrietta Templeton Price,with one foot on the railing, was shaking dice with three otherprominent society matrons for the next round, and saying she had alwaysbeen a Bohemian at heart, only you couldn't go very far in a small townlike this without causing unfavourable comment among a certain element.

It was a merry scene, with the cash register playing like the SwissFamily Bellringers. Even the new Episcopalian minister come along, withold Proctor Knapp, and read the signs and said they was undeniablyquaint, and took a slug of rye and said it was undeniably delightful;though old Proctor roared like a maddened bull when he found what theprice was. I guess you can be an Episcopalian one without itsinterfering much with man's natural habits and innocent recreations.Then he went over and lost a two-bit piece on the double-o, and laughedheartily over the occurrence, saying it was undeniably piquant with oldProctor plunging ten cents on the red and losing it quick, and saying afool and his money was soon parted—yes, and I wish I had as much moneyas that old crook ain't foolish; but no matter.

Beryl Mae Macomber was aiding the Belgians by running out in the bigroom to drum up the stragglers. She was now being Little Nugget, theMiners' Pet; and when she wasn't chasing in easy money she'd loll at oneend of the bar with a leer on her flowerlike features to entice honestworkingmen in to lose their all at the gaming tables. There waschuck-a-luck and a crap game going, and going every minute, too, withCousin Egbert trying to start three-card monte at another table—onlythey all seemed wise to that. Even the little innocent children give himthe laugh.

I went over to the roulette table and lost a few dollars, not being ableto stick long, because other women would keep goring me with theirelbows. Yes, sir; that layout was ringed with women four deep. All thatthe men could do was stand on the outside and pass over their loosesilver to the fair ones. Sure! Women are the only real natural-borngamblers in the world. Take a man that seems to be one and it's onlybecause he's got a big streak of woman in him, even if it don't show anyother way. Men, of course, will gamble for the fun of it; but it ain'tever funny to a woman, not even when she wins. It brings out the naturalwolf in her like nothing else does. It was being proved this night allyou'd want to see anything proved. If the men got near enough and won abet they'd think it was a good joke and stick round till they lost it.Not so my own sex. Every last one of 'em saw herself growing rich onCousin Egbert's money—and let the Belgians look out for themselves.

Mrs. Tracy Bangs, for instance, fought her way out of the mob, lookingas wild as any person in a crazy house, choking twenty-eight dollars todeath in her two fists that she win off two bits. She crowds this ontoTracy and makes him swear by the sacred memory of his mother that hewill positively not give her back a cent of it to gamble with if thefever comes on her again—not even if she begs him to on her bendedknees. And fifteen minutes later the poor little shark nearly hashysterics because Tracy won't give her back just five of it to gambleagain with. Sure! A very feminine woman she is.

Tracy is a pretty good little sport himself. He says, No, and that'll beall, please, not only on account of the sacred memory of his mother butbecause the poor Belgians has got to catch it going if they don't catchit coming; and he's beat it out to a booth and bought thetwenty-five-dollar gold clock with chimes, with the other three dollarsgoing for the dozen bottles of Snake Oil and the twenty street-cartickets.

And now let there be no further words about it, but there was when shehears this horrible disclosure—lots of words, and the brute won't evengive her the street-car tickets, which she could play in for a dollar,and she has to go to the retiring room to bathe her temples, and treatsTracy all the rest of the evening like a crippled stepchild, thinking ofall she could of won if he hadn't acted like a snake in the grass towardher!

Right after this Mrs. Leonard Wales, in her flag and powder, begun tostick up out of the scene, though not risking any money as yet. She'djust stand there like one petrified while cash was being paid in andout, keeping away about three women of regular size that would like toget their silver down. I caught the gleam in her eye, and the way shedrawed in her breath when the lucky number was called out, kind ofshrinking her upper lip every time in a bloodthirsty manner. Yes, sir;in the presence of actual money that dame reminded me of the greatsaber-toothed tiger that you see terrible pictures of in the animalbooks.

Pretty soon she mowed down a lot of her sister gamblers and got out towhere Leonard was standing, to tell him all about how she'd have won alot of money if she'd only put some chips down at the right time, theway she would of done if she'd had any; and Leonard said what a shame!And they drifted into a corner, talking low. I bet she was asking him ifshe couldn't make a claim to these here bets she'd won in her mind, andif this wasn't the magic time to get the little home or bungalow on thenew lot she'd won by finding out from the Chicago professor how to mouldher destiny.

Then I lose track of the two for a minute, because Judge Ballard comesin escorting his sister from South Carolina, that's visiting them, andinvites every one to take something in her honour. She was a fraillittle old lady, very old-fashioned indeed, with white hair built up ina waterfall and curls over both ears, and a flowered silk dress that Ibet was made in Civil War times, and black lace mitts. Say! She lookedlike one of the ladies that would of been setting in the front of a boxat Ford's Theatre the night President Lincoln was shot up!

She seemed a mite rattled when she found herself in a common barroom,having failed to read Cousin Egbert's undeniably quaint signs; but theJudge introduced her to some that hadn't met her yet, and when he askedher what her refreshment would be she said in a very brazen way that shewould take a drop of anisette cordial. Louis Meyer says they ain'tkeeping that, and she says, Oh, dear! she's too old-fashioned! So CousinEgbert says, why, then she should take an old-fashioned co*cktail, whichshe does and sips it with no sign of relish. Then she says she willhelp the cause by wagering a coin on yonder game of chance.

The Judge paws out a place for her and I go along to watch. She priesopen a bead reticule that my mother had one like and gets out a knittedsilk purse, and takes a five-dollar gold piece into her little bonywhite fingers and drops it on a number, and says: "Now that is wellover!" But it wasn't over. There was excitement right off, because,outside of some silver dollars I'd lost myself, I hadn't seen anythingbigger than a two-bit piece played there that night. Right over myshoulder I heard heavy breathing and I didn't have to turn round to knowit was Cora Wales. When the ball slowed up she quit breathing entirelytill it settled.

It must of been a horrible strain on her, for the man was raking in allthe little bets and leaving the five-dollar one that win. Say! Thatwoman gripped an arm of mine till I thought it was caught in machineryof some kind! And Mrs. Doc Martingale, that she gripped on the otherside, let out a yell of agony. But that wasn't the worst of Cora Wales'torture. No, sir! She had to stand there and watch this littleold-fashioned sport from South Carolina refuse the money!

"But I can't accept it from you good people," says she in her thinlittle voice. "I intended to help the cause of those poor sufferers, andto profit by the mere inadvertence of your toy there would beunspeakable—really no!"

And she pushed back the five and the hundred and seventy-five that thedealer had counted out for her, dusted her little fingers with a littlelace handkerchief smelling of lavender, and asked the Judge to show hera game that wasn't so noisy.

I guess Cora Wales was lost from that moment. She had Len over in acorner again, telling him how easy it was to win, and how this poordemented creature had left all hers there because Judge Ballard probablydidn't want to create a scene by making her take it; and mustn't theyhave a lot of trouble looking after the weak-minded thing all the time!And I could hear her say if one person could do it another could,especially if they had learned how to get in tune with the Infinite. Lensays all right, how much does she want to risk? And that scares herplumb stiff again, in spite of her uncanny powers. She says it wouldn'tbe right to risk one cent unless she could be sure the number was goingto win.

Of course if you made your claim on the Universal, your own was bound tocome to you; still, you couldn't be so sure as you ought to be with aroulette wheel, because several times the ball had gone into numbersthat she wasn't holding for with her psychic grip, and the uncertaintywas killing her; and why didn't he say something to help her, instead ofstanding there silent and letting their little home slip from her grasp?

Cousin Egbert comes up just then, still happy and puffed up; so I puthim wise to this Wales conspiracy against his game.

"Mebbe you can win back that lot from her," I says, "and raffle it overagain for the fund. She's getting worked up to where she'll take achance."

"Good work!" says he. "I'll approach her in the matter."

So over he goes and tries to interest her in the dice games; but no, shethinks dice is low and a mere coloured person's game. So then he says toset down to the card table and play this here Canfield solitaire; she'sto be paid five dollars for every card she gets up and a whole thousandif she gets 'em all up. That listens good to her till she finds she hasto give fifty-two dollars for the deck first. She says she knew theremust be some catch about it. Still, she tries out a couple of deals justto see what would happen, and on the first she would have won thirteendollars and on the second eight dollars. She figures then that by allmoral rights Cousin Egbert owes her twenty-one dollars, and at leasteight dollars to a certainty, because she was really playing for moneythe second time and merely forgot to mention it to him.

And while they sort of squabble about this, with Cousin Egbert verypig-headed or adamant, who should come in but this Sandy Sawtelle,that's now sobbing out his heart in song down there; and with him isBuck Devine. It seems they been looking for a game, and they givesqueals of joy when they see this one. In just two minutes Sandy iscollecting thirty-five dollars for one that he had carefully placed onNo. 11. He gives a glad shout at this, and Leonard Wales and lady moveover to see what it's all about. Sandy is neatly stacking his red chipsand plays No. 11 once more, but No. 22 comes up.

"Gee!" says Sandy. "I forgot. Twenty-two, of course, and likewisethirty-three."

So he now puts dollar bets on all three numbers, and after a couple moreturns he's collecting on 33, and the next time 22 comes again. He don'thardly have time to stack his chips, they come so fast; and then it'sNo. 11 once more, amid rising excitement from all present. Cora Wales ispanting like the Dying Gamekeeper I once saw in the Eden Musée in NewYork City. Sandy quits now for a moment.

"Let every man, woman, and child, come one, come all, across the roomand crook the convivial elbow on my ill-gotten gains!" he calls out.

So everybody orders something; Tim Mahoney going in behind the bar tohelp out. Even Cora Wales come over when she understood no expense wasattached to so doing, though taking a plain lemonade, because she saidalcohol would get one's vibrations all fussed up, or something likethat.

Cousin Egbert was still chipper after this reverse, though it had sweptaway about all he was to the good up to that time.

"Three rousing cheers!" says he. "And remember the little ball stillrolls for any sport that thinks he can Dutch up the game!"

While this drink is going on amid the general glad feeling that alwaysprevails when some spendthrift has ordered for the house, Leonard Walesgets Buck Devine to one side and says how did Sandy do it? So Buck tellshim and Cora that Sandy took eleven stitches in Jerry's hide yesterdayafternoon and he was playing this hunch, which he had reason to feel wasa first-class one.

"If I could only feel it was a cosmic certainty—" says Cora.

"Oh, she's cosmic, all right!" says Buck. "I never seen anythingcosmicker. Look what she's done already, and Sandy only begun! Justwatch him! He'll cosmic this here game to a standstill. He'll have SourDough there touching him for two-bits breakfast money—see if he don't."

"But eleven came only twice," says the conservative Cora.

"Sure! But did you notice Nos. 22 and 33?" says Buck. "You got to humourany good hunch to a certain extent, cosmic or no cosmic."

"I see," says Cora with gleaming eyes; "and No. 33 is not only what drewour beautiful building lot but it is also the precise number of my yearson the earth plane."

Cousin Egbert overheard this and snorted like no gentleman had ought to,even in the lowest gambling den.

"Thirty-three!" says he to me. "Did you hear the big cheat? Say! Nogambling house on earth would have the nerve to put her right age on awheel! The chances is ruinous enough now without running 'em up toforty-eight or so. I bet that's about what you'd find if you was totooth her."

Sandy has now gone back, followed by the crowd, and wins another bet onNo. 11. This is too much for Cora's Standard Oil instincts. She nevertrusts Leonard with any money, but she goes over into a corner, hikesthe flag of her country up over one red stocking for a minute, and comesback with a two-dollar bill, which she splits on 22 and 33; and when 33wins she's mad clean through because 22 didn't also win, and she'swasted a whole dollar, like throwing it into the Atlantic Ocean.

"Too bad, Pettie!" says Leonard, who was crowded in by her. "But youmustn't expect to have all the luck"—which is about the height ofLeonard's mental reach.

"It was not luck; it was simple lack of faith," says Cora. "I put myselfin tune with the Infinite and make my claim upon the all-good—and thenI waver. The loss of that dollar was a punishment to me."

Now she stakes a dollar on No. 33 alone, and when it comes double-o shecries out that the man had leaned his hand on the edge of the tablewhile the ball was rolling and thereby mushed up her cosmic vibrations,even if he didn't do something a good deal more crooked. Then sheswitches to No. 22, and that wins.

She now gets suspicious of the chips and has 'em turned into realmoney, which she stuffs into her consort's pockets for the time being,all but two dollars that go on Nos. 11 and 33. And No. 22 comes upagain. She nearly fainted and didn't recover in time to get anythingdown for the next roll—and I'm darned if 11 don't show! She turnssavagely on her husband at this. The poor hulk only says:

"But, Pettie, you're playing the game—I ain't."

She replies bitterly:

"Oh, ain't that just like a man! I knew you were going to saythat!"—and seemed to think she had him well licked.

Then the single-o come. She says:

"Oh, dear! It seems that, even with the higher consciousness, one can'tbe always certain of one's numbers at this dreadful game."

And while she was further reproaching her husband, taking time to do itgood and keeping one very damp dollar safe in her hand, what comes upbut old 33 again!

It looked like hysterics then, especially when she noticed Buck Devinehelping pile Sandy's chips up in front of him till they looked like agreat old English castle, with towers and minarets, and so on, Sandyhaving played his hunch strong and steady. She waited for another turnthat come nothing important to any of 'em; then she drew Leonard out andmade him take her for a glass of lemonade out where Aggie Tuttle wasbeing Rebekkah at the Well, because they charged two bits for it at thebar and Aggie's was only a dime. The sale made forty cents Aggie hadtook in on the evening.

Racing back to Ye Olde Tyme Gambling Denne, she gets another hard blow;for Sandy has not only win another of his magic numbers but has boughtup the bar for the evening, inviting all hands to brim a cup at hisexpense, whenever they crave it—nobody's money good but his; so Cora isnot only out what she would of made by following his play but the tencents cash she has paid Aggie Tuttle. She was not a woman to be trifledwith then. She took another lemonade because it was free, and made Lentake one that he didn't want. Then she draws three dollars from him andcovers the three numbers with reckless and noble sweeps of her powerfularms. The game was on again.

Cousin Egbert by now was looking slightly disturbed, or outré, as theFrench put it, but tries to conceal same under an air of sparklinggayety, laughing freely at every little thing in a girlish or painfulmanner.

"Yes," says he coquettishly; "that Sandy scoundrel is taking it fast outof one pocket, but he's putting it right back into the other. Thewheel's loss is the bar's gain."

I looked over to size Sandy's chips and I could see four or five markersthat go a hundred apiece.

"I admire your roguish manner that don't fool any one," I says; "but ifwe was to drink the half of Sandy's winnings, even at your robberprices, we'd all be submerged to the periscope. It looks to me," I goeson, "like the bazaar-robbing genius is not exclusively a male attributeor tendency."

"How many of them knitted crawdabs you sold out there at your booths?"he demands. "Not enough to buy a single Belgian a T-bone steak and friedpotatoes."

"Is that so, indeed?" I says. "Excuse me a minute. Standing here in theblinding light of your triumph, I forgot a little matter of detail suchas our sex is always wasting its energies on."

So I call Sandy and Buck away from their Belgian atrocities and speaksharply to 'em.

"You boys ought to be ashamed of yourselves," I says—"winning all thatmoney and then acting like old Gaspard the Miser in the Chimes ofNormandy! Can't you forget your natural avarice and loosen up some?"

"I bought the bar, didn't I?" asks Sandy. "I can't do no more, can I?"

"You can," I says. "Out in that big room is about eighteen tired maidsand matrons of Red Gap's most exclusive inner circles yawning theirheads off over goods, wares, and merchandise that no one will look atwhile this sinful game is running. If you got a spark of manhood in yougo on out and trade a little with 'em, just to take the curse off yourdepredations in here."

"Why, sure!" says Sandy. He goes back to the layout and loads Buck'shat full of red and blue chips at one and two dollars each. "Go buy theplace clean," he says to Buck. "Do it good; don't leave a single objectof use or luxury. My instructions is sweeping, understand. And ifthere's a harness booth there you order a solid gold collar for oldJerry, heavily incrusted with jewels and his initials and minesurrounded by a wreath. Also, send out a pint of wine for every one ofthese here maids and matrons. Meantime, I shall stick here and keep aneye on my large financial interests."

So Buck romps off on his joyous mission, singing a little ballad thatgoes: "To hell with the man that works!" And Sandy moves quickly back tothe wheel.

I followed and found Cora barely surviving because she's lost nine ofher three-dollar bets while Sandy was away, leaving her only about ahundred winner. Len was telling her to "be brave, Pettie!" and she wassaying it was entirely his fault that they hadn't already got their neatlittle home; but she would have it before she left the place or know thereason why.

It just did seem as if them three numbers had been resting while Sandywas away talking to me. They begin to show up again the minute heresumed his bets, and Cora was crowding onto the same with a risingtemperature. Yes, sir, it seemed downright uncanny or miraculous the wayone or the other of 'em showed up, with Sandy saying it was a shame totake the money, and Cora saying it was a shame she had to bet on allthree numbers and get paid only on one.

Of course others was also crowding these numbers, though not so many asyou'd think, because every one said the run must be at an end, andthey'd be a fool to play 'em any farther; and them that did play 'em wasmostly making ten-cent bets to be on the safe side. Only Sandy and Corakept right on showing up one Egbert Floud as a party that had much tolearn about pulling off a good bazaar.

It's a sad tale. Cousin Egbert had to send out twice for more cash, CoraWales refusing to take his check on the Farmers and Merchants Nationalfor hers. She said she was afraid there would be some catch about it. Imet Egbert out in the hall after the second time she'd made him send andhe'd lost much of his sparkle.

"I never thought it was right to strike a lady without cause," he saysbitterly; "but I'd certainly hate to trust myself with that frail out insome lonely spot, like Price's Addition, where her screams couldn't beheard."

"That's right," I says; "take it out on the poor woman that's trying towin a nice bungalow with big sawed corners sticking out all over it,when that cut-throat Sandy Sawtelle has win about twice as much! Thatain't the light of pure reason I had the right to expect from the BazaarKing of Red Gap."

"That's neither here nor there," says he with petulance. "Sandy wouldof been just as happy if he'd lost the whole eighteen dollars him andBuck come in here with."

"Well," I warns him, "it looks to me like you'd have to apply them otherdrastic methods you met with in this deadfall at the San FranciscoFair—strong-arm work or medicine in the drinks of the winners, orsomething like that—if you want to keep a mortgage off the old home. Ofcourse I won't crowd you for that two dollars you promised me for everyone that goes out of the hall. You can have any reasonable time you wantto pay that," I says.

"That's neither here nor there," he says. "Luck's got to turn. The wheelain't ever been made that could stand that strain much longer."

And here Luella Stultz comes up and says Mrs. Wales wants to know howmuch she could bet all at once if she happened to want to. I could justsee Cora having a sharp pain in the heart like a knife thrust when shethought what she would of win by betting ten dollars instead of one.Cousin Egbert answers Luella quite viciously.

"Tell that dame the ceiling sets the limit now," says he; "but if thatain't lofty enough I'll have a skylight sawed into it for her."

Then he goes over to watch, himself, being all ruined up by theseplungers. Leonard was saying: "Now don't be rash, Pettie!" And Pettiewas telling him it was his negative mind that had kept her from bettingfive dollars every clip, and look what that would mean to their pile!

Cousin Egbert give 'em one look and says, right out loud, Leonard Walesis the biggest ham that was ever smoked, and he'd like to meet him, manto man, outside; then he goes off muttering that he can be pushed sofar, but in the excitement of the play no one pays the least attentionto him. A little later I see him all alone out in the hall again. He wasscrunched painfully up in a chair till he looked just like this hereFrench metal statue called Lee Penser, which in our language means"The Thinker." I let him think, not having the heart to prong him againso quick.

And the game goes merrily on, with Sandy collecting steadily on hishunch and Cora Wales telling her husband the truth about himself everytime one of these three numbers didn't win; she exposed some verydistressing facts about his nature the time she put five apiece on thethree numbers and the single-o come up. It was a mad life, that lasthour, with a lot of other enraged ladies round the layout, some beingmad because they hadn't had money to play the hunch with, and othersbecause they hadn't had the nerve.

Then somebody found it was near midnight and the crowd begun to fallaway. Cousin Egbert strolls by and says don't quit on his account—thatthey can stick there and play their hunch till the bad place freezesover, for all he cares; and he goes over to the bar and takes a drinkall by himself, which in him is a sign of great mental disturbance.

Then, for about twenty minutes, I was chatting with the Mes-damesBallard and Price about what a grand success our part had been, owing toSandy acting the fool with Cousin Egbert's money, which the latter ain'twise to yet. When I next notice the game a halt has been called by CoraWales. It seems the hunch has quit working. Neither of 'em has won a betfor twenty minutes and Cora is calling the game crooked.

"It looks very, very queer," says she, "that our numbers should sosuddenly stop winning; very queer and suspicious indeed!" And she glaredat Cousin Egbert with rage and distrust splitting fifty-fifty in herfevered eyes.

Cousin Egbert replied quickly, but he kind of sputtered and so couldn'thave been arrested for it.

"Oh, I've no doubt you can explain it very glibly," says Cora; "but itseems very queer indeed to Leonard and I, especially coming at thispeculiar time, when our little home is almost within my grasp."

Cousin Egbert just walked off, though opening and shutting his hands ina nervous way, like, in fancy free, he had her out on her own lot inPrice's Addition and was there abusing her fatally.

"Very well!" says Cora with great majesty. "He may evade giving me asatisfactory explanation of this extraordinary change, but I shallcertainly not remain in this place and permit myself to be fleeced.Here, darling!"

And she stuffs some loose silver into darling's last pocket that willhold any more. He was already wadded with bills and sagging with coin,till it didn't look like the same suit of clothes. Then she stood therewith a cynical smile and watched Sandy still playing his hunch, tendollars to a number, and never winning a bet.

"You poor dupe!" says she when Sandy himself finally got tired and quit."It's especially awkward," she adds, "because while we have saved enoughto start our little nook, it will have to be far less pretentious than Iwas planning to make it while the game seemed to be played honestly."

Cousin Egbert gets this and says, as polite as a stinging lizard, thathe stands ready to give her a chance at any game she can think of, frommumblety-peg up. He says if she'll turn him and Leonard loose in acellar that he'll give her fifty dollars for every one she's winner ifhe don't have Len screaming for help inside of one minute—or make itfifteen seconds. Len, who's about the size of a freight car, smiles kindof sickish at this, and says he hopes there's no hard feelings among oldfriends and lodge brothers; and Egbert says, Oh, no! It would just be inthe nature of a friendly contest, which he feels very much like havingone, since he can be pushed just so far; but Cora says gambling hasbrutalized him.

Then she sees the cards on the table and asks again about this gamewhere you play cards with yourself and mebbe win a thousand dollarscold. She wants to know if you actually get the thousand in cash, andEgbert says:

"Sure! A thousand that any bank in town would accept at par."

She picks up the deck and almost falls, but thinks better of it.

"Could I play with my own cards?" she wants to know, looking suspiciousat these. Egbert says she sure can. "And in my own home?" asks Cora.

"Your own house or any place else," says Egbert, "and any hour of theday or night. Just call me up when you feel lucky."

"We could embellish our little nook with many needful things," saysCora. "A thousand dollars spent sensibly would do marvels." But afterfiddling a bit more with the cards she laid 'em down with a pitifulsigh.

Cousin Egbert just looked at her, then looked away quick, as if hecouldn't stand it any more, and says: "War is certainly what that manSherman said it was."

Then he watches Sandy Sawtelle cashing in his chips and is kind offiguring up his total losses; so I can't resist handing him another.

"I don't know what us Mes-dames would of done without your master mind,"I says; "and yet I'd hate to be a Belgian with the tobacco habit andhave to depend on you to gratify it."

