The Son of his Father
by Ridgwell Cullum · English · Gutenberg #36170 · 584,519 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: The Son of his Father
Author: Ridgwell Cullum
Illustrator: Douglas Duer
Release date: May 30, 2011 [eBook #36170]
Most recently updated: January 7, 2021
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/36170
Credits: Produced by Al Haines
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SON OF HIS FATHER ***
Produced by Al Haines
[Frontispiece: With Eyes Wide and Staring She Looked About Her]
THE SON OF HIS FATHER
BY
RIDGWELL CULLUM
AUTHOR OF
"THE MEN WHO WROUGHT," "THE WAY OF THE STRONG," "THE NIGHT-RIDERS,"
"THE WATCHERS OF THE PLAINS," ETC.
Illustrations by
DOUGLAS DUER
PHILADELPHIA
GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1915, by
George W. Jacobs & Company
_Published March, 1917_
All rights reserved
_Printed in U. S. A._
TO
G. RALPH HALL-CAINE
WHOSE SYMPATHY WITH MY WORK HAS NEVER
FAILED TO CHEER ME THROUGHOUT
OUR LONG AND VALUED
FRIENDSHIP
CONTENTS
CHAP.
I Unrepentant
II In Chastened Mood
III Gordon Arrives
IV Gordon Lands at Snake's Fall
V A Letter Home
VI Gordon Prospects Snake's Fall
VII "Miss Hazel"
VIII At Buffalo Point
IX The First Check
X Gordon Makes His Bid for Fortune
XI Hazel Mallinsbee's Campaign
XII Thinking Hard
XIII Slosson Snatches at Opportunity
XIV The Reward of Victory
XV In Council
XVI Something Doing
XVII The Code Book
XVIII Ways that are Dark
XIX James Carbhoy Arrives
XX The Boom in Earnest
XXI A Trifle
XXII On the Trail
XXIII In New York
XXIV Preparing for the Finale
XXV The Rescue
XXVI Cashing In
ILLUSTRATIONS
With eyes wide and staring she looked about her . . . _Frontispiece_
Hazel was waiting for that sign
He drew her gently towards his father
CHAPTER I
UNREPENTANT
"To wine, women and gambling, at the age of twenty-four--one hundred
thousand dollars. That's your bill, my boy, and--I've got to pay it."
James Carbhoy leaned back smiling, his half-humorous eyes squarely
challenging his son, who was lounging in a luxurious morocco chair at
the other side of the desk.
As the moments passed without producing any reply, he reached towards
the cabinet at his elbow and helped himself to a large cigar. Without
any scruple he tore the end off it with his strong teeth and struck a
match.
"Well?"
Gordon Carbhoy cleared his throat and looked serious. In spite of his
father's easy, smiling manner he knew that a crisis in his affairs had
been reached. He understood the iron will lying behind the pleasant
steel-gray eyes of his parent. It was a will that flinched at nothing,
a will that had carved for its owner a great fortune in America's most
strenuous financial arena, the railroad world. He also knew the only
way in which to meet his father's challenge with any hope of success.
Above everything else the millionaire demanded courage and
manhood--manhood as he understood it--from those whom he regarded well.
"I'm waiting."
Gordon stirred. The millionaire carefully lit his cigar.
"Put that way it--sounds rotten, Dad, doesn't it?" Gordon's mobile
lips twisted humorously, and he also reached towards the cigar cabinet.
But the older man intercepted him. He held out a box of lesser cigars.
"Try one of these, Gordon. One of the others would add two dollars to
your bill. These are half the price."
The two men smiled into each other's eyes. A great devotion lay
between them. But their regard was not likely to interfere with the
business in hand.
Gordon helped himself. Then he rose from his chair. He moved across
the handsome room, towering enormously. His six feet three inches were
well matched by a great pair of athletic shoulders. His handsome face
bore no traces of the fast living implied by the enormous total of his
debts. The wholesome tan of outdoor sports left him a fine specimen of
the more brilliant youth of America. Then, too, in his humorous blue
eyes lay an extra dash of recklessness, which was probably due to his
superlative physical advantages. He came back to his chair and propped
his vast body on the back of it. His father was watching him
affectionately.
"Dad," he exclaimed, "I'm--sorry."
The other shook his head.