"Well," he answers, very mad, "I don't see so many of 'em gettingtobacco heart with the proceeds of your fancy truck out in them boothseither!"

"Don't you indeed?" I says, and just at the right moment, too. "Then youbetter take another look or get your eyes fixed or something."

For just then Sandy stands up on a chair and says:

"Ladies and gents, a big pile of valuable presents is piled just at theright of the main entrance as you go out, and I hope you will one andall accept same with the welcome compliments of me and old Jerry, that Ihad to take eleven stitches in the hide of. As you will pass out in anorderly manner, let every lady help herself to two objects that attracther, and every gent help himself to one object; and no crowding orpulling I trust, because some of the objects would break, like themoustache cup and saucer, or the drainpipe, with painted posies on it,to hold your umbrels. Remember my words—every lady two objects andevery gent one only. There is also a new washboiler full of lemonadethat you can partake of at will, though I guess you won't want any—andthanking you one and all!"

So they cheer Sandy like mad and beat it out to get first grab at theplunder; and just as Cousin Egbert thinks he now knows the worst, incomes the girls that had the booths, bringing all the chips Buck Devinehad paid 'em—two hundred and seventy-eight dollars' worth that Egberthas to dig down for after he thinks all is over.

"Ain't it jolly," I says to him while he was writing another check onthe end of the bar. "This is the first time us ladies ever did clean outevery last object at a bazaar. Not a thing left; and I wish we'd got intwice as much, because Sandy don't do things by halves when his moneycomes easy from some poor dub that has thought highly of himself as athinker about money matters." He pretends not to hear me because ofsigning his name very carefully to the check. "And what a sweet littlehome you'll build for the Wales family!" I says. "I can see it now, allornamented up, and with one of these fancy bungalow names up over thefront gate—probably they'll call it The Breakers!"

But he wouldn't come back; so I left him surrounded by the wreck of hisformer smartiness and went home. At the door where the treasures hadbeen massed not a solitary thing was left but a plush holder for a whiskbroom, with hand-painted pansies on the front; and I decided I couldlive without that. Tim Mahoney was there, grouching round about havingto light up the hall next night for the B'nai B'rith; and I told him totake it for himself. He already had six drawnwork doilies and a vanitybox with white and red powder in it.

As I go by the Hong Kong Quick Lunch, Sandy and three or four others isup on stools; the Chinaman, cooking things behind the counter, iswearing a lavender-striped silk dressing sacque and a lace boudoir capwith pink ribbons in it. Yes; we'd all had a purple night of it!

Next day about noon I'm downtown and catch sight of Cousin Egbertsetting in the United States Grill having breakfast; so I feel meanenough to go in and gloat over him some more. I think to find him allmadded up and mortified; but he's strangely cheerful for one who hassuffered. He was bearing up so wonderful that I asked why.

"Ain't you heard?" says he, blotting round in his steak platter with aslice of bread. "Well, I got even with that Wales outfit just beforedaylight—that's all!"

"Talk on," I beg, quite incredulous.

"I didn't get to bed till about two," he says, "and at three I was wokeup by the telephone. It's this big stiff Len Wales, that had ought tohave his head taken off because it only absorbs nourishment from hissystem and gives nothing in return. He's laughing in a childish frenzyand says is this me? I says it is, but that's neither here nor there,and what does he want at this hour? 'It's a good joke on you,' he says,'for the little woman got it on the third trial.' 'Got what?' I wantedto know. 'Got that solitaire,' he yells. 'And it's a good joke on you,all right, because now you owe her the thousand dollars; and I hate tobother you, but you know how some women are that have a delicate,high-strung organization. She says she won't be able to sleep a wink ifyou don't bring it up to her so she can have all our little treasureunder her pillow; and I think, myself, it's better to have it allsettled and satisfactory while the iron's hot, and you'd probably preferit that way, too; and she says she won't mind, this time, taking yourcheck, though the actual money would be far more satisfactory, becauseyou know what women are—"

"Say! He raves on like this for three minutes, stopping to laugh like amaniac about every three words, before I can get a word in to tell himthat I'm a delicate, high-strung organization myself, if you come rightdown to it, and I can't stand there in my nightgown listening to astring of nonsense. He chokes and says: 'What nonsense?' And I ask himdoes he think I'd pay a thousand dollars out on a game I hadn'toverlooked? And he says didn't I agree to in the presence of witnesses,and the cards is laid out right there now on the dining-room table if Igot the least suspicion the game wasn't played fair, and will I come upand look for myself! And I says 'Not in a thousand years!' Because whatdoes he think I am!

"So then Mis' Wales she breaks in and says: 'Listen, Mr. Floud! You aretaking a most peculiar attitude in this matter. You perhaps don'tunderstand that it means a great deal to dear Leonard and me—try tothink calmly and summon your finer instincts. You said I could not onlyplay with my own cards at any hour of the night or day, but in my ownhome; and I chose to play here, because conditions are more harmoniousto my psychic powers—' And so on and so on; and she can't understand mypeculiar attitude once more, till I thought I'd bust.

"It was lucky she had the telephone between us or I should certainly ofbeen pinched for a crime of violence. But I got kind of collected in mysenses and I told her I already had been pushed as far as I could be;and then I think of a good one: I ask her does she know what GeneralSherman said war was? So she says, 'No; but what has that got to do withit?' 'Well, listen carefully!' I says. 'You tell dear Leonard that I amnow saying my last word in this matter by telling you both to go towar—and then ask him to tell you right out what Sherman said war was.'

"I listened a minute longer for her scream, and when it come, like sweetmusic or something, I went to bed again and slept happy. Yes, sir; I goteven with them sharks all right, though she's telling all over town thismorning that I have repudiated a debt of honour and she's going to havethat thousand if there's any law in the land; and anyway, she'll get metook up for conducting a common gambling house. Gee! It makes me feelgood!"

That's the way with this old Egbert boy; nothing ever seems to faze himlong.

"How much do you lose on the night?" I ask him.

"Well, the bar was a great help," he says, very chipper; "so I only loseabout fourteen hundred all told. It'll make a nice bunch for theBelgians, and the few dollars you ladies made at your cheap booths willhelp some."

"How will your fourteen hundred lost be any help to the Belgians?" Iwanted to know; and he looked at me very superior and as crafty as afox.

"Simple enough!" he says in a lofty manner. "I was going to give what Iwin, wasn't I? So why wouldn't I give what I lose? That's plain enoughfor any one but a woman to see, ain't it? I give Mis' Ballard, thetreasurer, a check for fourteen hundred not an hour ago. I told you Iknew how to run one of these grafts, didn't I? Didn't I, now?"

Wasn't that just like the old smarty? You never know when you got himnailed. And feeling so good over getting even with the Wales couple thathad about a thousand dollars of his money that very minute!

Still from the dimly lighted bunk house came the wail of Sandy Sawtelleto make vibrant the night. He had returned to his earlier song afterintermittent trifling with an extensive repertoire:

There's a broken heart for every light on Broadway,
A million tears for every gleam, they say.
Those lights above you think nothing of you;
It's those who love you that have to pay....

It was the wail of one thwarted and perishing. "Ain't it the sobbingtenor?" remarked his employer. "But you can't blame him after thekilling he made before. Of course he'll get to town sooner or later andplay this fourteen number, being that the new reform administration,with Lon Price as Mayor, is now safely elected and the game has openedup again. Yes, sir; he's nutty about stitches in a mule. I wouldn't putit past him that he had old Jerry kicked on purpose to-day!"

VII

KATE; OR, UP FROM THE DEPTHS

This day I fared abroad with Ma Pettengill over wide spaces of theArrowhead Ranch. Between fields along the river bottom were gatesdistressingly crude; clumsy, hingeless panels of board fence, which Imust dismount and lift about by sheer brawn of shoulder. Such gatescombine the greatest weight with the least possible exercise of man'sinventive faculties, and are named, not too subtly, the Armstrong gate.This, indeed, is the American beauty of ranch humour, a flower ofimperishable fragrance handed to the visitor—who does the lifting withguarded drollery or triumphant snicker, as may be. Buck Devine or SandySawtelle will achieve the mot with an aloof austerity that abates no jotunto the hundredth repetition; while Lew Wee, Chinese cook of theArrowhead, fails not to brighten it with a nervous giggle, impairing itsvocal correctness, moreover, by calling it the "Armcatchum" gate.

Ma Pettengill was more versatile this day. The first gate I struggledwith she called Armstrong in a manner dryly descriptive; for the secondshe managed a humorous leer to illumine the term; for the third,secured with a garland of barbed wire that must be painfully untwisted,she employed a still broader humour. Even a child would then have knownthat calling this criminal device the Armstrong gate was a joke ofuncommon richness.

As I remounted, staunching the inevitable wound from barbed wire, Ibegan to speak in the bitterly superior tones of an efficiency expert aswe traversed a field where hundreds of white-faced Herefords wereputting on flesh to their own ruin. I said to my hostess that I vastlyenjoyed lifting a hundred-pound gate—and what was the loss of a littleblood between old friends, even when aggravated by probable tetanusgerms? But had she ever paused to compute the money value of time lostby her henchmen in dismounting to open these clumsy makeshifts? Isuggested that, even appraising the one reliable ranch joke in all theworld at a high figure, she would still profit considerably by puttingin gates that were gates, in place of contrivances that could be handledideally only by a retired weight lifter in barbed-wire-proof armour.

I rapidly calculated, with the seeming high regard for accuracy thatmarks all efficiency experts, that these wretched devices cost hertwenty-eight cents and a half each per diem. Estimating the total ofthem on the ranch at one hundred, this meant to her a loss oftwenty-eight dollars and a half per diem. I used per diem twice toimpress the woman. I added that it was pretty slipshod business for agoing concern, supposing—sarcastically now—that the Arrowhead was agoing concern. Of course, if it were merely a toy for the idle rich—

She had let me talk, as she will now and then, affecting to be engrossedwith her stock.

"Look at them white-faced darlings!" she murmured. "Two years old andweighing eleven hundred this minute if they weigh a pound!"

Then I saw we approached a gate that amazingly was a gate. Hinges, yes;and mechanical complications, and a pendant cord on each side. I tuggedat one and the gate magically opened. As we passed through I tugged atthe other and it magically closed. This was luxury ineffable to one whohad laboured with things that seemed to be kept merely for the sake of ajest that was never of the best and was staling with use. It would alsobe, I hoped, an object lesson to my hostess. I performed the simple ritein silence, yet with a manner that I meant to be eloquent, evenprovocative. It was.

"Oh, sure!" spoke Ma Pettengill. "That there's one of your per-diemgates; and there's another leading out of this field, and about sixbeyond—all of 'em just as per diem as this one; and, also, this hereranch you're on now is one of your going concerns." She chuckled at thisand repeated it in a subterranean rumble: "A going concern—my sakes,yes! It moved so fast you could see it go, and now it's went." Noisilyshe relished this bit of verbal finesse; then permitted her fancy againto trifle with it. "Yes, sir; this here going concern is plumb gone!"

With active malice I asked no question, maintaining a dignified silenceas I lightly manipulated a second paragon of gates. The lady now rumbledconfidentially to herself, and I caught piquant phrases; yet still Iforbore to question, since the woman so plainly sought to intrigue me.Even when we skirted a clump of cottonwoods and came—through anotherperfect gate—upon a most amazing small collection of ranch buildings,dying of desertion, I retained perfect control of a rising curiosity.

By unspoken agreement we drew rein to survey a desolation that was stillimmaculate. Stables and outbuildings were trim and new, and pure withpaint. All had been swept and garnished; no unsightly litter marred thescene. The house was a suburban villa of marked pretension and wouldhave excited no comment on Long Island. In this valley of the mountainsit was nothing short of spectacular. Only one item of decoration hintedan attempt to adapt itself to environment: in the noble stone chimneythat reared itself between two spacious wings a branding iron had beenembedded. Thus did it proclaim itself to the incredulous hills as aranch house.

Flowers had been planted along a gravelled walk. While I reminded myselfthat the gravel must have been imported from a spot at least ten milesdistant, I was further shocked by discovering a most improbable golfgreen, in gloomy survival. Then I detected a series of kennels facing awired dog run. This was overwhelming in a country of simple, steadfastdevotion to the rearing of cattle for market.

Ma Pettengill now spoke in a tone that, for her, could be called hushed,though it reached me twenty feet away.

"An art bungalow!" she said, and gazed upon it with seeming awe. Thenshe waved a quirt to indicate this and the painfully neat outbuildings."A toy for the idle rich—was that it? Well, you said something. Thiswas one little per-diem going concern, all right. They even had thename somewhere round here worked out in yellow flowers—Broadmoor itwas. You could read it for five miles when the posies got up. There itis over on that lawn. You can't read it now because the letters are allovergrown. My Chinaman got delirious about that when he first seen itand wanted me to plant Arrowhead out in front of our house, and wasquite hurt when I told him I was just a business woman—and a tiredbusiness woman at that. He done what he could, though, to show we wassome class. The first time these folks come over to our place to lunchhe picked all my pink carnations to make a mat on the table, and spelledout Arrowhead round it in ripe olives, with a neat frame of celeryinclosing same. Yes, sir!"

This was too much. It now seemed time to ask questions, and I did so ina winning manner; but so deaf in her backward musing was the woman thatI saw it must all come in its own way.

"We got to make up over that bench yet," she said at last; and we rodeout past the ideal stable—its natty weather vane forever pointing thewind to the profit of no man—through another gate of superb cunning,and so once more to an understandable landscape, where sane cattlegrazed. Here I threw off the depression that comes upon one in placeswhere our humankind so plainly have been and are not. Again I questionedof Broadmoor and its vanished people.

The immediate results were fragmentary, serving to pique rather thansatisfy; a series of hors d'oeuvres that I began to suspect must formthe whole repast. On the verge of coherence the woman would break off togloat over a herd of thoroughbred Durhams or a bunch of sportiveHereford calves or a field teeming with the prized fruits ofintermarriage between these breeds. Or she found diversion in stupendousstacks of last summer's hay, well fenced from pillage; or grounds forcriticising the sloth of certain of her henchmen, who had been told asplain as anything that "that there line fance" had to be finished bySaturday; no two ways about it! She repeated the language in which shehad conveyed this decision. There could have been no grounds formisunderstanding it.

And thus the annals of Broadmoor began to dribble to me, overlaid toofrequently for my taste with philosophic reflections at large upon whata lone, defenceless woman could expect in this world—irrelevant,pointed wonderings as to whether a party letting on he was a good ranchhand really expected to perform any labour for his fifty a month, orjust set round smoking his head off and see which could tell the biggestlie; or mebbe make an excuse for some light job like oiling thetwenty-two sets of mule harness over again, when they had already beenoiled right after haying. Furthermore, any woman not a born fool wouldget out of the business the first chance she got, this one often beingwilling to sell for a mutilated dollar, except for not wishing financialruin or insanity to other parties.

Yet a few details definitely emerged. "Her" name was called Posnett,though a party would never guess this if he saw it in print, because itwas spelled Postlethwaite. Yes, sir! All on account of having gone toEngland from Boston and found out that was how you said it, thoughCousin Egbert Floud had tried to be funny about it when shown the namein the Red Gap Recorder. The item said the family had taken apartmentsat Red Gap's premier hotel de luxe, the American House; and CousinEgbert, being told a million dollars was bet that he never could guesshow the name was pronounced in English, he up and said you couldn't foolhim; that it was pronounced Chumley, which was just like the oldsmarty—only he give in that he was surprised when told how it reallywas pronounced; and he said if a party's name was Postlethwaite whycouldn't they come out and say so like a man, instead of beating roundthe bush like that? All of which was promising enough; but then came theHereford yearlings to effect a breach of continuity.

These being enough admired, I had next to be told that I wouldn'tbelieve how many folks was certain she had retired to the countrybecause she was lazy, just keeping a few head of cattle fordiversion—she that had six thousand acres of land under fence, and hadmade a going concern per diem of it for thirty years, even if partiesdid make cracks about her gates; but hardly ever getting a good night'ssleep through having a "passel" of men to run it that you couldn'tdepend on—though God only knew where you could find any other sort—theminute your back was turned.

A fat, sleek, prosperous male, clad in expensive garments, and wearing aderby hat and too much jewellery, became somehow personified in thistirade. I was led to picture him a residuary legatee who had never donea stroke of work in his life, and believed that no one else ever didexcept from a sportive perversity. I was made to hear him tell her thatshe, Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill, was leading the ideal life on hercountry place; and, by Jove! he often thought of doing the same thinghimself—get a nice little spot in this beautiful country, with somegreen meadows, and have bands of large handsome cattle strolling aboutin the sunlight, so he could forget the world and its strife in the sameidyllic peace she must be finding. Or if he didn't tell her this, thenhe was sure to have a worthless son or nephew that her ranch would bejust the place for; and, of course, she would be glad to take him on andmake something of him—that is, so the lady now regrettably put it, ashe had shown he wasn't worth a damn for anything else, why couldn't shemake a cattleman of him?

"Yes, sir; that's what I get from these here visitors that are enchantedby the view. Either they think my ranch is a reform school for poorchinless Chester, that got led away by bad companions and can't say no,or they think, like you said, that it's just a toy for the idle rich.Show 'em a shoe factory or a steel works and they can understand it's abusiness proposition; but a ranch—Shucks! They think I've done my day'swork when I ride out on a gentle horse and look pleased at thelandscape."

Again were we diverted. A dozen alien beeves fed upon the Arrowheadpreserves. Did I see that wattle brand—the jug-handle split? That wasthe Timmins brand—old Safety First Timmins. There must be a break inhis fence at the upper end of the field. Made it himself likely.Wouldn't she give the old penny-pincher hell if she had him here? Shewould, indeed! Continuous muttering of a rugged character for half amile of jog trot.

Then again:

"Cousin Egbert got all fussed up in his mind about the name and alwayscalled her Postle-nut. He don't seem to have a brain for such things.But she didn't mind. I give her credit for that. She was fifty if shewas a day, but very, very blond; laboratory stuff, of course. You'd ofcalled her a superblonde, I guess. And haggard and wrinkled in the face;but she took good care of that, too—artist's materials.

"You know old Pete—that Indian you see cutting up wood back on theplace. Pete took a long look at her and named her the Painted Desert.You always hear say an Indian hasn't got any sense of humour. I don'tknow; Pete was sure being either a humourist or a poet. However, thishere lady handed me a new one about my business. She thought it wasmerely an outdoor sport. I never could get that out of her head. Evenwhen she left she says she knows it's ripping good sport, but it's sucha terrific drain on one's income, and I must be quite mad about ranchingto keep it up. I said, yes; I got quite mad about it sometimes, and letit go at that. What was the use?"

A voiceless interval while we climbed a trail to the timbered benchwhere fence posts were being cut by half a dozen of the Arrowheadforces. Two of these were swiftly detached and bade to repair the breakin the fence by which one Timmins was now profiting, the entire sixbeing first regaled with a brief but pithy character analysis of theoffender, portraying him as a loathsome biological freak; headless, Igathered, and with the acquisitive instincts of a trade rat.

Then we rounded back on our way to the Arrow head ranch house. Fivemiles up the narrowing valley we could see its outposts and its smoke.Far below us the spick-and-span buildings of deserted Broadmoorglittered newly, demanding that I be told more of them. Yet for thefive-mile ride I added, as I thought, no item to my slender stock.Instead, when we had descended from the bench and were again in fieldswhere the gates might be opened only by galling effort, I learnedapparently irrelevant facts concerning Egbert Floud's pet kitten.

"Yes, sir; he's just like any old maid with that cat. 'Kitty!' here and'Kitty!' there; and 'Poor Kitty, did I forget to warm its milk?' And soon. It was give to him two years ago by Jeff Tuttle's littlest girl,Irene; and he didn't want it at first, but him and Irene is greatfriends, so he pretended he was crazy about it and took it off in hisovercoat pocket, thinking it would die anyway, because it was only skinand bones. Whenever it tried to purr you'd think it was going to shakeall its timbers loose. His house is just over on the other side ofArrowhead Pass there, and I saw the kitten the first day he brought itup, kind of light brown and yellow in colour, with some gray on the leftshoulder.

"Well, the minute I see these markings I recognized 'em and rememberedsomething, and I says right off that he's got some cat there; and hesays how do I know? And I tell him that there kitten has got at least aquarter wildcat in it. Its grandmother, or mebbe its great-grandmother,was took up to the Tuttle Ranch when there wasn't another cat withinforty miles, and it got to running round nights; and quite a long timeafter that they found it with a mess of kittens in a box out in theharness room. One look at their feet and ears was all you'd want to seethat their pa was a bobcat. They all become famous fighting characters,and was marked just like this descendant of theirs that Cousin Egberthas. And, say, I was going on like this, not suspecting anything exceptthat I was giving him some interesting news about the family history ofthis pet of his, when he grabs the beast up and cuddles it, and says Ihad ought to be ashamed of myself, talking that way about a poor littleinnocent kitten that never done me a stroke of harm. Yes, sir; he wasright fiery.

"I don't know how he come to take it that cross way, for he hadn'tthought highly of the thing up to that moment. But some way it seemed tohim I was talking scandal about his pet—kind of clouding up itsancestry, if you know what I mean. He didn't seem to get any broad viewof it at all. You'd almost think I'd been reporting an indiscretion insome member of his family. Can you beat it? Heating up that way over apuny kitten, six inches from tip to tip, that he'd been thinking of as apest and only taken to please Irene Tuttle! So he starts in from thatminute to doctor it up and nurture it with canned soup and delicacies;and every time I see him after that he'd look indignant and say whatgreat hands for spreading gossip us women are, and his kitten ain't gotno more bobcat in its veins than what I have.

"He's a stubborn old toad. Irene had told him the kitten's name wasKate; so he kept right on calling it that even after it becomeincongruous, as you might say. Judge Ballard was up here on a fishingtrip one time and heard him calling it Kate, and he says to Egbert: Whycall it Kate when it ain't? Egbert says that was the name little Irenegive it and it's too much trouble to think up another. The Judge says,Oh, no; not so much trouble, being that he could just change the nameswiftly from Kate to Cato, thus meeting all conventional requirementswith but slight added labour. But Egbert says there's the sentiment tothink of—whatever he meant by that; and if you was to go over thereto-day and he was home you'd likely hear him say: 'Yes; Kate iscertainly some cat! Why, he's at least half bobcat—mebbethree-quarters; and the fightingest devil!' What's that? Yes; he'schanged completely round about the wildcat strain. He's proud of it. IfI was to say now it was only a quarter bob he'd be as mad as he was atfirst; he says anybody can see it's at least half bob. What changed him?Oh, well, we're too near home. Some other time."

So it befell that not until we sat out for a splendid sunset thatevening did I learn in an orderly manner of Postlethwaite vicissitudes.Ma Pettengill built her first cigarette with tender solicitude; andthis, in consideration of her day's hard ride, I permitted her to burnin relaxed silence. But when her trained fingers began to combine paperand tobacco for the second I mentioned Broadmoor, Postlethwaite,Posnett, and parties in general that come round the tired businesswoman, harassed with the countless vexations of a large cattle ranch,telling her how wise she has been to retire to this sylvan quietude,where she can dream away her life in peace. She started easily:

"That's it; they always intimate that running a ranch is mere creampuffs compared to a regular business, and they'd like to do the samething to-morrow if only they was ready to retire from active life. Mebbethey get the idea from these here back-to-nature stories about abrokendown bookkeeper, sixty-seven years old, with neuritis and gastriccomplications and bum eyesight, and a wife that ain't ever seen a wellday; so they take every cent of their life savings of eighty-threedollars and settle on an abandoned farm in Connecticut and clear ninethousand dollars the first year raising the Little Giant caper forboiled mutton. There certainly ought to be a law against such romantictrifling. In the first place, think of a Connecticut farmer abandoninganything worth money! Old Timmins comes from Connecticut. Any time thatold leech abandons a thing, bookkeepers and all other parties will dowell to ride right along with him. I tell you now—"

The second cigarette was under way, and suddenly, without modulation,the performer was again on the theme, Posnett née Postlethwaite.

"Met her two years ago in Boston, where I was suffering a brief visitwith my son-in-law's aunts. She was the sole widow of a large woolenmill. That's about all I could ever make out—couldn't get any line onhim to speak of. The first time I called on her—she was in pink silkpyjamas, smoking a perfecto cigar, and unpacking a bale of lion andtiger skins she'd shot in Africa, or some place—she said she believedthere would be fewer unhappy marriages in this world if women would onlytry more earnestly to make a companion of their husbands; she said she'dtried hard to make one of hers, but never could get him interested inher pursuits and pastimes, he preferring to set sullenly at his deskmaking money. She said to the day of his death he'd never even had apolo mallet in his hand. And wasn't that pitiful!

"And right now she wanted to visit a snappy little volcano she'd heardabout in South America—only she had a grown son and daughter she wastrying to make companions of, so they would love and trust her; andthey'd begged her to do something nearer home that was less fatiguing;and mebbe she would. And how did I find ranching now? Was I awfully keenabout it and was it ripping good sport? I said yes, to an extent. Shesaid she thought it must be ripping, what with chasing the wild cattleover hill and dale to lasso them, and firing off revolvers in companywith lawless cowboys inflamed by drink. She went on to give me some moredetails of ranch life, and got so worked up about it that we settledthings right there, she being a lady of swift decisions. She said itwouldn't be very exciting for her, but it might be fine for son anddaughter, and bring them all together in a more sacred companionship.

"So I come back and got that place down the creek for her, and she sentout a professional architect and a landscape gardener, and some otherexperts that would know how to build a ranch de luxe, and the thingwas soon done. And she sent son on ahead to get slightly acquainted withthe wild life. He was a tall bent thing, about thirty, with a longsquinted face and going hair, and soft, innocent, ginger-colouredwhiskers, and hips so narrow they'd hardly hold his belt up. That rowdymother of his, in trying to make a companion of him, had near scared himto death. He was permanently frightened. What he really wanted to do, Ifound out, was to study insect life and botany and geography andarithmetic, and so on, and raise orchids, instead of being killed off ina sudden manner by his rough-neck parent. He loved to ride a horse thesame way a cat loves to ride a going stove.

"I started out with him one morning to show him over the valley. He gotinto the saddle all right and he meant well, but that don't go any toofar with a horse. Pretty soon, down on the level here, I started tocanter a bit. He grabbed for the saddle horn and caught a handful ofbunch grass fifteen feet to the left of the trail. He was game enough.He found his glasses and wiped 'em off, and said it was too bad themater couldn't have seen him, because it would have been a bright spotin her life.

"Then he got on again and we took that steep trail up the side of thecañon that goes over Arrowhead, me meaning to please him with somebeautiful and rugged scenery, where one false step might cause utterruin. It didn't work, though. After we got pretty well up to the rim ofthe cañon he looks down and says he supposes they could recover one ifone fell over there. I says: 'Oh, yes; they could recover one. They'dget you, all right. Of course you wouldn't look like anything!'

"He shudders at that and gets off to lead his horse, begging me to dothe same. I said I never tried to do anything a horse could do better,and stayed on. Then he got confidential and told me a lot of interestingcrimes this mater of his had committed in her mad efforts to make acompanion of him. Once she'd tramped on the gas of a ninety-horsepowerracer and socked him against a stone wall at a turn some fool had madein the road; and another time she near drowned him in the Arctic Oceanwhen she was off there for the polar-bear hunting; and she'd got himwell clawed by a spotted leopard in India, that was now almost the bestskin in her collection; and once in Switzerland he fell off the side ofan Alp she was making him climb, causing her to be very short with himall day because it delayed the trip. Tied to a rope he was and hangingout there over nothing for about fifteen minutes—he must have lookedlike a sash weight.

"Then he told about learning to run a motor car all by himself, just toplease the mater. The first time he made the sharp turns round theircountry house he took nine shingles off the corner and crumpled a fenderlike it was tissue paper; but he stuck to it till he got the score downto two or three shingles only. He seemed right proud of that, like itwas bogey for the course, as you might say. He wasn't the greatesthumourist in the world, being too high-minded, but he appealed to all mybetter instincts; he was trying so hard to make the grade out of respectfor his bedizened and homicidal mother.

"And his poor sister, that come along later, was very much like him,being severe of outline and wearing the same kind of spectacles, and notfussing much about the fripperies of dress that engross so many of ourempty-headed sex and get 'em the notice of the male. Her complexion wasbrutally honest, which was about all her very best-wishers could say forit, but she was kind-hearted and earnest, and thought a good deal aboutthe real or inner meaning of life. What she really yearned for was tostay in Boston and go to concerts, holding the music on her lap andchecking off the notes with a gold pencil when the fiddlers played them.I watched her do it one night. I don't know what her notion was, keepingcases on the orchestra that way; but it seemed to give her a secretsatisfaction. She was also interested in bird life and other studies ofa high character, and she didn't want to be made a companion of by herrabid parent any more than brother did. They was just a couple oflambkins born to a tiger.

"Pretty soon the ranch buildings was all complete and varnished andpolished, like you seen to-day, and the family moved in with all kindsof uniformed servants that looked unhappy and desperate. They had apained butler in a dress suit that never once set foot outside the housethe whole five months they was here. He'd of been thought too gloomy forgood taste, even at a funeral. He had me nervous every time I wentthere, thinking any minute he was going to break down and sob.

"And this lady loses no time making companions of her children thatdidn't want to be. First she tried to make 'em chase steers onhorseback. A fact! That was one of her ideas of ranch life. When I askedher what she was going to stock her ranch with she said didn't I havesome good heads of stock I could sell her? And I said yes, I had somegood heads, and showed her a bunch of my thoroughbreds, thinking nonebut the best would satisfy her. She looked 'em over with a glitteringeye and said they was too fat to run well. I didn't get her. I said itwas true; I hadn't raised 'em for speed. I said I didn't have an animalon the place that could hit better than three miles an hour, and notthat for long. I cheerfully admitted I didn't have a thoroughbred onthe place that wouldn't be a joke on any track in the country; but Iwanted to know what of it.

"'How do you get any sport out of them,' demands the lady, 'if theycan't give you a jolly good chase?'

"That's what she asked me in so many words. I says, does she aim tobreed racing cattle? And she says, where will the sport be withcreatures all out of condition with fat, like mine are? It took me aboutten minutes to get her idea, it was that heinous or criminal. When I didget it I sent her to old Safety First; and what does she do but buy aherd of twenty yearling steers from the old crook! Scrubby little runtsthat had been raised out in the hills and was all bone and muscle, andany one of 'em able to do a mile in four minutes flat, I guess.

"Old Safety was tickled to death at first when he put off this refuse onher at a price not much more than double what they would have brought ina tanyard, which was all they'd ever be good for except bone fertilizer,mebbe; but he was sick unto death when he found they was just what shewanted, the skinnier the better and he could have got anything he askedfor 'em. He says to me afterward why don't I train some of mine and trimher good? But I told him I'm cinched for hell, anyway, and don't have tomake it tighter by torturing poor dumb brutes.

"That's what it amounted to. Having got Angora chaps and cowboy hats forherself and offsprings, what do they do but get on ponies and chasethis herd all over creation, whirling their ropes, yelling, shooting inthe air—just like you see on any well-conducted ranch. Once in a whilethe old lady herself, being a demon rider, would rope an animal andfetch it down; but brother and sister was very careful not to tangletheir own ropes on anything. They didn't shoot their guns with anyproper spirit, either; and when they tried to yip like cowboys theysounded like rabbits. And brother having to smoke brown-papercigarettes, which he hated like poison and had trouble in rolling!

"Mother could roll 'em, all right—do it with one hand. And she urgedsister to; but sister rebelled for once. The old lady admitted this wasdue to a fault in her early training. It seems her grandmother had beenone of the old-fashioned sort; and, having studied the modern youngwoman of society in Boston and New York, she'd promised sister a stringof pearls if she didn't either smoke or drink till her twenty-firstbirthday. Sister had not only won the pearls but had come on totwenty-eight without being like other young girls of the day, and wasn'tgoing to begin now. So ma and brother had to do all the smoking.

"After a fine morning's run following the steers they'd like as not havea little branding in the afternoon, the old-fashioned kind that ain'tdone in the higher ranch circles any more, where a couple of sillypunchers rope an animal fore and aft and throw it, thereby setting itback at least four months in its growth. The old lady was puzzled againby me having my branding done in a chute, where the poor things ain'tworried more than is necessary. I bet she thought I was a short sport,not doing a thing on my place that would look well in a moving picture.She got a lot of ripping sport out of this branding. Made no differenceif they was already branded, they got it again; she'd brand 'em over andover. Two or three of that herd got it so often that they looked likethese leather suitcases parties bring back from Europe stuck all overwith hotel labels.

"Well, this branch of sport lasted quite a while, with them steersdeveloping speed every day till they got too fast for any one but theold lady. Brother and sister would be left far behind, or mebbe getstacked up and discouraged or sprained for the day. The old dame said itwas disheartening, indeed, trying to make companions of one's childrenwhen they showed such a low order of intelligence for it. Still, she wasfair-minded; so she had a golf links made, and put 'em at that. Shewouldn't play herself, saying it was an effeminate game, good for fatold men or schoolboys, but mebbe her chits would benefit by it and get ataste for proper sports, where you can break a bone now and then by notusing care.

"But golf wasn't much better. Sister would carry a book of poetry withher and read it as she loafed from one hit to another. The old lady nearshed tears at the sight. And brother was about as bad, gettinghypnotized by passing insect life and forgetting his score whileprodding some new kind of bug.

"The old lady said I'd never believe what a care and responsibilitychildren was. She had wanted 'em to go in for ranching and be awfullykeen about it, and look how they acted! Still, she wouldn't give up. Shesuggested polo next; but sister said it wasn't a lady's game, making nodemand upon the higher attributes of womanhood, and brother said hemight go in for it if she'd let him play his on a bicycle, as being morereliable or stauncher than a pony.

"So she throws up her hands in despair, but thinks hard again; and atlast she says she has the right sport for 'em and why didn't she thinkof it before! This new idea is to bring up her pack of prize-winningbeagles, the sport being full of excitement, and yet safe enough for allconcerned if they'll look where they walk and not stop to read slushypoems or collect insect life. Sister and brother said beagles, by allmeans, like drowning sailors clutching at a straw or something; and theold lady sent off a telegram.

"I admit I didn't know what kind of a game beagles was, but I didn'tbetray the fact when she told me about it. I was over to Egbert Floud'splace next day and I asked him. But he didn't know and he couldn't evenget the name right. He says: 'You mean beetles.' I says, 'Not at all';that it's beagles. Then he says I must of got the name twisted, andprobably it's one of these curly horns. That's as close as he ever didcome to the name; and until he actually saw the things he insisted theywas either something to blow on or something that crawled. 'Mark mywords,' he says,'they're either a horn or a bug; and I wonder what thishere blond guy will be doing next.' So I saw nothing sensible was to behad out of him, and I left him there, doddering.

"Then in about ten days, which was days of peace for brother and sister,because they didn't have to go in keenly for any new way of killingthemselves off, what comes up but several crates of beagles, in chargeof their valet or tutor! I'd looked forward to something of a thrillingor unknown character, and they turned out to be mere dogs; just littlebrown-and-white dogs that you wouldn't notice if you hadn't been excitedby their names; kind of yapping mutts that some parties would poison offif they lived in the same neighbourhood with 'em. They all had nameslike Rex II and Lady Blessington, and so on; and each one had cost morethan any three steers I had on the place. What do you think of that?They was yapping in their kennels when I first seen 'em, with the oldlady as excited as they was, and brother and sister trying to lookexcited in order to please mother, and at least looking relieved becauseno fatalities was in immediate prospect.

"I listened to the noise a while and acted nice by saying they wasundoubtedly the very finest beagles I'd ever laid eyes on—which was thesimple God's truth; and then I says won't she take one out of the cageand let him beagle some, me not having any idea what it would be like?But the old lady says not yet, because the costumes ain't come. Ithought at first it was the pups that had to be dressed up, but it seemsit was costumes for her and brother and sister to wear; so I asked a fewmore silly questions and found out the mystery. It seemed the secret ofa beagle's existence was rabbits. Yes, sir; they was mad about rabbitsand went in keenly for 'em. Only they wouldn't notice one, I gathered,if the parties that followed 'em wasn't dressed proper for it.

"Then we went in where we could hear each other without screaming, andthe lady tells me more about it, and how beagles is her last hope of herchits ever amounting to anything in the great world of sport. If theydon't go in keenly for beagles she'll just have to give up and letNature take its course with the poor things. And she said these wasA-Number-One beagles, being sure to get a rabbit if one was in thecountry. She'd just had 'em at a big fashionable country resort downSouth, some place where the sport attracted much notice from thesimple-minded peasantry, and it hadn't been a good country for rabbits;so the beagles had trooped into a backyard and destroyed a Belgian harethat had belonged to a little boy, whose father come out and swore atthe costumed hunters in a very common manner, and offered to lick anythree of 'em at once.

"And in hurrying acrost a field to get away from this rowdy, thatseemed liable to forget himself and do something they'd all regretlater, they was put up a tree by a bull that was sensitive aboutcostumes, and had to stay there two hours, with the bull trying to grubup the tree, and would of done so if his owner hadn't come along andrescued 'em.

"She made it sound like an exciting sport, all right, yet nothing Ithought I'd ever go in keenly for. It didn't seem like anything I'd getup in the night to indulge myself in. And I agreed with her that if herchits found beagling too adventurous, then all hope was gone and shemight as well let 'em die peacefully in their beds.

"Two days later the costumes come along and I was kindly sent word toshow up the next morning if I wanted to see some ripping sport that I'dbe quite mad about and go in for keenly, and all that sort of thing, byJove! Of course I go over, on account of this dame's atrocities neveryet having failed to interest me, and I didn't think she'd fall downnow. I felt strangely out of it, though, when I seen the costumes. Maand sister had, from the top down, black velvet jockey caps; greenvelvet coats with gold buttons; white pique skirts, coming to the knee;black silk stockings; and neat black shoes with white spats. Brother hadbeen abused the same, barring the white skirt, which left him lookinglike something out of a collection called The Dolls of All Nations.

"I saw right off that all these clothes must be necessary—they lookedso careful and expensive. Yes, Sir; that lady would no more of went outbeagling without being draped for it than she'd of gone steer huntingwithout a vanity-box lashed to her saddle horn.

"I sort of hung back with the awe-stricken help when the start was made.They was all out in front except the butler, who lurked in the entrylooking like he'd passed a night of grief at the new-made grave of hismother.

"The beagles surged all over the place the minute they was let loose,and then made for down in the willows below the house. And, sure enough,they started a cottontail down there and went in for him keenly,followed by ma and brother and sister. Brother started to yell 'Yoicks!Yoicks!' But ma shut him off with a good deal of severity that causedhim to blush at his words. It seems Yoicks is a cry you give at someother critical juncture in life. When beagles start you must yell 'Goneaway!' in a clear, ringing voice. Brother meant well, but didn't know.

"Anyhow, they followed those pups, and I trailed along at a decentdistance on my horse; and pretty soon they got the rabbit which had beenfool enough to come round in a wide circle back to where it startedfrom. Say! It was mere child's play for that plucky little band of ninedogs to clean up that rabbit. They never had a minute's fear of it andthe rabbit didn't have the least chance of winning the fight, not atany stage. Yes, sir! any time you see nine beagles setting on a tuckeredrabbit—I don't care how wild he is—you'll know how to put your moneydown.

"I never did see a rabbit put up a worse fight than that one did. I rodeup to its fragments, and the old lady was saying how ripping it was andcalling sister a mollycoddle, because here was sister crying like a babyover the rabbit's fate—a rabbit she'd never set eyes on before in herlife. Brother didn't look like he had gone in keenly for the sport,either. He was kind of green and yellow, like one of these parties onshipboard about the time he's saying he don't feel the boat's motion theleast bit; and, anyway, he's got a sure-fire remedy for it if anythingdoes happen. I just kind of stood around, neutral and revolted.

"Pretty soon the pack beagles off again with glad cries; and this time,up on the hillside, what do they start but a little spike buck that hasbeen down to a salt lick on the creek flat! They wasn't any more afraidof him than they had been of the rabbit and started to chase him out ofthe country. Of course they didn't do well after they got himinterested. The last I saw of the race he was making 'em look like theywas in reverse gear and backing up full speed. Anyway, that seemed toend the sport for the day, because the dogs and the buck must of beenover near the county line in ten minutes. The old lady was mad andblamed it on the valet, who come up and had to take as sweet a roastingas you ever heard a man get from a lady word painter. It seems he'dought to have taught 'em to ignore deer.

"Then I lied like a lady and said it was a ripping sport that I wouldsure go in keenly for if I had time; and we all went back to the houseand sat down to what they called a hunt breakfast. Ma said at last herchits could hold up their heads in the world of sport and not be areproach to her training. The chits looked very thoughtful, indeed.Sister still had red eyes and couldn't eat a mouthful of hunt breakfast,and brother just toyed with little dabs of it.

"Next day I learned the pack didn't get back till late that evening,straggling in one by one, and the valet having to go out and look forthe last two with a lantern. Also, these last two had been treatedbrutally by some denizen of the wildwood. Rex II had darn near lost hiseyesight and Lady Blessington was clawed something scandalous. Brothersaid mebbe a rabbit mad with hydrophobia had turned on 'em. He said itin hopeful tones, and sister cheered right up and said if these two hadit they would give it to the rest of the pack, and shouldn't they all beshot at once?

"Mother said what jolly nonsense; that they'd merely been scratched bythorns. I thought, myself, that mebbe they'd gone out of their class andtackled a jack rabbit; but I didn't say it, seeing that the owner wassensitive. Afterward she showed me a lot of silver things her pets hadwon—eye-cups and custard dishes, and coffee urns and things, about adozen, with their names engraved on 'em. She said it was very annoyingto have 'em take after deer that way. What she wanted 'em to do was tobutcher rabbits where parties in the right garments could stand and lookon.

"Next day they tried again; and one fool rabbit was soon gone in forkeenly to the renewed sound of sister's bitter sobs, and brother lookinglike he'd been in jail two years—no colour left at all in his face. Butpretty soon the pack took up the scent of a deer again, and that was theend of another day's sport. Brother and sister looked glad and resumedtheir peaceful sports. He hunted butterflies with a net, and she setdown and looked at birds through an opera glass and wrote down thingsabout their personal appearance in a notebook. The old lady changed toher cowboy suit and went out and roped three steers—just to work hermad off, I guess.

"Well, this time the beagles not only limped in at a shocking hour ofthe night but three of the others had had their beauty marred by a demonrabbit or something. They had been licked very thoroughly, indeed; andthe old lady now said it must be a grizzly bear, and brother and sisterbeamed on her and said: 'What a shame!' And would they hunt again nextday? For the first time they seemed quite mad about the sport. Mothersaid they better wait till she went out and shot the grizzly, but I toldher we hadn't had any grizzlies round here for years; so she said, allright, they could lick anything less than a grizzly. And they beagledagain next day, with terrible and inspiring results, not only to Rex IIand Lady Blessington again, but to two of the others that hadn't beentouched before.

"This left only two of the pack that hadn't been horribly abused by someunknown varmint; so a halt had to be called for three days while RedCross work was done. Brother and sister tried to look regretful andcomplained about this break in the ripping sport; but their manner wasartificial. They spent the time riding peacefully round up in the cañon,pretending to look for the wild creature that had chewed their littlepets. They come back one day and cheered their mother a whole lot bytelling her the pack had been over the pass as far as the house of aworthy rancher, Mr. Floud by name. They said Mr. Floud didn't believethere was any bears round, and further said he greatly admired thebeagles, even though at first they seriously annoyed his pet kitten.

"The old lady said this was ripping of Mr. Floud, to take it in such asporting way, because many people in the past had tried to make allsorts of nasty rows when her pets had happened to kill their kittens.Brother said, yes; Mr. Floud took the whole thing in a true sportingway, and he hoped the pack would soon be well enough to hunt again.Right then I detected falsity in his manner; I couldn't make out whatit was, but I knew he was putting something over on mother.

"Two days later the dogs was fit again, and another gay hunt was had,with a rabbit to the good in the first twenty minutes, and then theusual break, when they struck a deer scent. Brother said he'd follow onhis horse this time and try to get whatever was bothering 'em. Hedidn't. He said he lost 'em. They crawled back at night, well chewed;and mother was now frantic.

"There had to be another three days in bed for the cunning littlemurderers, after which brother and sister both went out with 'em onhorseback, with the same mysterious results—except that Rex II didn'tget in till next day and looked like he'd come through a feed chopper.For the next hunt, four days after that, the old lady went, too, all of'em on horseback; but the same slinking marauder got at the pack beforethey could come up with it, and two of 'em had to be brought back inarms. They all stopped here on the way home to tell about the mystery.Brother and sister was very cheerful and mad about the sport, but theirmanner was falser than ever. Mother says the pack is being ruined, andshe wouldn't continue the sport, except it has roused the first gleam ofinterest her chits has ever showed in anything worth while. I caught thechits looking at each other in a guilty manner when she says this, andmy curiosity wakes up. I says next time they go out I will be pleased togo with 'em; and the old lady thanks me and says mebbe I can solve thisreprehensible mystery.

"In another three days they come by for me. The beagles was looking anawful lot different from what I had first seen 'em. They was not onlybeautifully scarred but they acted kind of timid and reproachful, andtheir yapping had a note of caution in it that I hadn't noticed before.So I got on my pony and went along to help probe the crime. We worked upthe cañon trail and over the pass, with the pack staying meekly behindmost of the time. Just the other side of the pass they actually got arabbit, though not working with their old-time recklessness, I thought.Of course we had to stop and watch this. Brother looked the other wayand sister just set there biting her lips, with an evil gleam in herpale-blue eyes. Not a beagle in the pack would have trusted himselfalone with her at that minute if he'd known his business.

"Then we rode on down toward Cousin Egbert's shack, with nothing furtherhappening and the pups staying back in a highly conservative manner.Brother says that yonder is the Mr. Floud's place he had spoken of, andma wants to know if he, too, goes in for ranching, and I says yes, he'sawfully keen about it; so she says we'll ride over and chat with him andperhaps he can suggest some solution of the mystery in hand. I said allright, and we ride up.

"Cousin Egbert is tipped back in a chair outside the door, reading aSunday paper. Whenever he gets one up here he always reads it cleanthrough, from murders to want ads. And he'd got into this about as faras the beauty hints and secrets of the toilet. Well, he was very politeand awkward, and asked us into his dinky little shack; and the old ladysays she hears he is quite mad about ranching, and he says, Oh,yes—only it don't help matters any to get mad; and he finds a chair forher, and the rest of us set on stools and the bed; and just then shenotices that the beagle pack has halted about thirty feet from the door,and some of 'em is milling and acting like they think of starting forhome at once.

"So out she goes and orders the little pets up. They didn't want to comeone bit; it seemed like they was afraid of something, but they was welldisciplined and they finally crawled forward, looking like they didn'tknow what minute something cruel might happen.

"The old lady petted 'em and made 'em lie down, and asked Cousin Egbertif he'd ever seen better ones, or even as good; and he said No, ma'am;they was sure fine beetles. Then she begun to tell him about some wildanimal that had been attacking 'em, a grizzly, or mebbe a mountain lion,with cubs; and he is saying in a very false manner that he can't thinkwhat would want to harm such playful little pets, and so on. All thistime the pets is in fine attitudes of watchful waiting, and I'm justbeginning to suspect a certain possibility when it actually happens.

"There was an open window high up in the log wall acrost from the door,and old Kate jumps up onto the sill from the outside. He was one fierceobject, let me tell you; weighing about thirty pounds, all muscle, withone ear gone, and an eye missing that a porcupine quill got into, and alot of fresh new battle scars. We all got a good look at him while hecrouched there for a second, purring like a twelve-cylinder car andtwitching his whiskers at us in a lazy way, like he wanted to have folksmake a fuss over him. And then, all at once, catching sight of the dogs,he changed to a demon; his back up, his whiskers in a stiff tremble, andhis half of a tail grown double in girth.