"Don't say that. It's not true. I'd hate it to be true--anyway."
Gordon's face lit.
"You're--going to pay it?"
"Sure. I'm not going to have our name stink in our home city. Sure
I'm going to pay it. But----"
"But--what?"
"So are you."
The faint ticking of the bracket clock on the wall suddenly became like
the blows of a hammer.
"I--I don't think I----"
Young Gordon broke off. His merry eyes had suddenly become troubled.
The crisis was becoming acute.
For some moments the millionaire smoked on luxuriously. Then he
removed his cigar and cleared his throat.
"I'm not going to shout. That's not my way," he said in his easy,
deliberate fashion. "Guess folks have got to be young, and the younger
they're young--why, the better. I was young, and--got over it. You're
going to get over it. I figure to help you that way. This is not the
first bill you've handed me, but--but it's going to be the last. Guess
your baby clothes can be packed right up. Maybe they'll be all the
better for it when you hand 'em on to--your kiddie."
The trouble had passed out of the younger man's eyes. They were filled
with the humor inspired by his father's manner of dealing with the
affair in hand.
"That's all right," he said. "I seem to get that clear enough."
"I'm glad." The millionaire twisted the cigar into the corner of his
mouth. "We can pass right on to--other things. You've been one of my
secretaries for three years, and it don't seem to me the work's worried
you a lot. Still, I put you in early thinking you'd get interested in
the source of the dollars you were handing out in bunches. Maybe it
wasn't the best way of doing it. Still, I had to try it. You see,
it's a great organization I control--though you may not know it. I
control more millions than you could count on your fingers and toes,
and they've cost me some mental sweat gathering 'em together. Some day
you've got to sit in this chair and talk over this 'phone, and when you
do you'll be--a man. You see, I don't fancy my pile being invested in
cut flowers and automobiles for lady friends. I don't seem to have
heard that thousand-dollar parties to boys who can't smoke a five-cent
cigar right, and girls who're just out for a good time anyway, are
liable to bring you interest on the capital invested, except in the way
of contempt. And five-thousand dollar apartments are calculated to
rival the luxury of Rome before its fall. Big play at 'draw' and
'auction' are two diseases not provided for amongst the cures in patent
med'cine advertisements, and as for the older vintages in wines,
they're only permissible in folks who've quit worrying to scratch
dollars together. None of these things seem to me good business, and
in a man at the outset of his career some of 'em are--immoral. You've
had your preliminary run, and I'll admit you've shown a fine turn of
speed. But it smacks too much of the race-track, and seems to me quite
unsuited to the hard highroad of big finance you're destined to travel.
"Just one moment," he went on, as, with flushing cheeks and half-angry
eyes, his son was about to break in. "You haven't got the point of
this talk yet. This bill you've handed me don't figure as largely in
it as you might guess. I've thought about things these months. I
don't blame you a thing. I'm not kicking. The fact you've got to grab
and get your hind teeth into is that there comes a time when two can't
spend one fortune with any degree of amicability. It's a sort of
proposition like two dogs and a bone. Now from a canine point of view
that bone certainly belongs to one of those dogs. No two dogs ever
stole a bone together. Consequently, the situation ends in a scrap,
and it isn't always a cert. that the right thief gets the bone. How it
would work out between us I'm not prepared to guess, but, as 'scrap'
don't belong to the vocabulary between us, we'll handle the matter in
another way. Seeing the fortune--at present--belongs to me, I'll do
the spending in--my own way. My way is mighty simple, too, as far as
you're concerned. I'm going to stake you all you need, so you can get
out and find a bone you can worry on _your own_. That's how you're
going to pay this bill. You're going to get busy quitting play. We
are, and always have been, and always will be, just two great big
friends, and I'd like you to remember that when I say that the life
you're living is all right for a boy, but in a man it leads to dirty
ditches that aren't easy climbing out of, and--you can't do clean work
with dirty hands. When you've shown me you're capable of collecting a
bone for your own worrying--why, you can come right back here, and I'll
be pleased and proud to hand over the reins of this organization, and
I'll be mighty content to sit around in one of the back seats and get
busy with the applause. Now you talk."
Gordon began without a moment's hesitation. Something of his heat had
passed, but it still remained near the surface.