"I looked quick to the dogs, and they was froze stiff with horror for atleast another second. Then they made one scramble for the open door, andKate made a beautiful spring for the bunch, landing on the back of thelast one with a yell of triumph. Mother shrieked, too, and we all rushedto the door to see one of the prettiest chases you'd want to look at,with old Kate handing out the side wipes every time he could get nearone of the dogs. They fled down over the creek bank and a minute laterwe could see the pack legging it up the other side to beat the cars,losing Kate—I guess because he didn't like to get his hide wet.

"When the first shock of this wore off, here was silly old Egbert, in aweak voice, calling: 'Kitty, Kitty, Kitty! Here, Kitty! Here, Kitty!'Then we notice brother and sister. Brother is waving his hat in the airand yelling 'Yoicks!' and 'Gone away!' and 'Fair sport, by Jove!'—justlike some crazy man; and sister, with her chest going up and down, isclapping her hands and yelling 'Goody! Goody! Goody!' and squealing withhelpless laughter. Mother just stood gazing at 'em in horrible silence.Pretty soon they felt it and stopped, looking like a couple of kids thatknow it's spanking time.

"'So!' says mother. That's all she said—just, 'So!'

"But she stuffed the simple word with eloquence; she left it pregnantwith meaning, as they say. Then she stalked loftily out and got on herhorse, brother and sister slinking after her. I guess I slunk, too,though it was none of my doings. Cousin Egbert kind of sidled along,mumbling about Kitty:

"'Kitty was quite frightened of the pets first time he seen 'em; butsomeway to-day it seemed like he had lost much of his fear—seemed morelike he had wanted to play with 'em, or something.'

"Nobody listened to the doddering old wretch, but I caught brotherwinking at him behind mother's back. Then we all rode off in loftysilence, headed by mother, who never once looked back to her late host,even if he was mad about ranching. We got up over the pass and the packof ruined beagles begun to straggle out of the underbrush. A good bigbuck rabbit with any nerve could have put 'em all on the run again. Youcould tell that. They slunk along at the tail of the parade. I droppedout informally when it passed the place here. It seemed like somethingmight happen where they'd want only near members of the family present.

"I don't hear anything from Broadmoor next day; so the morning afterthat I ride over to Cousin Egbert's to see if I couldn't get a betterline on the recent tragedy. He was still on his Sunday paper, havingfinished an article telling that man had once been scaly, like a fish;and was just beginning the fashion notes, with pictures showing that thesmart frock was now patterned like an awning. Old Kate was lying on abench in the sun, trying to lick a new puncture he'd got in his chest.

"I started right in on the old reprobate. I said it was a prettyhow-de-do if a distinguished lady amateur, trying to raise ranching tothe dignity of a sport, couldn't turn loose a few prize beagles withouthaving 'em taken for a hunt breakfast by a nefarious beast that ought tobe in a stout cage in a circus this minute! I thought, of course, thiswould insult him; but he sunned right up and admitted that Kate wasabout half to three-quarters bobcat; and wasn't he a fine specimen? Andif he could only get about eight more as good he'd have a pack ofbeagle-cats that would be the envy of the whole sporting world.

"'It ain't done!' I remarked, aiming to crush him.

"'It is, too!' Egbert says. 'I did it myself. Look what I already done,just with Kitty alone!'

"'How'd it start?' I asked him.

"'Easy! says he. 'They took Kate for a rabbit and Kate took them forrabbits. It was a mutual error. They found out theirs right soon; but Ibet Kate ain't found out his, even to this day. I bet he thinks they'rejust a new kind of rabbit that's been started. The first day they brokein here he was loafin' round out in front, and naturally he started for'em, though probably surprised to see rabbits travelling in a bunch.Also, they see Kate and start for him, which must of startled him goodand plenty. He'd never had rabbits make for him before. He pulled up soquick he skidded. I could see his mind working. Don't tell me that catain't got brains like a human! He was saying to himself: "Is this here anew kind of rabbits, or is it a joke—or what? Mebbe I better not tryanything rash till I find out."

"'They was still coming for him acrost the flat, with their tongues out;so he soopled himself up a bit with a few jumps and made for that therebig down spruce. He lands on the trunk and runs along it to where thetop begins. He has it all worked out. He's saying: "If this here is ajoke, all right; but if it ain't a joke I better have some place back ofme for a kind of refuge."

"'So up come these strange rabbits and started to jump for him on thetrunk of the spruce; but it's pretty high and they can't quite make it.And in a minute they sort of suspicion something on their part, becauseKate has rared his back and is giving 'em a line of abuse they neverheard from any rabbit yet. Awful wicked it was, and they sure gotpuzzled. I could hear one of 'em saying: "Aw, come on! That ain't noregular rabbit; he don't look like a rabbit, and he don't talk like arabbit, and he don't act like a rabbit!" Then another would say: "Whatof it? What do we care if he's a regular rabbit or not? Let's get him,anyway, and take him apart!"

"'So they all begin to jump again and can't quite make it till theirleader says he'll show 'em a real jump. He backs off a little to get arun and lands right on the log. Then he wished he hadn't. Old Kateworked so quick I couldn't hardly follow it. In about three seconds thisleader lands on his back down in the bunch, squealing like one of theseItalian sopranos when the flute follows her up. He crawls off on hisstomach, still howling, and I see he's had a couple of wipes over theeye, and one of his ears is shredded.

"'A couple of the others come over to ask him how it happened, and whathe quit for, and did his foot slip; and he says: "Mark my words,gentlemen; we got our work cut out for us here. That animal is actingless and less like a rabbit every minute. He's more turbulent and he'sgot spurs on." He goes on talking this way while the others bark atKate, and Kate dares any one of 'em to come on up there and have it out,man to man. Finally another lands on the tree trunk and gets what thefirst one got. I could see it this time. Kate done some dandy shortarmwork in the clinches and hurled him off on his back like the other one;then he stands there sharpening his claws on the bark and grinning in amasterful way. He was saying: "You will, will you?"

"'Then one of these beetles must of said, "Come on, boys—all togethernow!" for four of 'em landed up on the trunk all to once. And Katewasn't there. He'd had the top of this fallen tree at his back, and hekites up a limb about ten feet above their heads and stretches out for arest, cool as anything, licking his paws and purring like he enjoyed thebeautiful summer day, and wasn't everything calm and lovely? It wasawful insulting the way he looked down on 'em, with his eyes half shut.And you never seen beetles so astonished in your life. They justcouldn't believe their eyes, seeing a rabbit act that way! The leaderlimps over and says: "There! What did I tell you, smarties? I guess nexttime you'll take my word for it. I guess you can see plain enough now heain't no rabbit, the way he skinned up that tree."

"'They calm down a mite at this, and one or two says they thought he wasright from the first; and some others says: "Well, it wouldn't make nodifference what he was, rabbit or no rabbit, if he'd just come down andmeet the bunch of us fair and square; but the dirty coward is afraid tofight us, except one at a time." The leader is very firm, though. Hetells 'em that if this here object ain't a rabbit they got no right tomolest him, and if he is a rabbit he's gone crazy, and wouldn't be goodto eat, anyway; so they better go find one that acts sensible. And hegets 'em away, all talking about it excitedly.

"'Well, sir, you wouldn't believe how tickled Kate was all that day. Itwas like he'd found a new interest in life. And next time these beetlescome up they pull off another grand scrap. Kate laid for 'em just thisside of the creek and let 'ern chase him back to his tree. He skun upthree others that day, still pursuin' his cowardly tactics of fighting'em one at a time, and retirin' to his perch when three or four wouldcome at once. Also, when they give him up again and started off he comedown and chased 'em to the creek bank, like you seen the other day,telling 'em to be sure and not forget the number, because he ain't hadso much fun since he met up with a woodchuck. The next time they showedup he'd got so contemptuous of 'em that he'd leap down and engage onethat had got separated from the pack. He had two of 'em darn' near outbefore they was rescued by their friends.

"'Then, a few days later, along comes the pack again—only this timethey're being herded by the lad with the ginger-coloured whiskers. Hegets off his horse and says how do I do, and what lovely weather, andhow bracing the air is; and I says what pretty beetles he has; and hesays it's ripping sport; and I says, yes; Kate has ripped up a number of'em, but I hope he don't blame me none, because my Kitty has to defendhimself. Say, this guy brightened up and like to took me off my feet! Hegrabs both my hands and shakes 'em warmly for a long time and says do Ithink my cat can put the whole bunch on the blink?—or words to thateffect. And I says it's the surest thing in the world; but why? And hesays, then the sooner the better, because it's a barbarous sport andevery last beetle ought to be thoroughly killed; and when they are, incase his mother don't find out the crooked work, mebbe he'll be let toraise orchids or do something useful in the world, instead of fritteringhis life away in the vain pursuit of pleasure.

"'Oh, he was the chatty lad, all right! And I felt kind of sorry forhim; so I says Kate would dearly love to wipe these beetles out one byone; and he says: 'Capital, by Jove!' And I call Kitty and we pull offanother nice little scrap on the fallen tree, though it's hard to makethe beetles take much interest in it now, except in the way ofself-defense. Even at that, they're kept plenty occupied.

"'Say, this guy is the happiest you ever see one when Kate has aboutfour more of 'em licked to a standstill in jigtime. He says he has onemore favour to ask of me: Will I allow his sister to come up some dayand see the lovely carnage? And I says, Sure! Kate will be glad tooblige any time. He says he'll fetch her up the first time the pack isable to get out again, and he keeps on chattering like a child that'sfound a new play-pretty.

"'I can't hardly get him off the place, he's so greatful to me. He tellsme his biography and about how this here blond guy has been roughinghim all over Europe and Asia, and how it had got to stop right here,because a man has a right to live his own life, after all; and then hebranches off in a nutty way to tell me that he always takes a coldshower every morning, winter and summer, and he never could read a lineof Sir Walter Scott, and why don't some genius invent a fountain penthat will work at all times? and so on, till it sounded delirious. Buthe left at last.

"'And we had some good ripping sport when him and sister come up. Inever seen such a blood-thirsty female. She'd nearly laugh her head offwhen Kitty was gouging the eye out of one of these cunning littlescamps. She said if I'd ever seen the nasty curs pile on to one poordefenseless little bunny I'd understand why she was so keen about mybeetle-cat. That's what she called Kate.

"'Kate, he got kind of bored with the whole business after that. Hehadn't actually eat one yet, and mebbe that was all that kept himgoing—wanting to see if they'd taste any better than regular rabbits.But you bet they knew now that Kate wasn't any kind of a rabbit. Theydidn't have any more arguments on that point—they knew darn' well hedidn't have a drop of rabbit blood in his veins. Oh, he's somebeetle-cat, all right!'

"That's Cousin Egbert for you! Can you beat him—changing round andbeing proud of this mixed marriage that he had formerly held to be ascandal!

"Well, I go back home, and here is mother waiting for me. And she's achanged woman. She's actually give up trying to make anything out of herchits, because after considerable browbeating and third-degree stuff,they've come through with the whole evil conspiracy—how they'd got herprize-winning beagles licked by a common cat that wouldn't be let intoany bench show on earth! Her spirit was broke.

"'My poor son,' she says, 'I shall allow to go his silly way after thisoutrageous bit of double-dealing. I think it useless to strive furtherwith him. He has not only confessed all the foul details, but he camebrazenly out with the assertion that a man has a right to lead his ownlife—and he barely thirty!'

"She goes on to say that it's this terrible twentieth-century modernismthat has infected him. She says that, first woman sets up a claim tolive her own life, and now men are claiming the same right, even one ascarefully raised and guarded as her boy has been; and what are we comingto? But, anyway, she did her best for him.

"Pretty soon Broadmoor was closed like you seen it to-day. Sister is nowback in Boston, keeping tabs on orchestras and attending lectures on thehigher birds; and brother at last has his orchid ranch somewhere down inCalifornia. He's got one pet orchid that I heard cost twelve thousanddollars—I don't know why. But he's very happy living his own life. Thelast I heard of mother she was exploring the headwaters of the AmazonRiver, hunting crocodiles and jaguars and natives, and so on.

"She was a good old sport, though. She showed that by the way shesimmered down about Cousin Egbert's cat before she left. At first, shewanted to lay for it and put a bullet through its cowardly heart. Thenshe must of seen the laugh was on her, all right; for what did she do?Why, the last thing she done was to box up all these silver cups herbeagles had won and send 'em over to Kate, in care of his owner—all theeye-cups and custard bowls, and so on. Cousin Egbert shows 'em off toevery one.

"'Just a few cups that Kate won,' he'll say. 'I want to tell you he'ssome beetle-cat! Look what he's come up to—and out of nothing, youmight say!'"

VIII

PETE'S B'OTHER-IN-LAW

On the Arrowhead Ranch it was noon by the bell that Lew Wee loves toclang. It may have been half an hour earlier or later on other ranches,for Lew Wee is no petty precisian. Ma Pettengill had ridden off at dawn;and, rather than eat luncheon in solitary state, I joined her retainersfor the meal in the big kitchen, which is one of my prized privileges. Adozen of us sat at the long oilcloth-covered table and assuaged the moreurgent pangs of hunger in a haste that was speechless and far fromhygienic. No man of us chewed the new beef a proper number of times; heswallowed intently and reached for more. It was rather like twentyminutes for dinner at what our railway laureates call an eating house.Lew Wee shuffled in bored nonchalance between range and table. It was anold story to him.

The meal might have gone to a silent end, though moderating in pace; butwe had with us to-day—as a toastmaster will put it—the youngveterinary from Spokane. This made for talk after actual starvation hadbeen averted—fragmentary gossip of the great city; of neighbouringranches in the valley, where professional duty had called him; ofAdolph, our milk-strain Durham bull, whose indisposition had brought himseveral times to Arrowhead; and then of Squat, our youngest cowboy, fromwhose fair brow the intrepid veterinary, on his last previous visit, hadremoved a sizable and embarrassing wen with what looked to me like apair of pruning shears.

The feat had excited much uncheerful comment among Squat's confrères,bets being freely offered that he would be disfigured for life, even ifhe survived; and what was the sense of monkeying with a thing like thatwhen you could pull your hat down over it? Of course you couldn't wear aderby with it; but no one but a darned town dude would ever want to weara derby hat, anyway, and the trouble with Squat was, he wished to bepretty. It was dollars to doughnuts the thing would come right backagain, twice as big as ever, and better well enough alone. But Squat,who is also known as Timberline, and is, therefore, a lanky six feetthree, is young and sensitive and hopeful, and the veterinary is amatchless optimist; and the thing had been brought to a happyconclusion.

Squat, being now warmly urged, blushingly turned his head from side toside that all might remark how neatly his scar had healed. Theveterinary said it had healed by first intention; that it was as prettya job as he'd ever done on man or beast; and that Squat would be more ofa hit then ever with the ladies because of this interesting chapter inhis young life. Then something like envy shone in the eyes of those whohad lately disparaged Squat for presuming to thwart the will of God; Idetected in more than one man there the secret wish that he hadsomething for this ardent expert to eliminate. Squat continued to blushpleasurably and to bolt his food until another topic diverted thisentirely respectful attention from him. The veterinary asked if we hadheard about the Indian ruction down at Kulanche last night—KulancheSprings being the only pretense to a town between our ranch and RedGap—a post-office, three general stores, a score of dwellings, and alow drinking place known as The Swede's. The news had not come to us; sothe veterinary obliged. A dozen Indians, drifting into the valley forthe haying about to begin, had tarried near Kulanche and bought whiskeyof the Swede. The selling of this was a lawless proceeding and theconsumption of it by the purchasers had been hazardous in the extreme.Briefly, the result had been what is called in newspaper headlines astabbing affray. I quote from our guest's recital:

"Yes; and he'd ought to be sent up for life for selling it to white men,too—the kind he sells." This was Sandy Sawtelle, speaking as one whoknew and with every sign of conviction. "It sure is enterprisingwhiskey. Three drinks of it make a decent man want to kill his littlegolden-haired baby sister with an axe. Say, here's a good one—lemmetell you! I remember the first time, about three, four years ago—"

The speaker was interrupted—it seemed to me with intentional rudeness.One man hurriedly wished to know who did the cutting last night;another, if the wounded would recover; and a third, if Pete, an aged redvassal of our own ranch, had been involved. Each of the three flashed abored glance at Sandy as he again tried for speech:

"Well, as I was saying, I remember the first time, about three, fouryears ago—"

"If old Pete was down there I bet his brother-in-law did most of theknifework," put in Buck Devine firmly.

It was to be seen that they all knew what Sandy remembered the firsttime and wished not to hear it again. Others of them now sought tostifle the memoir, while Sandy waited doggedly for the tide to ebb. Igathered that our Pete had not been one of the restive convives, hebeing known to have spent a quiet home evening with his mahala and theirnumerous descendants, in their camp back of the wood lot; I alsogathered that Pete's brother-in-law had committed no crime since Petequit drinking two years before. There was veiled mystery in theseallusions to the brother-in-law of Pete. It was almost plain that thebrother-in-law was a lawless person for whose offenses Pete had morethan once been unjustly blamed. I awaited details; but meantime—

"Well, as I was saying, I remember the first time, about three, fouryears ago—"

Sandy had again dodged through a breach in the talk, quite as if nothinghad happened. Buck Devine groaned as if in unbearable anguish. Theothers also groaned as if in unbearable anguish. Only the veterinary andI were polite.

"Oh, let him get it offen his chest," urged Buck wearily. "He'll perishif he don't—having two men here that never heard him tell it." Heturned upon the raconteur, with a large sweetness of manner: "Excuse me,Mr. Sawtelle! Pray do go on with your thrilling reminiscence. I couldjust die listening to you. I believe you was wishing to entertain thecompany with one of them anecdotes or lies of which you have so rich astore in that there peaked dome of yours. Gents, a moment's silencewhile this rare personality unfolds hisself to us!"

"Say, lemme tell you—here's a good one!" resumed the still placidSandy. "I remember the first time, about three, four years ago, I everwent into The Swede's. A stranger goes in just ahead of me and gets tothe bar before I do, kind of a solemn-looking, sandy-complected littlerunt in black clothes.

"'A little of your best cooking whiskey,' says he to the Swede, whileI'm waiting beside him for my own drink.

"The Swede sets out the bottle and glass and a whisk broom on the bar.That was sure a new combination on me. 'Why the whisk broom?' I says tomyself. 'I been in lots of swell dives and never see no whisk broomserved with a drink before.' So I watch. Well, this sad-looking sotpours out his liquor, shoots it into him with one tip of the glass; and,like he'd been shot, he falls flat on the floor, all bent up in aconvulsion—yes, sir; just like that! And the Swede not even lookingover the bar at him!

"In a minute he comes out of this here fit, gets on his feet and up tothe bar, grabs the whisk broom, brushes the dust off his clothes wherehe's rolled on the floor, puts back the whisk broom, says, 'So long,Ed!' to the Swede—and goes out in a very businesslike manner.

"Then the Swede shoves the bottle and a glass and the whisk broom overin front of me, but I says: 'No, thanks! I just come in to pass the timeof day. Lovely weather we're having, ain't it?' Yes, sir; down he goeslike he's shot, wriggles a minute, jumps up, dusts hisself off, fliesout the door; and the Swede passing me the same bottle and the samebroom, and me saying: 'Oh, I just come in to pass the time of—'"

The veterinary and I had been gravely attentive. The faces of the otherswore not even the tribute of pretended ennui. They had betrayed anelaborate deafness. They now affected to believe that Sandy Sawtellehad not related an anecdote. They spoke casually and with an effect ofpolished ease while yet here capitulated, as tale-tellers so often will.

"I remember a kid, name of Henry Lippincott, used to set in front of meat school," began Buck Devine, with the air of delicately breaking along silence; "he'd wiggle his ears and get me to laughing out loud, andthen I'd be called up for it by teacher and like as not kept in atrecess."

"You ought to seen that bunch of tame alligators down to the SanFrancisco Fair," observed Squat genially. "The old boy that had 'em says'Oh, yes, they would make fine pets, and don't I want a couple for tendollars to take home to the little ones?' But I don't. You come rightdown to household pets—I ruther have me a white rabbit or a canary birdthan an alligator you could step on in the dark some night and get allbit up, and mebbe blood poison set in."

"I recollect same as if it was yesterday," began Uncle Abner quickly."We was coming up through northern Arizona one fall, with a bunch oflonghorns and we make this here water hole about four P.M.—or mebbe amite after that or a little before; but, anyway, I says to Jeff Bradley,'Jeff,' I says to him, 'it looks to me almighty like—'"

Sandy Sawtelle savagely demanded a cup of coffee, gulped it heroically,rose in a virtuous hurry, and at the door wondered loudly if he wasleaving a bunch of rich millionaires that had nothing to do but loaf intheir club all the afternoon and lie their heads off, or just a passellof lazy no-good cowhands that laid down on the job the minute the bossstepped off the place. Whereupon, it being felt that the rabidanecdotist had been sufficiently rebuked, we all went out to help theveterinary look at Adolph for twenty minutes more.

Adolph is four years old and weighs one ton. He has a frowning andfearsome front and the spirit of a friendly puppy. The Arrowhead forceloafed about in the corral and imparted of its own lore to theveterinary while he took Adolph's temperature. Then Adolph, after nosingthree of the men to have his head rubbed, went to stand in therush-grown pool at the far end of the corral, which the gallery took tomean that he still had a bit of fever, no matter what the glass thingsaid.

The veterinary opposed a masterly silence to this majority diagnosis,and in the absence of argument about it there seemed nothing left forthe Arrowhead retainers but the toil for which they were paid. They wentto it lingeringly, one by one, seeming to feel that perhaps they wrongedthe ailing Adolph by not staying there to talk him over.

Uncle Abner, who is the Arrowhead blacksmith, was the last to leave—orthink of leaving—though he had mule shoes to shape and many mules toshoe. He glanced wistfully again at Adolph, in cool water to his knees,tugged at his yellowish-white beard, said it was a dog's life, if anyone should ask me, and was about to slump mournfully off to hisshop—when his eye suddenly brightened.

"Will you look once at that poor degraded red heathen, acting like awhirlwind over in the woodlot?"

I looked once. Pete, our Indian, was apparently the sole being on theranch at that moment who was honestly earning his wage. No one knows howmany more than eighty years Pete has lived; but from where we stood hewas the figure of puissant youth, rhythmically flashing his axe intobits of wood that flew apart at its touch. Uncle Abner, beside me, hadagain shrugged off the dread incubus of duty. He let himself gorestfully against the corral bars and chuckled a note of harsh derision.

"Ain't it disgusting! I bet he never saw the boss when she rode off thisA.M. Yes, sir; that poor benighted pagan must think she's still in thehouse—prob'ly watching him out of the east winder this very minute."

"What's this about his brother-in-law?" I asked.

"Oh, I dunno; some silly game he tries to come the roots over folkswith. Say, he's a regular old murderer, and not an honest hair in hishead! Look at the old cheat letting on to be a good steady workerbecause he thinks the boss is in the house there, keeping an eye on him.Ain't it downright disgusting!"

Uncle Abner said this as one supremely conscious of his own virtue. Hehimself was descending to no foul pretense.

"A murderer, is he?"

I opened my cigarette case to the man of probity. He took two, crumpledthe tobacco from the papers and stuffed it into his calabash pipe.

"Sure is he a murderer! A tough one, too."

The speaker moved round a corner of the barn and relaxed to a sittingposture on the platform of the pump. It brought him into the sun; but italso brought him where he could see far down the road upon which hisreturning employer would eventually appear. His eyes ever haunted thefar vistas of that road; otherwise he remained blissfully static.

It should perhaps be frankly admitted that Uncle Abner is not theblacksmith of song and story and lithographed art treasure, suitable forframing. That I have never beheld this traditional smith—the rugged,upstanding tower of brawn with muscles like iron bands—is beside thepoint. I have not looked upon all the blacksmiths in the world, and hemay exist. But Uncle Abner can't pose for him. He weighs a hundred andtwenty pounds without his hammer, is lean to scrawniness, and his armsare those of the boys you see at the track meet of Lincoln GrammarSchool Number Seven. The mutilated derby hat he now wore, a hat that hadbeen weathered from plum colour to a poisonous green—a shred of peaco*ckfeather stuck in the band—lent his face no dignity whatever.

In truth, his was not an easy face to lend dignity to. It would stilllook foolish, no matter what was lent it. He has a smug fringe of whitecurls about the back and sides of his head, the beard of a prophet, andthe ready speech of a town bore. The blacksmith we read of can look thewhole world in the face, fears not any man, and would far rather dohonest smithing any day in the week—except Sunday—than live the lifeof sinful ease that Uncle Abner was leading for the moment.

Uncle Abner may have feared no man; but he feared a woman. It was easyto see this as he chatted the golden hours away to me. His pale eyesseldom left the road where it came over a distant hill. When the womandid arrive—Oh, surely the merry clang of the hammer on the anvil wouldbe heard in Abner's shop, where he led a dog's life. But, for a time atleast—

"So he's one of these tough murderers, is he?"

"You said it! Always a-creating of disturbances up on the reservation,where he rightly belongs. Mebbe that's why they let him go off. Anyway,he never stays there. Even in his young days they tell me he wouldn'tstay put. He'd disappear for a month and always come back with a newwife. Talk about your Mormons! One time they sent out a new agent to thereservation, and he hears talk back and forth of Pete philanderingthisaway; and he had his orders from the Gov'ment at Washington, D.C.,to stamp out this here poly-gamy—or whatever you call it; so he ordersPete up on the carpet and says to him: 'Look here now, Pete! You got aregular wife, ain't you?' Pete says sure he has; and how could he sayanything else—the old liar! 'Well,' says Mr. Agent, 'I want you to getthis one regular wife of yours and lead a decent, orderly home life withher; and don't let me hear no more scandalous reports about your goingson.'

"Pete says all right; but he allows he'll have to have help in gettingher back home, because she's got kind of antagonistic and left him. Theagent says he'll put a stop to that if Pete'll just point her out. Sothey ride down about a mile from the agency to a shack where they's ayoung squaw out in front graining a deerhide and minding her ownbusiness. She looked up when they come and started to jaw Pete somethingfierce; but the agent tells her the Gov'ment frowns on wives runningoff, and Pete grabbed her; and the agent he helps, with her screechingand biting and clawing like a female demon. The agent is going to seethat Pete has his rights, even if it don't seem like a joyous household;and finally they get her scrambled onto Pete's horse in front of him andoff they go up the trail. The agent yells after 'em that Pete is toremember that this is his regular wife and he'd better behave himselffrom now on.

"And then about sunup next morning this agent is woke up by a poundingon his door. He goes down and here's Pete clawed to a frazzle andwhimpering for the law's protection because his squaw has chased himover the reservation all night trying to kill him. She'd near done it,too. They say old Pete was so scared the agent had to soothe him like amother."

Uncle Abner paused to relight his pipe, meantime negotiating a doublyvigilant survey of the distant road. But I considered that he had toldme nothing to the discredit of Pete, and now said as much.

"You couldn't blame the man for wanting his wife back, could you?" Idemanded. "Of course he might have been more tactful."

"Tactful's the word," agreed Uncle Abner cordially. "You see, thiswasn't Pete's wife at all. She was just a young squaw he'd took a fancyto."

"Oh!" Nothing else seemed quite so fitting to say.

"'Nother time," resumed the honest blacksmith, "the Gov'ment atWashington, D.C., sent out orders for all the Injun kids to be sent offto school. Lots of the fathers made trouble about this, but Pete was theworst of all—the old scoundrel! The agent said to him would Pete sendhis kids peaceful; and Pete said not by no means. So the agent says inthat case they'll have to take 'em by force. Pete says he'll be rightthere a-plenty when they're took by force. So next day the agent and hishelper go down to Pete's tepee. It's pitched up on a bank just off theroad and they's a low barrier of brush acrost the front of it. They lookclose at this and see the muzzle of a rifle peeking down at 'em; also,they can hear little scramblings and squealings of about a dozen orfourteen kids in the tepee that was likely nestled up round the oldmurderer like a bunch of young quail.

"Well, they was something kind of cold and cheerless about the muzzle ofthis rifle poked through the brush at 'em; so the agent starts in andmakes a regular agent speech to Pete. He says the Great White Father atWashington, D.C., has wished his children to be give an Englisheducation and learnt to write a good business hand, and all like that;and read books, and so on; and the Great White Father will be peeved ifPete takes it in this rough way. And the agent is disappointed in him,too, and will never again think the same of his old friend, and whycan't he be nice and submit to the decencies of civilization—and soon—a lot of guff like that; but all the time he talks this here rifleis pointing right into his chest, so you can bet he don't make no falsemotions.

"At last, when he's told Pete all the reasons he can think up andguesses mebbe he's got the old boy going, he winds up by saying: 'Andnow what shall I tell the Great White Father at Washington you say tohis kind words?' Old Pete, still not moving the rifle a hair's breadth,he calls out: 'You tell the Great White Father at Washington to go tohell!' Yes, sir; just like that he says it; and I guess that shows youwhat kind of a murderer he is. And what I allus say is, 'what's the useof spending us taxpayers' good money trying to educate trash like that,when they ain't got no sense of decency in the first place, and theminute they learn to talk English they begin to curse and swear as badas a white man? They got no wish to improve their condition, which iswhat I allus have said and what I allus will say.

"Anyway, this agent didn't waste no more time on Pete's brats. He comeright away from there, though telling his helper it was a great pitythey couldn't have got a good look into the tepee, because then they'dhave known for the first time just what kids round there Pete reallyconsidered his. Of course he hadn't felt he should lay down his life inthe interests of this trifling information, and I don't blame him onebit. I wouldn't have done it myself. You can't tell me a reservationwith Pete on it would be any nice place. Look at the old crook now,still lamming that axe round to beat the cars because he thinks he'sbeing watched! I bet he'll be mad down to his moccasins when he findsout the Old Lady's been off all day."

Uncle Abner yawned and stretched his sun-baked form with wearyrectitude. Then he looked with pleased dismay into the face of hissilver watch.

"Now, I snum! Here she's two-thirty! Don't it beat all how time flitsby, as it were, when you meet a good conversationalist and get startedon various topics! Well, I guess like as not I better amble along overtoward the little shop and see if they ain't some little thing to beputtered at round there. Yes, sir; all play and no work makes Jack adull boy, as the saying is."

The honest fellow achieved a few faltering paces in the generaldirection of his shop. Then he turned brightly.

"A joke's a joke, all right; but, after all, I hate to see old Peteworking hisself into the grave that way, even if he ain't a regularhuman being. Suppose you loaf over there and put him wise that theMadam's been off the place since sunup. The laugh's on him enoughalready."

Which showed that Uncle Abner had not really a bad heart. And I did evenas he had said.

Pete was instantly stilled by my brief but informing speech. He leanedupon his axe and gazed at me with shocked wonder. The face of theAmerican Indian is said to be unrevealing—to be a stoic mask underwhich his emotions are ever hidden. For a second time this day I foundtradition at fault. Pete's face was lively and eloquent under his shockof dead-black hair—dead black but for half a dozen gray or grayishstrands, for Pete's eighty years have told upon him, even if he is notyet sufficiently gray at the temples to be a hero in a magazine costingover fifteen cents. His face is a richly burnished mahogany and tellslittle of his years until he smiles; then from brow to pointed chin itcracks into a million tiny wrinkles, an intricate network of themframing his little black eyes, which are lashless, and radiating fromthe small mouth to the high cheek bones of his race.

His look as he eyed me became utter consternation; then humour slowlylightened the little eyes. He lifted the eyes straight into the glare ofthe undimmed sun; nor did they blink as they noted the hour. "My goodgosh!" he muttered; then stalked slowly round the pile of stove woodthat had been spreading since morning. He seemed aggrieved—yethumorously aggrieved—as he noted its noble dimensions. He cast away theaxe and retrieved some outflung sticks, which he cunningly adjusted tothe main pile to make it appear still larger to the casual eye.

"My good gosh!" he muttered again. "My old mahala she tell me Old LadyPettengill go off early this morning; but I think she make one bigmistake. Now what you know about that?" He smiled winningly now andbecame a very old man indeed, the smile lighting the myriad minutewrinkles that instantly came to life. Again he ruefully surveyed themorning's work. "I think that caps the climax," said he, and grimancedhumorous dismay for the entertainment of us both.

I opened my cigarette case to him. Like his late critic, Pete availedhimself of two, though he had not the excuse of a pipe to be filled. Onehe coyly tucked above his left ear and one he lighted. Then he satgracefully back upon his heels and drew smoke into his innermostrecesses, a shrunken little figure of a man in a calico shirt of gaystripes, faded blue overalls, and shoes that were remarkable as ruins.With a pointed chip in the slender fingers of one lean brown hand—anarrow hand of quite feminine delicacy—he cleared the ground of otherchips and drew small figures in the earth.

"Some of your people cut up in a fight down at Kulanche last night," Iremarked after a moment of courteous waiting.

"Mebbe," said Pete, noncommittal.

"Were you down there?"

"I never kill a man with a knife," said Pete; "that ain't my belief."

He left an opening that tempted, but I thought it wise to ignore thatfor the moment.

"You an old man, Pete?"

"Mebbe."

"How old?"

"Oh, so-so."

"You remember a long time ago—how long?"

He drew a square in his cleared patch of earth, subdivided it intolittle squares, and dotted each of these in the centre before he spoke.

"When Modocs have big soldier fight."

"You a Modoc?"

"B'lieve me!"

"When Captain Jack fought the soldiers over in the Lava Beds?"

"Some fight—b'lieve me!" said Pete, erasing his square and starting acircle.

"You fight, too?"

"Too small; I do little odd jobs—when big Injin kill soldier I skin umhead."

I begged for further items, but Pete seemed to feel that he had beenalready verbose. He dismissed the historic action with a wise saying:

"Killing soldiers all right; but it don't settle nothing." He drew atriangle.

Indelicately then I pried into his spiritual life.

"You a Christian, Pete?"

"Injin-Christian," he amended—as one would say"Progressive-Republican."

"Believe in God?"

"Two." This was a guarded admission; I caught his side glance.

"Which ones?" I asked it cordially; and Pete smiled as one who detects abrother liberal in theology.

"Injin God; Christian God. Injin God go like this—" He brushed out hislatest figure and drew a straight line a foot long. And Christian God goso—he drew a second straight line perpendicular to the first. I wasmade to see the line of his own God extending over the earth some fiftyfeet above its surface, while the line of the Christian God wentstraight and endlessly into the heavens. "Injin God stayclose—Christian God go straight up. Whoosh!" He looked toward thezenith to indicate the vanishing line. "I think mebbe both O.K. Youthink both O.K.?"

"Mebbe," I said.

Pete retraced the horizontal line of his own God and the perpendicularline of the other.

"Funny business," said he tolerantly.

"Funny business," I echoed. And then—the moment seeming ripe forintimate personal research: "Pete, how about that brother-in-law ofyours? Is he a one-God Christian or a two-God, like you?"

He hurriedly brushed out his lines, flashed me one of his uneasy sideglances, and seemed not to have heard my question. He sprang lightlyfrom his heels, affected to scan a murky cloud-bank to the south,ignited his second cigarette from the first, and seemed relieved by theactual diversion of Laura, his present lawful consort, now ploddingalong the road just outside the fence.

Laura is ponderous and billowy, and her moonlike face of rusty bronze islined to show that she, too, has gone down a little into the vale ofyears. She was swathed in many skirts, her shoulders enveloped by aneutral-tinted shawl, and upon her head was a modist toque of lightstraw, garlanded with pink roses. This may have been her hunt constume,for the carcasses of two slain rabbits swung jauntily from her girdle.She undulated by us with no sign. Pete's glistening little eyes lingeredin appraisal upon her noble rotundities and her dangling quarry. Then,with a graceful flourish of the new cigarette, he paid tribute to theancient fair.

"That old mahala of mine, she not able to chew much now; but she's someswell chicken—b'lieve me!"

I persisted in the impertinence he had sought to turn.

"How about this brother-in-law of yours, Pete?"

Again he was deaf. He picked up his axe, appearing to weigh theresumption of his task against a reply to this straight question. Hemust have found the alternative too dreadful; he leaned upon the axe,thus winning something of the dignity of labour, with none of its pains,and grudgingly asked:

"Mebbe some liars tell you in conversation about that oldb'other-in-law?"

"Of course! Many nice people tell me every day. They tell me all abouthim. I rather hear you tell me. Is he a Christian?"

"He's one son-of-gun, pure and simple—that old feller. He caps theclimax."

"Yes; I know all about that. He's a bad man. I hear everything abouthim. Now you tell me again. You can tell better than liars."

"One genuine son-of-gun!" persisted Pete, shrewdly keeping to generalterms.

"Oh, very well!" I rose from the log I was sitting on, yawning myindifference. "I know everything he ever did. Other people tell me allthe time."

I moved off a few steps under the watchful side glance. It worked. Oneof Pete's slim, womanish hands fluttered up in a movement of arrest.

"Those liars tell you about one time he shoot white man off horse goingby?"

"Certainly!"

"That white man still have smallpox to give all Injins he travel to; sothey go 'n' vote who kill him off quick, and my b'other-in-law he winit."

I tried to look as if this were a bit of stale gossip.

"Then whites raise hell to say Pete he do same. What you know aboutthat? My old b'other-in-law send word he do same—twenty, fifty Injinwitness tell he said so—and now he gon' hide far off. Dep'ty sheriffcan't find him. That son-of-gun come back next year, raise big fightover one span mules with Injin named Walter that steal my mules out ofpasture; and Walter not get well from it—so whites say yes, old Petedone that same killing scrape to have his mules again; plain as the noseon the face old Pete do same. But I catch plenty Injin witness see myb'other-in-law do same, and I think they can't catch him another timeonce more, because they look in all places he ain't. I think plenty toomuch trouble he make all time for me—perform something not nice and getfound out about it; and all people say, Oh, yes—that old Pete he's attricks again; he better get sent to Walla Walla, learn some good tradein prison for eighteen years. That b'other-in-law cap the climax! Heknow all good place to hide from dep'ty sheriff, so not be found whenbadly wanted—the son-of-gun!"

Pete's face now told that, despite the proper loathing inspired by hismisdeeds, this brother-in-law compelled a certain horrid admiration forhis gift of elusiveness.

"What's your brother-in-law's name?"

Pete deliberated gravely.

"In my opinion his name Edward; mebbe Sam, mebbe Charlie; I think moreit's Albert."

"Well, what about that next time he broke out?"

"Whoosh! Damn no-good squaw man get all Injins drunk on whiskey; thenplay poker with four aces. 'What you got? No good—four aces—hardluck—deal 'em up!'" Pete's flexible wrists here flashed in pantomime."Pretty soon Injin got no mules, no blanket, no spring wagon, no gun, nonew boots, no nine dollars my old mahala gets paid for three bushel wildplums from Old Lady Pettengill to make canned goods of—only got one bigsick head from all night; see four aces, four kings, four jacks. 'Whatyou got, Pete? No good. Full house here. Hard luck—my deal. Haveanother drink, old top!'"

"Well, what did your brother-in-law do when he heard about this?"

"Something!"

"Shoot?"

"Naw; got no gun left. Choke him on the neck—I think this way."

The supple hands of Pete here clutched his corded throat, fingertipsmeeting at the back, and two potent thumbs uniting in a sinisterpressure upon his Adam's apple. To further enlarge my understanding hecontorted his face unprettily. From rolling eyes and outthrust tongue itwas apparent that the squaw man had survived long enough to regret theinveteracy of his good luck at cards.

"Then what?"

"Man tell you before?" He eyed me with frank suspicion.

"Certainly; you tell, too!"

"That b'other-in-law he win everything back this poor squaw man don'tneed no more, and son-of-gun beat it quick; so all liars say Old Peteturn that trick, but can't prove same, because my b'other-in-law do samein solitude. And old judge say: 'Oh, well, can't prove same incourthouse, and only good squaw man is dead squaw man; sowhat-the-bad-place!' I think mebbe."

"Go on; what about that next time?"

"You know already," said Pete firmly.

"You tell, too."

He pondered this, his keen little eyes searching my face as he pensivelyfondled the axe.

"You know about this time that son-of-gun go 'n' kill a bright lawyer inRed Gap? I think that cap the climax!"

"Certainly, I know!" This with bored impatience.

"I think, then, you tell me." His seamed face was radiant with cunning.

"What's the use? You know it already."

He countered swiftly:

"What's use I tell you—you know already."

I yawned again flagrantly.

"Now you tell in your own way how this trouble first begin," persistedPete rather astonishingly. He seemed to quote from memory.

Once more I yawned, turning coldly away.

"You tell in your own words," he was again gently urging; but on theinstant his axe began to rain blows upon the log at his feet.

Sounds of honest toil were once more to be heard in the wood lot; and,though I could not hear the other, I surmised that the sledge of UncleAbner now rang merrily upon his anvil. Both he and Pete had doubtlessnoted at the same moment the approach of Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill,who was spurring her jaded roan up the long rise from the creek bottom.

My stalwart hostess, entirely masculine to the eye from a littledistance, strode up from the corral, waved a quirt at me in greeting,indicated by another gesture that she was dusty and tired, and vanishedbriskly within the ranch house. Half an hour later she joined me in theliving-room, where I had trifled with ancient magazines and stockjournals on the big table. Laced boots, riding breeches, and army shirthad gone for a polychrome and trailing tea gown, black satin slippers,flashing rhinestone rosettes, and silk stockings of a sinful scarlet.She wore a lace boudoir cap, plenteously beribboned, and her sunburnednose had been lavishly powdered. She looked now merely like an indulgedmatron whose most poignant worry would be a sick Pomeranian orovernight losses at bridge. She wished to know whether I would have teawith her. I would.

Tea consisted of bottled beer from the spring house, half a ham, and aloaf of bread. It should be said that her behaviour toward thesedainties, when they had been assembled, made her seem much less the wornsocial leader. There was practically no talk for ten active minutes. Ahigh-geared camera would have caught everything of value in the scene.It was only as I decanted a second bottle of beer for the woman that sheseemed to regain consciousness of her surroundings. The spirit of herfirst attack upon the food had waned. She did fashion another sandwichof a rugged pattern, but there was a hint of the dilettante in her work.

And now she spoke. Her gaze upon the magazines of yesteryear massed atthe lower end of the table, she declared they must all be scrapped,because they too painfully reminded her of a dentist's waiting-room. Shewondered if there mustn't be a law against a dentist having in hispossession a magazine less than ten years old. She suspected as much.

"There I'll be sitting in Doc Martingale's office waiting for him tokill me by inches, and I pick up a magazine to get my mind off my fateand find I'm reading a timely article, with illustrations, aboutCervera's fleet being bottled up in the Harbour of Santiago. I bet he'sgot Godey's Lady's Book for 1862 round there, if you looked for it."

Now a brief interlude for the ingestion of malt liquor, followed by apained recital of certain complications of the morning.

"That darned one-horse post-office down to Kulanche! What do you think?I wanted to send a postal card to the North American Cleaning and DyeWorks, at Red Gap, for some stuff they been holding out on me a month,and that office didn't have a single card in stock—nothing but some ofthese fancy ones in a rack over on the grocery counter; horrible thingswith pictures of brides and grooms on 'em in coloured costumes, withsickening smiles on their faces, and others with wedding bells ringingout or two doves swinging in a wreath of flowers—all of 'em havingmushy messages underneath; and me having to send this card to the NorthAmerican Cleaning and Dye Works, which is run by Otto Birdsall, asmirking old widower, that uses hair oil and perfumery, and imaginesevery woman in town is mad about him.

"The mildest card I could find was covered with red and purplecauliflowers or something, and it said in silver print: 'With fondestremembrance!' Think of that going through the Red Gap post-office to beread by old Mis' Terwilliger, that some say will even open letters thatlook interesting—to say nothing of its going to this fresh old OttoBirdsall, that tried to hold my hand once not so many years ago.

"You bet I made the written part strong enough not to give him or anyother party a wrong notion of my sentiments toward him. At that, I guessOtto wouldn't make any mistake since the time I give him hell lastsummer for putting my evening gowns in his show window every time he'dclean one, just to show off his work. It looked so kind of indelicateseeing an empty dress hung up there that every soul in town knewbelonged to me.

"What's that? Oh, I wrote on the card that if this stuff of mine don'tcome up on the next stage I'll be right down there, and when I'm throughhandling him he'll be able to say truthfully that he ain't got a grayhair in his head. I guess Otto will know my intentions are honest, inspite of that 'fondest remembrance.'

"Then, on top of that, I had a run-in with the Swede for selling hisrotten whiskey to them poor Injin boys that had a fight last night afterthey got tight on it. The Swede laughs and says nobody can prove he sold'em a drop, and I says that's probably true. I says it's always hard toprove things. 'For instance,' I says, 'if they's another drop of liquorsold to an Injin during this haying time, and a couple or three nightsafter that your nasty dump here is set fire to in six places, and somecowardly assassin out in the brush picks you off with a rifle when yourush out—it will be mighty hard to prove that anybody did that, too;and you not caring whether it's proved or not, for that matter.

"THE SWEDE BRISTLES UP AND SAYS: 'THAT SOUNDS LIKEFIGHTING TALK!' I SAYS: 'YOUR HEARING IS PERFECT.'"

"'In fact,' I says, 'I don't suppose anybody would take the trouble toprove it, even if it could be easy proved. You'd note a singular lack ofpublic interest in it—if you was spared to us. I guess about as far asan investigation would ever get—the coroner's jury would say it was thework of Pete's brother-in-law; and you know what that would mean.' TheSwede bristles up and says: 'That sounds like fighting talk!' I says:'Your hearing is perfect.' I left him thinking hard."

"Pete's brother-in-law? That reminds me," I said. "Pete was telling meabout him just—I mean during his lunch hour; but he had to go to workagain just at the beginning of something that sounded good—about thetime he was going to kill a bright lawyer. What was that?"

The glass was drained and Ma Pettengill eyed the inconsiderable remainsof the ham with something like repugnance. She averted her face from it,lay back in the armchair she had chosen, and rolled a cigarette, while Ibrought a hassock for the jewelled slippers and the scarlet silkenankles, so ill-befitting one of her age. The cigarette was presentlyburning.

"I guess Pete's b'other-in-law, as he calls him, won't come into theseparts again. He had a kind of narrow squeak this last time. Pete donesomething pretty raw, even for this liberal-minded community. He gotscared about it himself and left the country for a couple ofmonths—looking for his brother-in-law, he said. He beat it up North andgot in with a bunch of other Injins that was being took down to New YorkCity to advertise a railroad, Pete looking like what folks think anInjin ought to look when he's dressed for the part. But he got homesick;and, anyway, he didn't like the job.

"This passenger agent that took 'em East put 'em up at one of the bighotels all right, but he subjects 'em to hardships they ain't used to.He wouldn't let 'em talk much English, except to say, 'Ugh! Ugh!'—likeInjins are supposed to—with a few remarks about the Great Spirit; andnot only that, but he makes 'em wear blankets and paint their faces—anInjin without paint and blanket and some beadwork seeming to a generalpassenger agent like a state capitol without a dome. And on top of theseoutrages he puts it up with the press agent of this big hotel to havethe poor things sleep up on the roof, right in the open air, so them jayNew York newspapers would fall for it and print articles about thesehardy sons of the forest, the last of a vanishing race, being stifled bywalls—with the names of the railroad and the hotel coming out good andstrong all through the piece.