"Quite time I did," he cried almost sharply. "Look here, father, I
don't think you meant all you said the way your talk conveyed it. To
me the most important of your talk is the implied immorality of my mode
of life. Then the inconsistent fashion in which you point my way
towards--big finance."
His eyes lit again. They had suddenly become dangerously bright.
"Here, we're not going to quarrel, nor get angry," he went on,
gathering heat of manner even in his denial. "We're too great friends
for that, and you've always been too good a sportsman to me, but--but
I'm not going to sit and listen to you or anybody else accusing me of
immorality without kicking with all my strength!"
He brought one great fist down on the desk with a bang that set the
ink-wells and other objects dancing perilously.
"I'm not angry with you. I couldn't get angry with you," he proceeded,
with a suppressed excitement that added to his father's smile; "but I
tell you right here I'll not stand for it from you or anybody. My only
crime is spending your money, which you have always encouraged me to
do. From my university days to now my whole leisure has been given up
to athletics. A man can't live immorally and win the contests I have
won. I don't need to name them. Boxing, sculling, running, baseball,
swimming. You know that. Any sane man knows that. The money I've
spent has been spent in the ordinary course of the life to which you
have brought me up. You have always impressed on me the great position
you occupy and the necessity for keeping my end up. That's all I have
to say about my debts, but I have something to say on the subject of
the inconsistency with which you censure immorality in the same breath
as you demand my immediate plunge into the mire of big finance."
He paused for a moment. Then, as abruptly as it had arisen, his heat
died down, and gave place to the ready humor of his real nature.
"Gee, I want to laugh!" He sprang from his seat and began to pace the
floor, talking as he moved. His father watched him with twinkling,
affectionate eyes. "Immorality? Psha! Was there ever anything more
immoral than modern finance? You imply I have learned nothing of your
organization in the three years I've been one of your secretaries.
Dad," he warned, "I've learned enough to have a profound contempt for
the methods of big corporations in this country, or anywhere else.
It's all graft--graft of one sort or another. Do you need me to tell
_you_ of it? No, I don't think so. Twenty-five millions wouldn't
cover the fortune you've made. I know that well enough. How has it
been made? Here, I'll just give you one instance of the machinations
of a big corporation. How did you gain control of the Union Grayling
and Ukataw Railroad? Psha! What's the use? You know. You hammered
it, hammered it to nothing. You got your own people into it, and sat
back while they ran it nearly into bankruptcy under your orders. Then
you bought. Bought it right up, and--sent it ahead. Immoral? It
makes me sweat to think of the people who must have lost fortunes in
that scoop. Immoral? Why, I tell you, Dad, any man can make a pile if
he sticks to the old saw: 'Don't butt up against the law--just dodge
it.' It's only difficult for the fellow who remembers his
Sunday-school days. So far, Dad, I've avoided immorality. I'm waiting
till I start on big finance to become its victim. That's my talk. Now
you do some."
His father nodded. Then he said dryly, "This carpet cost me five
hundred dollars, that chair fifty. Try the chair."
Gordon laughed at the imperturbable smile on his father's face, but he
flung his great body into the chair.
James Carbhoy deliberately knocked the ash from his cigar. It was many
years since he had received such a straight talk from any man. Some of
it had stung--stung sharply, but the justice or injustice of it he set
aside. His whole mind and heart were upon other matters. He took no
umbrage. He swept all personal feeling aside and regarded the boy whom
he idolized.
"We've both made some talk," he observed, "but I think the last word's
with me. I don't seem to be sure which of us has put up the bluff.
Maybe we both have. Anyway, right here and now I'm going to call your
hand. I offered you a stake. You say it's easy to make a pile. Can
you make a pile?"
Gordon shrugged.
"Why, yes. If I follow your wish and embark on--big finance.
And--forget my Sunday school."
The millionaire gathered up the sheaf of loose accounts on the desk and
held them up. His smile was grim and challenging.
"One hundred thousand dollars these bills represent. The cashier will
hand you a check for that amount. Say, you've shown your ability to
spend that amount; can you show your ability to make it?"
For a moment the boy's blue eyes avoided the half-ironical smile of his
father's. Then suddenly they returned the steady gaze, and a flush
spread swiftly over his handsome face. Something of his father's
purpose was dawning upon him. He began to realize that the man who had
made those many millions was far too clever for him when it came to
debate. He squared his shoulders obstinately and took up the
challenge. There was no other course for him. But even as he accepted
it his heart sank at the prospect.