"Three of the poor things got pneumonia, not being used to suchexposure; and Pete himself took a bad cold, and got mad and quit thejob. They find him a couple of days later, in a check suit and whiteshoes and a golf cap, playing pool in a saloon over on Eighth Avenue,and ship him back as a disgrace to the Far West and a great commoncarrier.

"He got in here one night, me being his best friend, and we talked itover. I advised him to go down and give himself up and have it over;and he agreed, and went down to Red Gap the next day in his new clothesand knocked at the jail door. He made a long talk about how hisbrother-in-law was the man that really done it, and he's been searchingfor him clear over to the rising sun, but can't find him; so he's cometo give himself up, even if they ain't got the least grounds to suspecthim—and can he have his trial for murder over that afternoon, so he cancome back up here the next day and go to work?

"They locked him up and Judge Ballard appointed J. Waldo Snyder todefend him. He was a new young lawyer from the East that had just cometo Red Gap, highly ambitious and full of devices for showing thatparties couldn't have been in their right mind when they committed thedeed—see the State against Jamstucker, New York Reports Number 23,pages 19 to 78 inclusive.

"Oh, he told me all about it up in his office one day —how he was goingto get Pete off. Ain't lawyers the goods, though! And doctors? This J.W.Snyder had a doctor ready to swear that Pete was nutty when he fired theshot, even if not before nor after. When I was a kid at school, back inFredonia, New York State, we used to have debates about which does themost harm—fire or water? Nowadays I bet they'd have: Which does themost harm—doctors or lawyers? Well, anyway, there Pete was injail—"

"Please tell in your own simple words just how this trouble began," Ibroke in. "What did Pete fire the shot for and who stopped it? Nowthen!"

"What! Don't you know about that? Well, well! So you never heard aboutPete sending this medicine man over the one-way trail? I'll have to tellyou, then. It was three years ago. Pete was camped about nine miles theother side of Kulanche, on the Corporation Ranch, and his littleyear-old boy was took badly sick. I never did know with what.Diphtheria, I guess. And I got to tell you Pete is crazy about babies.Always has been. Thirty years ago, when my own baby hadn't been but afew weeks born, Lysander John had to be in Red Gap with a smashed legand arm, and I was here alone with Pete for two months of one winter.Say, he was better than any trained nurse with both of us, even if mypapoose was only a girl one! Folks used to wonder afterward if I hadn'tbeen afraid with just Pete round. Good lands! If they'd ever seen himcuddle that mite and sing songs to it in Injin about the rain and thegrass! Anyway, I got to know Pete so well that winter I never blamed himmuch for what come off.

"Well, this yearling of his got bad and Pete was in two minds. Hebelieved in white doctors with his good sense, but he believed in Injindoctors with his superstition, which was older. So he tried to have oneof each. There was an old rogue of a medicine man round here then fromthe reservation up north. He'd been doing a little work at haying onthe Corporation, but he was getting his main graft selling the Injinscharms and making spells over their sick; a crafty old crook playing ontheir ignorance —understand? And Pete, having got the white doctor fromKulanche, thought he'd cinch matters by getting the medicine man, too.At that, I guess one would of been about as useful as the other, theKulanche doctor knowing more about anthrax and blackleg than he didabout sick Injin babies.

"The medicine man sees right off how scared Pete is for his kid andthinks here's a chance to make some big money. He looks at the littlepatient and says yes, he can cure him, sure; but it'll be a hard job andhe can't undertake it unless Pete comes through with forty dollars andhis span of mules. But Pete ain't got forty dollars or forty cents, andthe Kulanche doctor has got to the mules already, having a lien on 'emfor twenty-five.

"Pete hurried over and put the proposition up to me. He says his littlechief is badly sick and he's got a fine white doctor, but will I stakehim to enough to get this fine Injin doctor?—thus making a curecertain. Well, I tore into the old fool for wanting to let this depravedold medicine man tamper with his baby, and I warned him the Kulanchedoctor probably wasn't much better. Then I tell him he's to send downfor the best doctor in Red Gap at my expense and keep him with the childtill it's well. I tell him he can have the whole ranch if it would curehis child, but not one cent for the Injin.

"Well, the poor boy is about half convinced I'm right, but he's been anInjin too long to believe it all through. He went off and sent for theRed Gap doctor, but he can't resist making another try for the Injinone; and that old scoundrel holds out for his price. Pete wants him towait for his pay till haying is over; but he won't because he thinksPete can get the money from me now if he really has to have it. Petemust of been crazy for fair about that time.

"'All right,' says he; 'you can cure my little chief?'

"The crook says he can if the money is in his hand.

"'All right,' says Pete again; 'but if my little chief dies somethingbad is going to happen to you.'

"That's about all they ever found out concerning this threat of Pete's,though another Injin who heard it said that Pete said his brother-in-lawwould make the trouble—not Pete himself. Which was likely true enough.

"Pete's little chief died the night the Red Gap doctor got up here. Tenminutes later this medicine man had hitched up his team, loaded hisplunder into a wagon, and was pouring leather into his horses to getback home quick. He knew Pete never talks just to hear himself talk.They found him about thirty miles on his way—slumped down in the wagonbed, his team hitched by the roadside. There had been just one carefulshot. As he hadn't been robbed—he had over" a hundred dollars in goldon him—it pointed a mite too strong at Pete after his threat.

"A deputy sheriff come up. Pete said his brother-in-law had beenhanging round lately and had talked very dangerous about the medicineman. He said the brother-in-law had probably done the job. But Pete hadpulled this too often before when in difficulties. The deputy said he'dbetter come along down to Red Gap and tell the district attorney aboutit. Pete said all right and crawled into his tepee for his coat andhat—crawled right on out the back and into the brush while the deputyrolled a cigarette.

"That was when he joined this bunch of noble redmen to advertise thevanishing romance of the Great West—being helped out of the country, Ishouldn't wonder, by some lawless old hound that had feelings for himand showed it when he come along in the night to the ranch where he'dnursed her and her baby. They looked for him a little while, thendropped it; in fact, everybody was kind of glad he'd got off and kind ofsatisfied that he'd put this bad Injin, with his skull-duggery, over thebig jump.

"Then he got homesick, like I told you, and showed up here at the door;and I saw it was better for him to give himself up and get out of it byfair and legal means. Now! You got it straight that far?"

I nodded.

"So Pete took my advice, and a couple days later I hurried down to RedGap and had a talk with Judge Ballard and the district attorney. Thejudge said it had been embarrassing to justice to have my old Injinwalk in on 'em, because every one knew he was guilty. Why couldn't he ofstayed up here where the keen-eyed officers of the law could ofpretended not to know he was? And the old fool was only making thingsworse with his everlasting chatter about his brother-in-law, every oneknowing there wasn't such a person in existence—old Pete having haddozens of every kind of relation in the world but a brother-in-law. Butthey're going to have this bright young lawyer defend him, and they havehopes.

"Then I talked some. I said it was true that everybody knew Pete bumpedoff this old crook that had it coming to him, but they could never proveit, because Pete had come to my place and set up with me all night, whenI had lumbago or something, the very night this crime was donethirty-odd miles distant by some person or persons unknown—except itcould be known they had good taste about who needed killing.

"At this Judge Ballard jumps up and calls me an old liar and shook handswarmly with me; and Cale Jordan, that was district attorney then, saysif Mrs. Pettengill will give him her word of honour to go on the witnessstand and perjure herself to this effect then he don't see no use ofeven putting Kulanche County, State of Washington, to the expense of atrial, the said county already being deep in the hole for its newcourthouse—but for mercy's sake to stop the old idiot babbling abouthis brother-in-law, that every one knows he never had one, because sucha joke is too great an affront to the dignity of the law in such casesmade and provided—to wit: tell the old fool to say nothing except 'No,he never done it.' And he shakes hands with me, too, and says he'll havean important talk with Myron Bughalter, the sheriff.

"I says that's the best way out of it, being myself a heavy taxpayer;and I go see this Snyder lawyer, and then over to the jail and get intoPete's cell, where he's having a high old time with a sack of peppermintcandy and a copy of the Scientific American. I tell him to cut out thebrother-in-law stuff and just say 'No' to any question whatever. He saidhe would, and I went off home to rest up after my hard ride.

"Judge Ballard calls that night and says everything is fixed. No useputting the county to the expense of a trial when Pete has such a classyperjured alibi as I would give him. Myron Bughalter is to go out of thejail in a careless manner at nine-thirty that night, leaving all cellsunlocked and the door wide open so Pete can make his escape withoutdoing any damage to the new building. It seems the only other prisoneris old Sing Wah, that they're willing to save money on, too. He'd gotfull of perfumed port and raw gin a few nights before, announced himselfas a prize-hatchet man, and started a tong war in the laundry of one ofhis cousins. But Sing was sober now and would stay so until the next NewYear's; so they was going to let him walk out with Pete. The judge saidPete would probably be at the Arrowhead by sunup, and if he'd behavehimself from now on the law would let bygones be bygones. I thanked thejudge and went to bed feeling easy about old Pete.

"But at seven the next morning I'm waked up by the telephone—wanteddown to the jail in a hurry. I go there soon as I can get a drink of hotcoffee and find that poor Myron Bughalter is having his troubles. He'dgot there at seven, thinking, of course, to find both his prisonersgone; and here in the corridor is Pete setting on the chest of Sing Wah,where he'd been all night, I guess! He tells Myron he's a fool sheriffto leave his door wide open that way, because this bad Chinaman tried towalk out as soon as he'd gone, and would of done so it Pete hadn'tjumped him.

"It leaves Myron plenty embarrassed, but he finally says to Pete he cango free, anyway, now, for being such an honest jailbird; and old SingWah can go, too, having been punished enough by Pete's handling. SingWah slides out quickly enough at this, promising to send Myron a dozensilk handkerchiefs and a pound of tea. But not Pete. No, sir! He tellsMyron he's give himself up to be tried, and he wants that trial andwon't budge till he gets it.

"Then Myron telephoned for the judge and the district attorney, and forme. We get there and tell Pete to beat it quick. But the old mule isn'tgoing to move one step without that trial. He's fled back to his celland stands there as dignified as if he was going to lay a cornerstone.He's a grave rebuke to the whole situation, as you might say. Then theJudge and Cale go through some kind of a hocus-pocus talk, winding upwith both of them saying 'Not guilty!' in a loud voice; and Myron saysto Pete: 'There! You had your trial; now get out of my jail thisminute.'

"But canny old Pete is still balking. He says you can't have a trialexcept in the courthouse, which is upstairs, and they're trying to cheata poor old Injin. He's talking loud by this time, and Judge Ballardsays, all right, they must humour the poor child of Nature. So Myrontakes Pete by the wrist in a firm manner—though Pete's insisting heought to have the silver handcuffs on him—and marches him out the jaildoor, round to the front marble steps of the new courthouse, up thesteps, down the marble hall and into the courtroom, with the judge andCale Jordan and me marching behind.

"We ain't the whole procession, either. Out in front of the jail wasabout fifteen of Pete's friends and relatives, male and female, that hadbeen hanging round for two days waiting to attend his coming-out party.Mebbe that's why Pete had been so strong for the real courthouse,wanting to give these friends something swell for their trouble. Anyway,these Injins fall in behind us when we come out and march up into thecourtroom, where they set down in great ecstasy. Every last one of 'emhas a sack of peppermint candy and a bag of popcorn or peanuts, andthey all begin to eat busily. The steam heat had been turned on and thathall of justice in three minutes smelt like a cheap orphan asylum onChristmas-morning.

"Then, before they can put up another bluff at giving Pete his trial,with Judge Ballard setting up in his chair with his specs on and lookingfierce, who rushes in but this J. Waldo person that is Pete's lawyer.He's seen the procession from across the street and fears some low-downtrick is being played on his defenseless client.

"He comes storming down the aisle exclaiming; 'Your Honour, I protestagainst this grossly irregular proceeding!' The judge pounds on his deskwith his little croquet mallet and Myron Bughalter tells Snyder, out ofthe corner of his mouth, to shut up. But he won't shut up for someminutes. This is the first case he'd had and he's probably lookedforward to a grand speech to the jury that would make 'em all blubberand acquit Pete without leaving the box, on the grounds of emotional orerratic insanity—or whatever it is that murderers get let off on whentheir folks are well fixed. He sputters quite a lot about this monstroustravesty on justice before they can drill the real facts into his head;and even then he keeps coming back to Pete's being crazy.

"Then Pete, who hears this view of his case for the first time, beginsto glare at his lawyer in a very nasty way and starts to interrupt; sothe judge has to knock wood some more to get 'em all quiet. When theydo get still—with Pete looking blacker than ever at his lawyer—CaleJordan says: 'Pete, did you do this killing?' Pete started to say mebbehis brother-in-law did, but caught himself in time and said 'No!' at thesame time starting for J. Waldo, that had called him crazy. MyronBughalter shoves him back in his chair, and Cale Jordan says: 'YourHonour, you have heard the evidence, which is conclusive. I now ask thatthe prisoner at the bar be released.' Judge Ballard frowns at Pete verystern and says: 'The motion is granted. Turn him loose, quick, and getthe rest of that smelly bunch out of here and give the place a goodairing. I have to hold court here at ten o'clock.'

"Pete was kind of convinced now that he'd had a sure-enough trial, andhis friends had seen the marble walls and red carpet and varnishedfurniture, and everything; so he consented to be set free—not in anyrush, but like he was willing to do 'em a favour.

"And all the time he's keeping a bad little eye on J. Waldo. The minutehe gets down from the stand he makes for him and says what does he meanby saying he was crazy when he done this killing? J. Waldo tries toexplain that this was his only defense and was going on to tell what anelegant defense it was; but Pete gets madder and madder. I guess he'dbeen called everything in the world before, but never crazy; that's thevery worst thing you can tell an Injin.

"They work out toward the front door; and then I hear Pete say: 'Youknow what? You said I'm crazy. My b'other-in-law's going to makesomething happen to you in the night.' Pete was seeing red by that time.The judge tells Myron to hurry and get the room cleared and open somewindows. Myron didn't have to clear it of J.W. Snyder. That bright younglawyer dashed out and was fifty feet ahead of the bunch when they got tothe front door.

"So Pete was a free man once more, without a stain on his characterexcept to them that knew him well. But the old fool had lost me atenant. Yes, sir; this J.W. Snyder young man, with the sign hardly dryon the glass door of his office in the Pettengill Block, had a nervoustemperament to start with, and on top of that he'd gone fully intoPete's life history and found out that parties his brother-in-law wasdispleased with didn't thrive long. He packed up his law library thatafternoon and left for another town that night.

"Yes, Pete's a wonder! Watch him slaving away out there. And he must ofbeen working hard all day, even with me not here to keep tabs on him.Just look at the size of that pile of wood he's done up, when he mighteasy of been loafing on the job!"

IX

LITTLE OLD NEW YORK

Monday's mail for the Arrowhead was brought in by the Chinaman while MaPettengill and I loitered to the close of the evening meal: a canvassack of letters and newspapers with three bulky packages of merchandisethat had come by parcels post. The latter evoked a passing storm from myhostess. Hadn't she warned folks time and again to send all her stuff byexpress instead of by parcels post, which would sure get her gunned someday by the stage driver who got nothing extra for hauling such matter?She had so!

We trifled now with a fruity desert and the lady regaled me with a briefexposure of our great parcels-post system as a piece of the nerviestpenny pinching she had ever known our Government guilty of. Because why?Because these here poor R.F.D. stage drivers had to do the extra haulingfor nothing.

"Here's old Harvey Steptoe with the mail contract for sixty dollars amonth, three trips a week between Red Gap and Surprise Valley,forty-five miles each way, barely making enough extra on express matterand local freight to come out even after buying horse-feed. Then comesparcels post, and parties that had had to pay him four bits or a dollarfor a large package, or two bits for a small one, can have 'em broughtin by mail for nothing. Of course most of us eased up on him after weunderstood the hellish injustice of it. We took pains not to have thingssent parcels post and when they come unbeknown to us, like these hereto-night, we'd always pay him anyway, just like they was express. It wasonly fair and, besides, we would live longer, Harvey Steptoe beingmorose and sudden.

"Like when old Safety First Timmins got the idea he could have all hissupplies sent from Red Gap for almost nothing by putting stamps on 'em.He was tickled to death with the notion until, after the second load ofabout a hundred pounds, some cowardly assassin shot at him from thebrush one morning about the time the stage usually went down past hisranch. The charge missed him by about four inches and went into the barndoor. He dug it out and found a bullet and two buckshot. Old SafetyFirst ain't any Sherlock Holmes, but even Doctor Watson could of solvedthis murderous crime. When Harvey come by the next night he went out andsays to him, 'Ain't you got one of them old Mississippi Yaegers aboutseventy-five years old that carries a bullet and two buckshot?' Harveythought back earnestly for a minute, then says,'Not now I ain't. I usedto have one of them old hairlooms around the house but I found theyain't reliable when you want to do fine work from a safe distance; so Ithrew her away yesterday morning and got me this nice new 30-30 down toGoshook & Dale's hardware store.'

"He pulled the new gun out and patted it tenderly in the sight of oldTimmins. 'Ain't it a cunning little implement?' he says; 'I tried it outcoming up this afternoon. I could split a hair with it as far, say, asfrom that clump of buck-brush over to your barn. And by the way, Mr.Timmins,' he says, 'I got some more stuff for you here from the SquareDeal Grocery—stuff all gummed up with postage stamps.' He leans his newtoy against the seat and dumps out a sack of flour and a sack of driedfruit and one or two other things. 'This parcels post is a grand thing,ain't it?' says he.

"'Well—yes and no, now that you speak of it,' says old Safety First.'The fact is I'm kind of prejudiced against it; I ain't going to havethings come to me any more all stuck over with them trifling littlepostage stamps. It don't look dignified.' 'No?' says Harvey. 'No,' saysSafety First in a firm tone. 'I won't ever have another single thingcome by mail if I can help it.' 'I bet you're superstitious,' saysHarvey, climbing back to his seat and petting the new gun again. 'I betyou're so superstitious you'd take this here shiny new implement off myhands at cost if I hinted I'd part with it.' 'I almost believe I would,'says Safety First. 'Well, it don't seem like I'd have much use for itafter all,' says Harvey. 'Of course I can always get a new one if myfancy happens to run that way again.'

"So old Safety First buys a new loaded rifle that he ain't got a use onearth for. It would of looked to outsiders like he was throwing hismoney away on fripperies, but he knew it was a prime necessity of lifeall right. The parcels post ain't done him a bit of good since, though Isend him marked pieces in the papers every now and then telling how thepostmaster general thinks it's a great boon to the ultimate consumer.And I mustn't forget to send Harvey six bits for them three packagesthat come to-night. That's what we do. Otherwise, him being morose andturbulent, he'd get a new gun and make ultimate consumers out of all ofus. Darned ultimate! I reckon we got a glorious Government, likecandidates always tell us, but a postmaster general that expected stagedrivers to do three times the hauling they had been doing with no extrapay wouldn't last long out at the tail of an ... route. There'd bepieces in the paper telling about how he rose to prominence from thetime he got a lot of delegates sewed up for the people's choice and howhis place will be hard to fill. It certainly would be hard to fill outhere. Old Timmins, for one, would turn a deaf ear to his country'scall."

Lew Wee having now cleared the table of all but coffee, we lingered fora leisurely overhauling of the mail sack. Ma Pettengill slit envelopesand read letters to an accompanying rumble of protest. She several timeswished to know what certain parties took her for—and they'd be fooledif they did; and now and again she dwelt upon the insoluble mystery ofher not being in the poorhouse at that moment; yes, and she'd of beenthere long ago if she had let these parties run her business like theythought they could. But what could a lone defenceless woman expect?She'd show them, though! Been showing 'em for thirty years now, andstill had her health, hadn't she?

Letters and bills were at last neatly stacked and the poor weak womanfell upon the newspapers. The Red Gap Recorder was shorn of its wrapper.Being first a woman she turned to the fourth page to flash a practisedeye over that department which is headed "Life's Stages—At theAltar—In the Cradle!—To the Tomb." Having gleaned recent vitalstatistics she turned next to the column carrying the market quotationson beef cattle, for after being a woman she is a rancher. Prices forthat day must have pleased her immensely for she grudgingly mumbled thatthey were less ruinous than she had expected. In the elation of whichthis admission was a sign she next refreshed me with various personalitems from a column headed "Social Gleanings—by Madame On Dit."

I learned that at the last regular meeting of the Ladies' FridayAfternoon Shakespeare Club, Mrs. Dr. Percy Hailey Martingale had read apaper entitled "My Trip to the Panama-Pacific Exposition," after which adainty collation was served by mine hostess Mrs. Judge Ballard; thatMiss Beryl Mae Macomber, the well-known young society heiress, wasvisiting friends in Spokane where rumour hath it that she would take acourse of lessons in elocution; and that Mrs. Cora Hartwick Wales,prominent society matron and leader of the ultra smart set of Price'sAddition, had on Thursday afternoon at her charming new bungalow, cornerof Bella Vista Street and Prospect Avenue, entertained a number of herinmates at tea. Ma Pettengill and I here quickly agreed that theproofreading on the Recorder was not all it should be. Then sheunctuously read me a longer item from another column which was signed"The Lounger in the Lobby":

"Mr. Benjamin P. Sutton, the wealthy capitalist of Nome, Alaska, and aprince of good fellows, is again in our midst for his annual visit toHis Honour Alonzo Price, Red Gap's present mayor, of whom he is anold-time friend and associate. Mr. Sutton, who is the picture of health,brings glowing reports from the North and is firm in his belief thatAlaska will at no distant day become the garden spot of the world. Inthe course of a brief interview he confided to ye scribe that on hispresent trip to the outside he would not again revisit his birthplace,the city of New York, as he did last year. 'Once was enough, for manyreasons,' said Mr. Sutton grimly. 'They call it "Little old New York,"but it isn't little and it isn't old. It's big and it's new—we haveolder buildings right in Nome than any you can find on Broadway. Sincemy brief sojourn there last year I have decided that our people beforegoing to New York should see America first."

"Now what do you think of that?" demanded the lady. I said I would beable to think little of it unless I were told the precise reasons forthis rather brutal abuse of a great city. What, indeed, were the "manyreasons" that Mr. Sutton had grimly not confided to ye scribe?

Ma Pettengill chuckled and reread parts of the indictment. Thereaftershe again chuckled fluently and uttered broken phrases to herself."Horse-car" was one; "the only born New Yorker alive" was another. Itbecame necessary for me to remind the woman that a guest was present. Idid this by shifting my chair to face the stone fireplace in which apine chunk glowed, and by coughing in a delicate and expectant manner.

"Poor Ben!" she murmured—"going all the day down there just to get oneromantic look at his old home after being gone twenty-five years. Idon't blame him for talking rough about the town, nor for his criminalact—stealing a street-car track."

It sounded piquant—a noble theft indeed! I now murmured a bit myself,striving to convey an active incredulity that yet might be vanquished byfacts. The lady quite ignored this, diverging to her own opinion of NewYork. She tore the wrapper from a Sunday issue of a famous metropolitandaily and flaunted its comic supplement at me. "That's how I alwaysthink of New York," said she—"a kind of a comic supplement to the restof this great country. Here—see these two comical little tots standingon their uncle's stomach and chopping his heart out with theiraxes—after you got the town sized up it's just that funny and horrible.It's like the music I heard that time at a higher concert I was drug toin Boston—ingenious but unpleasant."

But this was not what I would sit up for after a hard day'sfishing—this coarse disparagement of something the poor creature wasunfitted to comprehend.

"Ben Sutton," I remarked firmly.

"The inhabitants of New York are divided fifty-fifty between them thatare trying to get what you got and them that think you're trying to getwhat they got."

"Ben Sutton," I repeated, trying to make it sullen.

"Ask a man on the street in New York where such and such a building isand he'll edge out of reaching distance, with his hand on his watch,before he tells you he don't know. In Denver, or San Francisco now, theman will most likely walk a block or two with you just to make sure youget the directions right."

"Ben Sutton!"

"They'll fall for raw stuff, though. I know a slick mining promoter fromArizona that stops at the biggest hotel on Fifth Avenue and has himselfpaged by the boys about twenty times a day so folks will know howimportant he is. He'll get up from his table in the restaurant andfollow the boy out in a way to make 'em think that nine million dollarsis at stake. He tells me it helps him a lot in landing the wise ones."

"Stole a street-car track," I muttered desperately.

"The typical New Yorker, like they call him, was born in Haverhill,Massachusetts, and sleeps in New Rochelle, going in on the 8:12 andcoming out on the—"

"I had a pretty fight landing that biggest one this afternoon, from thatpool under the falls up above the big bend. Twice I thought I'd losthim, but he was only hiding—and then I found I'd forgotten my landingnet. Say, did I ever tell you about the time I was fishing for steelhead down in Oregon, and the bear—" The lady hereupon raised a hushinghand.

Well, as I was saying, Ben Sutton blew into town early last Septemberand after shaking hands with his old confederate, Lon Price, he says howis the good wife and is she at home and Lon says no; that Pettikins hasbeen up at Silver Springs resting for a couple weeks; so Ben says it'stoo bad he'll miss the little lady, as in that case he has somethinggood to suggest, which is, what's the matter with him and Lon taking aswift hike down to New York which Ben ain't seen since 1892, though hewas born there, and he'd now like to have a look at the old home inLon's company. Lon says it's too bad Pettikins ain't there to go along,but if they start at once she wouldn't have time to join them, and Bensays he can start near enough at once for that, so hurry and pack thesuitcase. Lon does it, leaving a delayed telegram to Henrietta to besent after they start, begging her to join them if not too late, whichit would be.

While they are in Louis Meyer's Place feeling good over this coop, incomes the ever care-free Jeff Tuttle and Jeff says he wouldn't mindgoing out on rodeo himself with 'em, at least as far as Jersey Citywhere he has a dear old aunt living—or she did live there when he was alittle boy and was always very nice to him and he ain't done right innot going to see her for thirty years—and if he's that close to the bigtown he could run over from Jersey City for a look—see.

Lon and Ben hail his generous decision with cheers and on the way toanother place they meet me, just down from the ranch. And why don't Icome along with the bunch? Ben has it all fixed in ten seconds, he beingone of these talkers that will odd things along till they sound even,and the other two chiming in with him and wanting to buy my ticket rightthen. But I hesitated some. Lon and Ben Sutton was all right to go with,but Jeff Tuttle was a different kittle of fish. Jeff is a decent man inmany respects and seems real refined when you first meet him if it's insome one's parlour, but he ain't one you'd care to follow step by stepthrough the mazes and pitfalls and palmrooms of a great city if you'resensitive to public notice. Still, they was all so hearty in theirurging, Ben saying I was the only lady in the world he could travel thatfar with and not want to strangle, and Lon says he'd rather have me thanmost of the men he knew, and Jeff says if I'll consent to go he'll takehis full-dress suit so as to escort me to operas and lectures in aclassy manner, and at last I give up. I said I'd horn in on their partysince none of 'em seemed hostile.

I'd meant to go a little later anyway, for some gowns I needed and someshopping I'd promised to do for Lizzie Gunslaugh. You got to hand it toNew York for shopping. Why, I'd as soon buy an evening gown in LosAngeles as in Portland or San Francisco. Take this same LizzieGunslaugh. She used to make a bare living, with her sign reading "Plainand Fashionable Dressmaking." But I took that girl down to New Yorktwice with me and showed her how and what to buy there, instead of goingto Spokane for her styles, and to-day she's got a thriving littlebusiness with a bully sign that we copied from them in the East—"Madame Elizabeth, Robes et Manteaux." Yes, sir; New York has at leastone real reason for taking up room. That's a thing I always try to getinto Ben Sutton's head, that he'd ought to buy his clothes down thereinstead of getting 'em from a reckless devil-dare of a tailor up inSeattle that will do anything in the world Ben tells him to—and hetells him a plenty, believe me. He won't ever wear a dress suit,either, because he says that costume makes all men look alike and heain't going to stifle his individuality. If you seen Ben's figure onceyou'd know that nothing could make him look like any one else, him beingbuilt on the lines of a grain elevator and having individuality noclothes on earth could stifle. He's the very last man on earth thatshould have coloured braid on his check suits. However!

My trunk is packed in a hurry and I'm down to the 6:10 on time. Lon isvery scared and jubilant over deserting Henrietta in this furtive way,and Ben is all ebullient in a new suit that looks like a lodge regaliaand Jeff Tuttle in plain clothes is as happy as a child. When I getthere he's already begun to give his imitation of a Sioux squaw with ahare lip reciting "Curfew Shall Not Ring To-night" in her nativelanguage, which he pulls on all occasions when he's feeling too good.It's some imitation. The Sioux language, even when spoken by a trainedelocutionist, can't be anything dulcet. Jeff's stunt makes it sound likegrinding coffee and shovelling coal into a cellar at the same time.Anyway, our journey begun happily and proved to be a good one, the dayspassing pleasantly while we talked over old times and played ten-centlimit in my stateroom, though Jeff Tuttle is so untravelled that he'llactually complain about the food and service in a dining-car. The poorpuzzled old cow-man still thinks you ought to get a good meal in one,like the pretty bill of fare says you can.

Then one morning we was in New York and Ben Sutton got his first shock.He believed he was still on the other side of the river because hehadn't rid in a ferryboat yet. He had to be told sharply by parties inuniform. But we got him safe to a nice tall hotel on Broadway at last.Talk about your hicks from the brush—Ben was it, coming back to thishere birthplace of his. He fell into a daze on the short ride to thehotel—after insisting hotly that we should go to one that was pulleddown ten years ago—and he never did get out of it all that day.

Lon and Jeff was dazed, too. The city filled 'em with awe and they madeno pretense to the contrary. About all they did that day was to buypicture cards and a few drinks. They was afraid to wander very far fromthe hotel for fear they'd get run over or arrested or fall into the newsubway or something calamitous like that. Of course New York was lookingas usual, the streets being full of tired voters tearing up thecar-tracks and digging first-line trenches and so forth.

It was a quiet day for all of us, though I got my shopping started, andat night we met at the hotel and had a lonesome dinner. We was all toodazed and tired to feel like larking about any, and poor Ben was sodownright depressed it was pathetic. Ever read the story about a mangoing to sleep and waking up in a glass case in a museum a thousandyears later? That was Ben coming back to his old town after onlytwenty-five years. He hadn't been able to find a single old friend norany familiar faces. He ordered a porterhouse steak, family style, forhimself, but he was so mournful he couldn't eat more than about twodollars' worth of it. He kept forgetting himself in dismalreminiscences. The onlysright thing he'd found was the men tearing upthe streets. That was just like they used to be, he said. He maunderedon to us about how horse-cars was running on Broadway when he left andhow they hardly bothered to light the lamps north of Forty-secondStreet, and he wished he could have some fish balls like the oldSinclair House used to have for its free lunch, and how in them goldendays people that had been born right here in New York was seen sofrequently that they created no sensation.

He was feeling awful desolate about this. He pointed out differentparties at tables around us, saying they was merchant princes fromSandusky or prominent Elks from Omaha or roystering blades fromPittsburgh or boulevardeers from Bucyrus—not a New Yorker in sight. Hesaid he'd been reading where a wealthy nut had seat out an expedition tothe North Pole to capture a certain kind of Arctic flea that haunts onlya certain rare fox—but he'd bet a born New Yorker was harder to find.He said what this millionaire defective ought to of done with hisinherited wealth was to find a male and female born here and have 'emstuffed and mounted under glass in a fire-proof museum, which would be afar more exciting spectacle than any flea on earth, however scarce andarctic. He said he'd asked at least forty men that day where they wasborn—waiters, taxi-drivers, hotel clerks, bartenders, and just anybodythat would stop and take one with him, and not a soul had been bornnearer to the old town than Scranton, Pennsylvania. "It'sheart-rending," he says, "to reflect that I'm alone here in this bigcity of outlanders. I haven't even had the nerve to go down to WestNinth Street for a look at the old home that shelters my boyhoodmemories. If I could find only one born New Yorker it would brace me upa whole lot."

It was one dull evening, under this cloud that enveloped Ben. We didn'teven go to a show, but turned in early. Lon Price sent a picture card ofthe Flatiron Building to Henrietta telling her he was having a drearytime and he was now glad he'd been disappointed about her not coming, solove and kisses from her lonesome boy. It was what he would of sent heranyway, but it happened to be the truth so far.

Well, I got the long night's rest that was coming to me and started outearly in the A.M. to pit my cunning against the wiles of the New Yorkdepartment stores, having had my evil desires inflamed the day before byan afternoon gown in chiffon velvet and Georgette crepe with silverembroidery and fur trimming that I'd seen in a window marked down to$198.98. I fell for that all right, and for an all-silk jersey sportsuit at $29.98 and a demi-tailored walking suit for a mere bagatelle,and a white corduroy sport blouse and a couple of imported eveninggowns they robbed me on—but I didn't mind. You expect to be robbed foranything really good in New York, only the imitation stuff that's wornby the idle poor being cheaper than elsewhere. And I was so busy in thiswhirl of extortion that I forgot all about the boys and their troublestill I got back to the hotel at five o'clock.

I find 'em in the palm grill, or whatever it's called, drinkingstingers. But now they was not only more cheerful than they had been thenight before but they was getting a little bit contemptuous and Westernabout the great city. Lon had met a brother real estate shark from SaltLake and Jeff had fell in with a sheep man from Laramie—and treated himlike an equal because of meeting him so far from home in a strange townwhere no one would find it out on him—and Ben Sutton had met up withhis old friend Jake Berger, also from Nome. That's one nice thing aboutNew York; you keep meeting people from out your way that are lonesome,too. Lon's friend and Jeff's sheep man had had to leave, beingencumbered by watchful-waiting wives that were having 'em paged everythree minutes and wouldn't believe the boy when he said they was out.But Ben's friend, Jake Berger, was still at the table. Jake is a goodsoul, kind of a short, round, silent man, never opening his head for anylength of time. He seems to bring the silence of the frozen North downwith him except for brief words to the waiter ever and anon.

As I say, the boys was all more cheerful and contemptuous about NewYork by this time. Ben had spent another day asking casual parties ifthey was born in New York and having no more luck than a rabbit, but itseemed like he'd got hardened to these disappointments. He said he mightleave his own self to a museum in due time, so future generations wouldknow at least what the male New Yorker looked like. As for the female,he said any of these blondes along Broadway could be made to look nearenough like his mate by a skilled taxidermist. Jeff Tuttle here saysthat they wasn't all blondes because he'd seen a certain brunette thatafternoon right in this palm grill that was certainly worth preservingfor all eternity in the grandest museum on earth—which showed that Jeffhad chirked up a lot since landing in town. Ben said he had used theterm "blonde" merely to designate a species and they let it go at that.

Lon Price then said he'd been talking a little himself to people he metin different places and they might not be born New Yorkers but theycertainly didn't know anything beyond the city limits. At this he looksaround at the crowded tables in this palm grill and says very bitterlythat he'll give any of us fifty to one they ain't a person in the placethat ever so much as even heard of Price's Addition to Red Gap. And sothe talk went for a little, with Jake Berger ever and again crooning tothe waiter for another round of stingers. I'd had two, so I stayed outon the last round. I told Jake I enjoyed his hospitality but two wouldbe all I could think under till they learned to leave the dash ofchloroform out of mine. Jake just looked kindly at me. He's as chatty asMount McKinley.

But I was glad to see the boys more cheerful, so I said I'd get mylumpiest jewels out of the safe and put a maid and hairdresser to workon me so I'd be a credit to 'em at dinner and then we'd spend a jollyevening at some show. Jeff said he'd also doll up in his dress suit andget shaved and manicured and everything, so he'd look like one in my ownwalk of life. Ben was already dressed for evening. He had on a totallynew suit of large black and white checks looking like a hotel floor froma little distance, bound with braid of a quiet brown, and with a vest ofwide stripes in green and mustard colour. It was a suit that theautomobile law in some states would have compelled him to put dimmerson; it made him look egregious, if that's the word; but I knew it was nogood appealing to his better nature. He said he'd have dinner orderedfor us in another palm grill that had more palms in it.

Jake Berger spoke up for the first time to any one but a waiter. Heasked why a palm room necessarily? He said the tropic influence of thesepalms must affect the waiters that had to stand under 'em all day,because they wouldn't take his orders fast enough. He said thelanguorous Southern atmosphere give 'em pellagra or something. JeffTuttle says Jake must be mistaken because the pellagra is a kind of aSpanish dance, he believes. Jake said maybe so; maybe it was tropicneurasthenia the waiters got. Ben said he'd sure look out for a freshwaiter that hadn't been infected yet. When I left 'em Jake was holding asplit-second watch on the waiter he'd just given an order to.

By seven P.M. I'd been made into a work of art by the hotel help andmight of been observed progressing through the palatial lobby with mypurple and gold opera cloak sort of falling away from the shoulders.Jeff Tuttle observed me for one. He was in his dress suit all right,standing over in a corner having a bell-hop tie his tie for him that henever can learn to do himself. That's the way with Jeff; he simplywasn't born for the higher hotel life. In his dress suit he looksexactly like this here society burglar you're always seeing a picture ofin the papers. However, I let him trail me along into this jewelled palmroom with tapestries and onyx pillars and prices for food like the townhad been three years beleagured by an invading army. Jake Berger isalone at our table sipping a stinger and looking embarrassed becausehe'll have to say something. He gets it over as soon as he can. He saysBen has ordered dinner and stepped out and that Lon has stepped out tolook for him but they'll both be back in a minute, so set down and orderone before this new waiter is overcome by the tropic miasma. We do thesame, and in comes Lon looking very excited in the dress suit he wasmarried in back about 1884.

"Ben's found one," he squeals excitedly—"a real genuine one that wasborn right here in New York and is still living in the same house he wasborn in. What do you know about that? Ben is frantic with delight and isgoing to bring him to dine with us as soon as he gets him brushed offdown in the wash room and maybe a drink or two thrown into him to revivehim from the shock of Ben running across him. Ain't it good, though!Poor old Ben, looking for a born one and thinking he'd never find himand now he has!"

We all said how glad we was for Ben's sake and Lon called over a titledaristocrat of foreign birth and ordered him to lay another place at thetable. Then he tells us how the encounter happened. Ben had stepped outon Broadway to buy an evening paper and coming back he was sneaking alook at his new suit in a plate-glass window, walking blindly ahead atthe same time. That's the difference between the sexes in front of aplate-glass window. A woman is entirely honest and shameless; she'llstop dead and look herself over and touch up anything that needs it ascool as if she was the last human on earth; while man, the coward, walksby slow and takes a long sly look at himself, turning his head more andmore till he gets swore at by some one he's tramped on. This is how Benhad run across the only genuine New Yorker that seemed to be left. He'drun across his left instep and then bore him to the ground like one ofthese juggernuts or whatever they are. Still, at that, it seemed kind ofa romantic meeting, like mebbe the hand of fate was in it. We chattedalong, waiting for the happy pair, and Jake ordered again to be on thesafe side because the waiter would be sure to contract hookworm orsleeping sickness in this tropic jungle before the evening was over.Jeff Tuttle said this was called the Louis Château room and he liked it.He also said, looking over the people that come in, that he bet everydress suit in town was hired to-night. Then in a minute or two more,after Jake Berger sent a bill over to the orchestra leader with a cardasking him to play all quick tunes so the waiters could fight betteragainst jungle fever, in comes Ben Sutton driving his captive New Yorkerbefore him and looking as flushed and proud as if he'd discovered astrange new vest pattern.

The captive wasn't so much to look at. He was kind of neat, dressed inone of the nobby suits that look like ninety dollars in the picture andcost eighteen; he had one of these smooth ironed faces that made himlook thirty or forty years old, like all New York men, and he had theconventional glue on his hair. He was limping noticeably where Ben hadrun across him, and I could see he was highly suspicious of the wholegang of us, including the man who had treated him like he was aco*ckroach. But Ben had been persuasive and imperious—took him off hisfeet, like you might say—so he shook hands all around and ventured toset down with us. He had the same cold, slippery cautious hand thatevery New York man gives you the first time so I says to myself he's areal one all right and we fell to the new round of stingers Jake hadmotioned for, and to the nouveaux art-work food that now came along.

Naturally Ben and the New Yorker done most of the talking at first;about how the good old town had changed; how they was just putting upthe Cable Building at Houston Street when Ben left in '92, and wasn'tthe old Everett House a good place for lunch, and did the other oneremember Barnum's Museum at Broadway and Ann, and Niblo's Garden wasstill there when Ben was, and a lot of fascinating memories like that.The New Yorker didn't relax much at first and got distinctly nervouswhen he saw the costly food and heard Ben order vintage champagne whichhe always picks out by the price on the wine list. I could see him plainas day wondering just what kind of crooks we could be, what our game wasand how soon we'd spring it on him—or would we mebbe stick him for thedinner check? He didn't have a bit good time at first, so us four otherskind of left Ben to fawn upon him and enjoyed ourselves in our own way.

It was all quite elevating or vicious, what with the orchestra and thesingers and the dancing and the waiters with vitality still unimpaired.And New York has improved a lot, I'll say that. The time I was therebefore they wouldn't let a lady smoke except in the very lowest tabled'hotes of the underworld at sixty cents with wine. And now the only onein the whole room that didn't light a cigarette from time to time was anervous dame in a high-necked black silk and a hat that was never madefarther east than Altoona, that looked like she might be taking notesfor a club paper on the attractions or iniquities of a great metropolis.Jeff Tuttle was fascinated by the dancing; he called it the "tangle" andsome of it did look like that. And he claimed to be shocked by theflagrant way women opened up little silver boxes and applied the paints,oils, and putty in full view of the audience. He said he'd just as liefsee a woman take out a manicure set and do her nails in public, and Iassured him he probably would see it if he come down again next year,the way things was going—him talking that way that had had his whitetie done in the open lobby; but men are such. Jake Berger just lookedaround kindly and didn't open his head till near the end of the meal. Ithought he wasn't noticing anything at all till the orchestra put on ashadow number with dim purple lights.

"You'll notice they do that," says Jake, "whenever a lot of these peopleare ready to pay their checks. It saves fights, because no one can seeif they're added right or not." That was pretty gabby for Jake. Then Ilistened again to Ben and his little pet. They was talking their way upthe Bowery from Atlantic Garden and over to Harry Hill's Place which,it seemed the New Yorker didn't remember, and Ben then recalled an oldleper with gray whiskers and a skull cap that kept a drug store inBleecker Street when Ben was a kid and spent most of his time wateringdown the sidewalk in front of his place with a hose so that ladies goingby would have to raise their skirts out of the wet. His eyes was quitedim as he recalled these sacred boyhood memories.

The New Yorker had unbent a mite like he was going to see the madadventure through at all costs, though still plainly worried about thedinner check. Ben now said that they two ought to found a New York club.He said there was all other kinds of clubs here—Ohio clubs and Southernclubs and Nebraska societies and Michigan circles and so on, that givelarge dinners every year, so why shouldn't there be a New York club;maybe they could scare up three or four others that was born here ifthey advertised. It would of course be the smallest club in the city orin the whole world for that matter. The New Yorker was kind of coldtoward this. It must of sounded like the scheme to get money out of himthat he'd been expecting all along. Then the waiter brought the check,during another shadow number with red and purple lights, and this ladpulled out a change purse and said in a feeble voice that he supposed wewas all paying share and share alike and would the waiter kindly figureout what his share was. Ben didn't even hear him. He peeled a largebill off a roll that made his new suit a bad fit in one place and heleft a five on the plate when the change come. The watchful New Yorkernow made his first full-hearted speech of the evening. He said that Benwas foolish not to of added up the check to see if it was right, andthat half a dollar tip would of been ample for the waiter. Ben pretendednot to hear this either, and started again on the dear old times. I saysto myself I guess this one is a real New Yorker all right.

Lon Prince now says what's the matter with going to some corking goodshow because nothing good has come to Red Gap since the Parisian BlondWidows over a year ago and he's eager for entertainment. Ben says "Fine!And here's the wise boy that will steer us right. I bet he knows everyshow in town."

The New Yorker says he does and has just the play in mind for us, onethat he had meant to see himself this very night because it has beenendorsed by the drama league of which he is a regular member. Well, thatsounded important, so Ben says "What did I tell you? Ain't we lucky tohave a good old New Yorker to put us right on shows our first night out.We might have wasted our evening on a dead one."

So we're all delighted and go out and get in a couple of taxicabs, Benand this city man going in the first one. When ours gets to the theatreBen is paying the driver while the New Yorker feebly protests that heought to pay his half of the bill, but Ben don't hear him and don't hearhim again when he wants to pay for his own seat in the theatre. I gotmy first suspicion of this guy right there; for a genuine New Yorker hewas too darned conscientious about paying his mere share of everything.You can say lots of things about New Yorkers, but all that I've ever methave been keenly and instantly sensitive to the presence of a determinedbuyer. Still I didn't think so much about it at that moment. This onelooked the part all right, with his slim clothes and his natty cloth hatand the thin gold cigarette case held gracefully open. Then we get intothe theatre. Of course Ben had bought a box, that being the only place,he says, that a gentleman can set, owing to the skimpy notions oftheatre-seat builders. And we was all prepared for a merry evening atthis entertainment which the wise New Yorker would be sure to know was agood one.

But that curtain hadn't been up three minutes before I get my next shockof disbelief about this well-known club man. You know what a good playmeans in New York: a rattling musical comedy with lively songs, a tenornaval lieutenant in a white uniform, some real funny comedians, and alot of girls without their stockings on, and so forth. Any one thatthinks of a play in New York thinks of that, don't he? And what do weget here and now? Why, we get a gruesome thing about a ruined home withthe owner going bankrupt over the telephone that's connected with WallStreet, and a fluffy wife that has a magnetic gentleman friend in asport suit, and a lady crook that has had husband in her toils, only hesees it all now, and tears and strangulations and divorce, and afaithful old butler that suffers keenly and would go on doing it withouta cent of wages if he could only bring every one together again, and ashot up in the bathroom or somewhere and gripping moments and soforth—I want to tell you we was all painfully shocked by this break ofthe knowing New Yorker. We could hardly believe it was true during thefirst act. Jeff Tuttle kept wanting to know when the girls was comingon, and didn't they have a muscle dancer in the piece. Ben himself washighly embarrassed and even suspicious for a minute. He looks at the NewYorker sharply and says ain't that a crocheted necktie he's wearing, andthe New Yorker says it is and was made for him by his aunt. But Benain't got the heart to question him any further. He puts away his basesuspicions and tries to get the New Yorker to tell us all about what agood play this is so we'll feel more entertained. So the lad tells usthe leading woman is a sterling actress of legitimate methods—all toohard to find in this day of sensationalism, and the play is a triumph ofadvanced realism written by a serious student of the drama that istrying to save our stage from commercial degradation. He explained a lotabout the lesson of the play. Near as I could make out the lesson wasthat divorce, nowadays, is darned near as uncertain as marriage itself.

"The husband," explains the lad kindly, "is suspected by his wife tohave been leading a double life, though of course he was never guilty ofmore than an indiscretion—"

Jake Berger here exploded rudely into speech again. "Thai wife isleading a double chin," says Jake.

"Say, people," says Lon Price, "mebbe it ain't too late to go to a showthis evening."

But the curtain went up for the second act and nobody had the nerve toescape. There continued to be low murmurs of rebellion, just the same,and we all lost track of this here infamy that was occurring on thestage.

"I'm sure going to beat it in one minute," says Jeff Tuttle, "if one of'em don't exclaim: 'Oh, girls, here comes the little dancer!'"

"I know a black-face turn that could put this show on its feet," saysLon Price, "and that Waldo in the sport suit ain't any real reason whywives leave home—you can't tell me!"

"I dare say this leading woman needs a better vehicle," says the NewYorker in a hoarse whisper.

"I dare say it, too," says Jeff Tuttle in a still hoarser whisper. "Abetter vehicle! She needs a motor truck, and I'd order one quick if Ithought she'd take it."

Of course this was not refined of Jeff. The New Yorker winced and loyalBen glares at all of us that has been muttering, so we had to set theretill the curtain went down on the ruined home where all was lost savehonour—and looking like that would have to go, too, in the next act.But Ben saw it wasn't safe to push us any further so he now said thispowerful play was too powerful for a bunch of low-brows like us and weall rushed out into the open air. Everybody cheered up a lot when we gotthere—seeing the nice orderly street traffic without a gripping momentin it. Lon Price said it was too late to go to a theatre, so what couldwe do to pass the time till morning? Ben says he has a grand idea and wecan carry it out fine with this New York man to guide us. His grand ideais that we all go down on the Bowery and visit tough dives where thefoul creatures of the underworld consort and crime happens every minuteor two. We was still mad enough about that play to like the idea. A goodlegitimate murder would of done wonders for our drooping spirits. So Benputs it up to the New Yorker and he says yes, he knows a vicious resorton the Bowery, but we'd ought to have a detective from central officealong to protect us from assault. Ben says not at all—nodetective—unless the joints has toughened up a lot since he used toinfest 'em, and we all said we'd take a chance, so again we was intaxicabs. Us four in the second cab was now highly cynical about Ben'sNew Yorker. The general feeling was that sooner or later he would sinkthe ship.

Then we reach the dive he has picked out; a very dismal dive with a roomback of the bar that had a few tables and a piano in it and asweet-singing waiter. He was singing a song about home and mother, thatin mem-o-ree he seemed to see, when we got to our table. A very gloomyand respectable haunt of vice it was, indeed. There was about a dozenmale and female creatures of the underworld present sadly enjoying thishere ballad and scowling at us for talking when we come in.

Jake Berger ordered, though finding you couldn't get stingers here andhaving to take two miner's inches of red whiskey, and the New Yorkerbegun to warn us in low tones that we was surrounded by danger on everyhand—that we'd better pour our drink on the floor because it would bedrugged, after which we would be robbed if not murdered and thrown outinto the alley where we would then be arrested by grafting policemen.Even Ben was shocked by this warning. He asks the New Yorker again if heis sure he was born in the old town, and the lad says honest he was andhas been living right here all these years in the same house he was bornin. Ben is persuaded by these words and gives the singing waiter a fiveand tells him to try and lighten the gloom with a few crimes of violenceor something. The New Yorker continued to set stiff in his chair, onehand on his watch and one on the pocket where his change purse was thathe'd tried to pay his share of the taxicabs out of.

The gloom-stricken piano player now rattled off some ragtime and thedepraved denizens about us got sadly up and danced to it. Say, it wasthe most formal and sedate dancing you ever see, with these gun menholding their guilty partners off at arm's length and their faces alldrawn down in lines of misery. They looked like they might be a bunch ofstrict Presbyterians that had resolved to throw all moral teaching tothe winds for one purple moment let come what might. I want to tell youthese depraved creatures of the underworld was darned near as depressingas that play had been. Even the second round of drinks didn't liven usup none because the waiter threw down his cigarette and sung anothertearful song. This one was about a travelling man going into a gildedcabaret and ordering a port wine and a fair young girl come out to singin short skirts that he recognized to be his boyhood's sweetheart Nell;so he sent a waiter to ask her if she had forgot the song she once didsing at her dear old mother's knee, or knees, and she hadn't forgot itand proved she hadn't, because the chorus was "Nearer My God to Thee"sung to ragtime; then the travelling man said she must be good and pure,so come on let's leave this place and they'd be wed.

Yes, sir; that's what Ben had got for his five, so this time he give thewaiter a twenty not to sing any more at all. The New Yorker washorrified at the sight of a man giving away money, but it was well spentand we begun to cheer up a little. Ben told the New Yorker about thetime his dog team won the All Alaska Sweepstake Race, two hundred andsix miles from Nome to Candle and back, the time being 76 hours, 16minutes, and 28 seconds, and showed him the picture of his lead dogpasted in the back of his watch. And Jake Berger got real gabby at lastand told the story about the old musher going up the White Horse Trailin a blizzard and meeting the Bishop, only he didn't know it was theBishop. And the Bishop says, "How's the trail back of you, my friend?"and the old musher just swore with the utmost profanity for threestraight minutes. Then he says to the Bishop, "And what's it like backof you?" and the Bishop says, "Just like that!" Jake here gotembarrassed from talking so much and ordered another round of thissquirrel poison we was getting, and Jeff Tuttle begun his imitation ofthe Sioux squaw with a hare lip reciting "Curfew Shall Not RingTo-night." It was a pretty severe ordeal for the rest of us, but we wasready to endure much if it would make this low den seem more homelike.Only when Jeff got about halfway through the singing waiter comes up,greatly shocked, and says none of that in here because they run anorderly place, and we been talking too loud anyway. This waiter had askull exactly like a picture of one in a book I got that was dug upafter three hundred thousand years and the scientific world couldn'tever agree whether it was an early man or a late ape. I decided I didn'tcare to linger in a place where a being with a head like this could passon my diversions and offenses so I made a move to go. Jeff Tuttle saysto this waiter, "Fie, fie upon you, Roscoe! We shall go to somerespectable place where we can loosen up without being called for it."The waiter said he was sorry, but the Bowery wasn't Broadway. And theNew Yorker whispered that it was just as well because we was lucky toget out of this dive with our lives and property—and even after thatthis anthropoid waiter come hurrying out to the taxis after us with myfur piece and my solid gold vanity-box that I'd left behind on a chair.This was a bitter blow to all of us after we'd been led to hope foroutrages of an illegal character. The New Yorker was certainly making amisdeal every time he got the cards. None of us trusted him any more,though Ben was still loyal and sensitive about him, like he was an onlychild and from birth had not been like other children.

The lad now wanted to steer us into an Allied Bazaar that would still beopen, because he'd promised to sell twenty tickets to it and had 'em onhim untouched. But we shut down firmly on this. Even Ben was firm. Hesaid the last bazaar he'd survived was their big church fair in Nomethat lasted two nights and one day and the champagne booth alone took insix thousand dollars, and even the beer booth took in something liketwelve hundred, and he didn't feel equal to another affair like thatjust yet.

So we landed uptown at a very swell joint full of tables and orchestrasaround a dancing floor and more palms—which is the national flower ofNew York—and about eighty or a hundred slightly inebriated débutantesand well-known Broadway social favourites and their gentlemen friends.And here everything seemed satisfactory at last, except to the NewYorker who said that the prices would be something shameful. However, noone was paying any attention to him by now. None of us but Ben cared ahoot where he had been born and most of us was sorry he had been at all.

Jake Berger bought a table for ten dollars, which was seven more than ithad ever cost the owner, and Ben ordered stuff for us, including avintage champagne that the price of stuck out far enough beyond otherprices on the wine list, and a porterhouse steak, family style, forhimself, and everything seemed on a sane and rational basis again. Itlooked as if we might have a little enjoyment during the evening afterall. It was a good lively place, with all these brilliant society peoplemingling up in the dance in a way that would of got 'em thrown out ofthat gangsters' haunt on the Bowery. Lon Price said he'd never witnessedso many human shoulder blades in his whole history and Jeff Tuttle sentoff a lot of picture cards of this here ballroom or saloon that a waitergive him. The one he sent Egbert Floud showed the floor full ofbeautiful reckless women in the dance and prominent society matronsdrinking highballs, and Jeff wrote on it, "This is my room; wish you washere." Jeff was getting right into the spirit of this bohemian nightlife; you could tell that. Lon Price also. In ten minutes Lon had madethe acquaintance of a New York social leader at the next table and wasdancing with her in an ardent or ribald manner before Ben had finishedhis steak.

I now noticed that the New Yorker was looking at his gun-metal watchabout every two minutes with an expression of alarm. Jake Berger noticedit, too, and again leaned heavily on the conversation. "Not keeping youup, are we?" says Jake. And this continual watch business must of beengetting on Ben's nerves, too, for now, having fought his steak to afinish, he says to his little guest that they two should put up theirwatches and match coins for 'em. The New Yorker was suspicious right offand looked Ben's watch over very carefully when Ben handed it to him. Itwas one of these thin gold ones that can be had any place for a hundreddollars and up. You could just see that New Yorker saying to himself,"So this is their game, is it?" But he works his nerve up to take achance and gets a two-bit piece out of his change purse and they match.Ben wins the first time, which was to of settled it, but Ben says rightquick that of course he had meant the best two out of three, which theNew Yorker doesn't dispute for a minute, and they match again and Benwins that, too, so there's nothing to do but take the New Yorker's watchaway from him. He removes it carefully off a leather fob with a giltacorn on it and hands it slowly to Ben. It was one of these extrasuperior dollar watches that cost three dollars. The New Yorker lookedvery stung, indeed. You could hear him saying to himself, "Serves meright for gambling with a stranger!" Ben feels these suspicions and ishurt by 'em so he says to Jeff, just to show the New Yorker he's anhonest sport, that he'll stake his two watches against Jeff's solidsilver watch that he won in a bucking contest in 1890. Jeff says he'son; so they match and Ben wins again, now having three watches. Then LonPrice comes back from cavorting with this amiable jade of the youngerdancing set at the next table and Ben makes him put up his goldseven-jewelled hunting-case watch against the three and Ben wins again,now having four watches.

Lon says "Easy come, easy go!" and moves over to the next table again tohelp out with the silver bucket of champagne he's ordered, taking JeffTuttle with him to present to his old friends that he's known for all oftwenty minutes. The New Yorker is now more suspicious then ever of Ben;his wan beauty is marred by a cynical smile and his hair has comeunglued in a couple of places. Ben is more sensitive than ever to thesesuspicions of his new pal so he calls on Jake Berger to match his watchagainst the four. Jake takes out his split-second repeater and him andBen match coins and this time Ben is lucky enough to lose, therebyshowing his dear old New Yorker that he ain't a crook after all. But theNew Yorker still looks very shrewd and robbed and begins to gulp thechampagne in a greedy manner. You can hear him calling Jake aconfederate. Jake sees it plain enough, that the lad thinks he's beenhigh-graded, so he calls over our waiter and crowds all five watchesonto him. "Take these home to the little ones," says Jake, and dismissesthe matter from his mind by putting a wine glass up to his ear andlistening into it with a rapt expression that shows he's hearing theroar of the ocean up on Alaska's rockbound coast.

The New Yorker is a mite puzzled by this, but I can see it don't takehim long to figure out that the waiter is also a confederate. Anyway,he's been robbed of his watch forever and falls to the champagne againvery eager and moody. It was plain he didn't know what a high-powereddrink he was trifling with. And Ben was moody, too, by now. He quitrecalling old times and sacred memories to the New Yorker. If the latterhad tried to break up the party by leaving at this point I guess Benwould of let him go. But he didn't try; he just set there soggilydrinking champagne to drown the memory of his lost watch. And prettysoon Ben has to order another quart of this twelve-dollar beverage. TheNew Yorker keeps right on with the new bottle, daring it to do its worstand it does; he was soon speaking out of a dense fog when he spoke atall.

With his old pal falling into this absent mood Ben throws off his owndepression and mingles a bit with the table of old New York familieswhere Lon Price is now paying the checks. They was the real New Yorkers;they'd never had a moment's distrust of Lon after he ordered the firsttime and told the waiter to keep the glasses brimming. Jeff Tuttle wasnow dancing in an extreme manner with a haggard society bud agedthirty-five, and only Jake and me was left at our table. We didn't countthe New Yorker any longer; he was merely raising his glass to his lipsat regular intervals. He moved something like an automatic chess playerI once saw. The time passed rapidly for a couple hours more, with JakeBerger keeping up his ceaseless chatter as usual. He did speak once,though, after an hour's silence. He said in an audible tone that the NewYorker was a human hangnail, no matter where he was born.

And so the golden moments flitted by, with me watching the crazy crowd,until they began to fall away and the waiters was piling chairs on thenaked tables at the back of the room. Then with some difficulty wewrenched Ben and Lon and Jeff from the next table and got out into thecrisp air of dawn. The New Yorker was now sunk deep in a trance and juststood where he was put, with his hat on the wrong way. The other boyshad cheered up a lot owing to their late social career. Jeff Tuttle saidit was all nonsense about its being hard to break into New York society,because look what he'd done in one brief evening without trying—and heflashed three cards on which telephone numbers is written in daintyfeminine hands. He said if a modest and retiring stranger like himselfcould do that much, just think what an out-and-out social climber mightachieve!

Right then I was ready to call it an absorbing and instructive eveningand get to bed. But no! Ben Sutton at sight of his now dazed New Yorkerhas resumed his brooding and suddenly announces that we must all make apilgrimage to West Ninth Street and romantically view his old home whichhis father told him to get out of twenty-five years ago, and which wecan observe by the first tender rays of dawn. He says he has been havingprecious illusions shattered all evening, but this will be a holy momentthat nothing can queer—not even a born New Yorker that hasn't made thegrade and is at this moment so vitrified that he'd be a mere glass crashif some one pushed him over.

I didn't want to go a bit. I could see that Jeff Tuttle would soon begindragging a hip, and the streets at that hour was no place for Lon Price,with his naturally daring nature emphasized, as it were, from drinkingthis here imprisoned laughter of the man that owned the joint we hadjust left. But Ben was pleading in a broken voice for one sight of theold home with its boyhood memories clustering about its modest front andI was afraid he'd get to crying, so I give in wearily and we was oncemore encased in taxicabs and on our way to the sacred scene. Ben hadquite an argument with the drivers when he give 'em the address. Theykept telling him there wasn't a thing open down there, but he finallygot his aim understood. The New Yorker's petrified remains was carefullytucked into the cab with Ben.

And Ben suffered another cruel blow at the end of the ride. He climbedout of the cab in a reverent manner, hoping to be overcome by the sightof the cherished old home, and what did he find? He just couldn'tbelieve it at first. The dear old house had completely disappeared andin its place was a granite office building eighteen stories high. Benjust stood off and looked up at it, too overcome for words. Up near thetop a monster brass sign in writing caught the silver light of dawn. Thesign sprawled clear across the building and said PANTS EXCLUSIVELY.Still above this was the firm's name in the same medium—looking like acouple of them hard-lettered towns that get evacuated up in Poland.

Poor stricken Ben looked in silence a long time. We all felt hissuffering and kept silent, too. Even Jeff Tuttle kept still—who all theway down had been singing about old Bill Bailey who played the Ukelelein Honolulu Town. It was a solemn moment. After a few more minutes ofsilent grief Ben drew himself together and walked off without saying aword. I thought walking would be a good idea for all of us, especiallyLon and Jeff, so Jake paid the taxi drivers and we followed on footafter the chief mourner. The fragile New Yorker had been exhumed andplaced in an upright position and he walked, too, when he understoodwhat was wanted of him; he didn't say a word, just did what was told himlike one of these boys that the professor hypnotizes on the stage. Iherded the bunch along about half a block back of Ben, feeling it wasdelicate to let him wallow alone in his emotions.

We got over to Broadway, turned up that, and worked on through thatdinky little grass plot they call a square, kind of aimless like andwondering where Ben in his grief would lead us. The day was well begunby this time and the passing cars was full of very quiet people on theirway to early work. Jake Berger said these New Yorkers would pay for itsooner or later, burning the candle at both ends this way—dancing allnight and then starting off to work.

Then up a little way we catch sight of a regular old-fashioned horse-cargoing crosstown. Ben has stopped this and is talking excitedly to thedriver so we hurry up and find he's trying to buy the car from thedriver. Yes, sir; he says its the last remnant of New York when it waslittle and old and he wants to take it back to Nome as a souvenir.Anybody might of thought he'd been drinking. He's got his roll out andwants to pay for the car right there. The driver is a cold-looking oldboy with gray chin whiskers showing between his cap and his comforterand he's indignantly telling Ben it can't be done. By the time we getthere the conductor has come around and wants to know what they'relosing all this time for. He also says they can't sell Ben the car andsays further that we'd all better go home and sleep it off, so Ben hands'em each a ten spot, the driver lets off his brake, and the old arkrattles on while Ben's eyes is suffused with a suspicious moisture, asthey say.

Ben now says we must stand right on this corner to watch these cars goby—about once every hour. We argued with him whilst we shivered in thebracing winelike air, but Ben was stubborn. We might of been there yetif something hadn't diverted him from this evil design. It was a stringof about fifty Italians that just then come out of a subway entrance.They very plainly belonged to the lower or labouring classes and Ijudged they was meant for work on the up-and-down street we stood on,that being already torn up recklessly till it looked like most otherstreets in the same town. They stood around talking in a delirious orItalian manner till their foreman unlocked a couple of big piano boxes.Out of these they took crowbars, axes, shovels, and other instruments oftheir calling. Ben Sutton has been standing there soddenly waiting foranother dear old horse-car to come by, but suddenly he takes notice ofthese bandits with the tools and I see an evil gleam come into his tiredeyes. He assumes a businesslike air, struts over to the foreman of thebunch, and has some quick words with him, making sweeping motions of thearm up and down the cross street where the horse-cars run. After aminute of this I'm darned if the whole bunch didn't scatter out andbegin to tear up the pavement along the car-track on this cross street.Ben tripped back to us looking cheerful once more.

"They wouldn't sell me the car," he says, "so I'm going to take back abunch of the dear old rails. They'll be something to remind me of thedead past. Just think! I rode over those very rails when I was a tot."

We was all kind of took back at this, and I promptly warned Ben thatwe'd better beat it before we got pinched. But Ben is confident. He saysno crime could be safer in New York than setting a bunch of Italians totearing up a street-car track; that no one could ever possibly suspectit wasn't all right, though he might have to be underhanded to someextent in getting his souvenir rails hauled off. He said he had told theforeman that he was the contractor's brother and had been sent with thisnew order and the foreman had naturally believed it, Ben looking like arich contractor himself.

And there they was at work, busy as beavers, gouging up the very lastremnant of little old New York when it was that. Ben rubbed his hands inecstasy and pranced up and down watching 'em for awhile. Then he wentover and told the foreman there'd be extra pay for all hands if they gota whole block tore up by noon, because this was a rush job. Hundreds ofpeople was passing, mind you, including a policeman now and then, but noone took any notice of a sight so usual. All the same the rest of usedged north about half a block, ready to make a quick getaway. Ben kepttelling us we was foolishly scared. He offered to bet any one in theparty ten to one in thousands that he could switch his gang over toBroadway and have a block of that track up before any one got wise.There was no takers.

Ben was now so pleased with himself and his little band of faithfulworkers that he even begun to feel kindly again toward his New Yorkerwho was still standing in one spot with glazed eyes. He goes up andtries to engage him in conversation, but the lad can't hear any morethan he can see. Ben's efforts, however, finally start him to mutteringsomething. He says it over and over to himself and at last we make outwhat it is. He is saying: "I'd like to buy a little drink for the partym'self."

"The poor creature is delirious," says Jake Berger.

But Ben slaps him on the back and tells him he's a good sport and he'llgive him a couple of these rails to take to his old New York home; hesays they can be crossed over the mantel and will look very quaint. Thelad kind of shivered under Ben's hearty blow and seemed to struggle outof his trance for a minute. His eyes unglazed and he looks around andsays how did he get here and where is it? Ben tells him he's amongfriends and that they two are the only born New Yorkers left in theworld, and so on, when the lad reaches into the pocket of his nattytopcoat for a handkerchief and pulls out with it a string of funnylittle tickets—about two feet of 'em. Ben grabs these up with a strangelook in his eyes.

"Bridge tickets!" he yells. Then he grabs his born New Yorker by theshoulders and shakes him still further out of dreamland.

"What street in New York is your old home on?" he demands savagely. Thelad blinks his fishy eyes and fixes his hat on that Ben has shook loose.

"Cranberry Street," says he.

"Cranberry Street! Hell, that's Brooklyn, and you claimed New York,"says Ben, shaking the hat loose again.

"Greater New York," says the lad pathetically, and pulls his hat firmlydown over his ears.

Ben looked at the imposter with horror in his eyes. "Brooklyn!" hemuttered—"the city of the unburied dead! So that was the secret of yourstrange behaviour? And me warming you in my bosom, you viper!"

But the crook couldn't hear him again, haying lapsed into his trance andbecome entirely rigid and foolish. In the cold light of day his face nowlooked like a plaster cast of itself. Ben turned to us with a huntedlook. "Blow after blow has fallen upon me to-night," he says tearfully,"but this is the most cruel of all. I can't believe in anything afterthis. I can't even believe them street-car rails are the originals.Probably they were put down last week."

"Then let's get out of this quick," I says to him. "We been exposingourselves to arrest here long enough for a bit of false sentiment onyour part."

"I gladly go," says Ben, "but wait one second." He stealthily approachesthe Greater New Yorker and shivers him to wakefulness with anotherhearty wallop on the back. "Listen carefully," says Ben as the ladstruggles out of the dense fog. "Do you see those workmen tearing upthat car-track?"

"Yes, I see it," says the lad distinctly. "I've often seen it."

"Very well. Listen to me and remember your life may hang on it. You goover there and stand right by them till they get that track up and don'tyou let any one stop them. Do you hear? Stand right there and make themwork, and if a policeman or any one tries to make trouble you soak him.Remember! I'm leaving those men in your charge. I shall hold youpersonally responsible for them."

The lad doesn't say a word but begins to walk in a brittle manner towardthe labourers. We saw him stop and point a threatening finger at them,then instantly freeze once more. It was our last look at him. We goteverybody on a north-bound car with some trouble. Lon Price had gone tosleep standing up and Jeff Tuttle, who was now looking like the societyburglar after a tough night's work at his trade, was getting turbulentand thirsty. He didn't want to ride on a common street car. "I want atashicrab," he says, "and I want to go back to that Louis Château roomand dance the tangle." But we persuaded him and got safe up to arestaurant on Sixth Avenue where breakfast was had by all withoutfurther adventure. Jeff strongly objected to this restaurant at first,though, because he couldn't hear an orchestra in it. He said he couldn'teat his breakfast without an orchestra. He did, however, ordering applepie and ice cream and a gin fizz to come. Lon Price was soon sleepinglike a tired child over his ham and eggs, and Jeff went night-night,too, before his second gin fizz arrived.

Ben ordered a porterhouse steak, family style, consuming it in a moodyrage like a man that has been ground-sluiced at every turn. He said hefelt like ending it all and sometimes wished he'd been in the cab thatplunged into one of the forty-foot holes in Broadway a couple of nightsbefore. Jake Berger had ordered catfish and waffles, with a glass ofInvalid port. He burst into speech once more, too. He said the nights inNew York were too short to get much done. That if they only had nightsas long as Alaska the town might become famous. "As it is," he says, "Idon't mind flirting with this city now and then, but I wouldn't want tomarry it."

Well, that about finished the evening, with Lon and Jeff making the roomsound like a Pullman palace car at midnight. Oh, yes; there was onething more. On the day after the events recorded in the last chapter, asit says in novels, there was a piece in one of the live newspaperstelling that a well-dressed man of thirty-five, calling himself CliffordJ. Hotchkiss and giving a Brooklyn address, was picked up in a dazedcondition by patrolman Cohen who had found him attempting to direct theoperations of a gang of workmen engaged in repairing a crosstown-cartrack. He had been sent to the detention ward of Bellevue to awaitexamination as to his sanity, though insisting that he was the victimof a gang of footpads who had plied him with liquor and robbed him ofhis watch. I showed the piece to Ben Sutton and Ben sent him up a pillowof forget-me-nots with "Rest" spelled on it—without the sender's card.

No; not a word in it about the street-car track being wrongfully toreup. I guess it was like Ben said; no one ever would find out about thatin New York. My lands! here it is ten-thirty and I got to be on the jobwhen them hayers start to-morrow A.M. A body would think I hadn't a careon earth when I get started on anecdotes of my past.