"Certainly," he cried. "Certainly--with a stake to start me."
His father nodded.
"Sure. That goes," he said.
Then he laid the papers on the desk, and his whole manner underwent a
further change. His eyes seemed to harden with the light of battle.
There was an ironical skepticism in them. Even there was a shadow of
contempt. For the moment it seemed as if he had forgotten that the man
before him was his son, and regarded him merely as some rival financier
seeking to beat him in a deal.
"I'll hand you one hundred thousand dollars. That's your stake. This
is the way you'll pay those bills. You'll leave this city in
twenty-four hours. You can go where you choose, do what you choose.
But you must return here in twelve months' time with exactly double
that sum. I make no conditions as to how you make the money. That's
right up to you. I shall ask no questions, and blame you for no
process you adopt, however much I disapprove. Then, to show you how
certain I am you can't do it--why, if you make good, there's a
half-share partnership in my organization waiting right here for you."
"A half-share partnership?" Gordon repeated incredulously. "You
said--a half-share?"
"That's precisely what I said."
All of a sudden the younger man flung back his head and laughed aloud.
"Why, Dad, I stand to win right along the line--anyway," he exclaimed.
The older man's eyes softened.
"Maybe it's just how you look at it."
The change in his father's manner was quite lost upon Gordon. He only
saw his enormous advantage in this one-sided bargain.
"Say, Dad, was there ever such a father as I've got?" he cried
exuberantly. "Never, never! But you're not going to monopolize all
the sportsmanship. I can play the game, too. I don't need one hundred
thousand dollars on this game. I don't need twelve months to do it in.
I'm not going to cut twelve months out of our lives together. Six is
all I need. Six months, and five thousand dollars' stake. That's what
I need. Give me that, and I'll be back with one hundred and five
thousand dollars in six months' time. I haven't a notion where I'm
going or what I'm going to do. All I know is you've put it up to me to
make good, and I'm going to. I'll get that money if--if I have to rob
a bank."
The boy's recklessness was too much for the gravity of the financier.
He sat back and laughed. He flung his half-smoked cigar away, and in a
moment father and son had joined in a duel of loud-voiced mirth.
Presently, however, their laughter died out. The millionaire sprang to
his feet. His eyes were shining with delight.
"I don't care a darn how you do it, boy," he cried. "As you say, it's
up to you. You see, I've got over my Sunday-school days, as you so
delicately reminded me. That's by the way. But there's more in this
than maybe you get right. You're going to learn that no graft can turn
five thousand dollars into one hundred thousand in six months without a
mighty fine commercial brain behind it. It's that brain I'm looking
for in my son. Now get along and see your mother and sister. You've
only got twenty-four hours' grace. Leave these bills to me. You're
making a bid for the greatest fortune ever staked in a wager, and
things like that don't stand for any delay. Get out, Gordon, boy; get
out and--make good."
He held one powerful hand out across the desk, and Gordon promptly
seized and wrung it.
"Good-by, Dad, and--God bless you."
CHAPTER II
IN CHASTENED MOOD
Of course, the whole thing was ridiculous. Gordon knew that. No one
could know it better. The more he thought about it the more surely he
was certain of it. He told himself that he, personally, had behaved
like a first-class madman over the whole affair. How on earth was he
to make one hundred thousand dollars in six months? It couldn't be
done. That was all. It simply couldn't be done. What power of
mischief had driven him to charge his highly respectable father with
graft? It was a rotten thing to do anyway. And it served him right
that it had come back on him by pointing the way to the present
impossible situation.
He was perfectly disgusted with himself.
But after a while he began to chuckle. The thing was not without an
atmosphere of humor--of a sort. No doubt his friends would have seen a
tremendous humor in the idea of his making one hundred thousand dollars
under any conditions.
One hundred thousand dollars! What a tremendous sum it sounded viewed
from the standpoint of his having to make it. He had never considered
it a vast sum before. But now it seemed to grow and grow every time he
thought of it. Then he laughed. What stupid things "noughts" were.
They meant so much just now, and, in reality, they mean nothing at all.
Oh, dear. The whole thing was a terrible trouble. It was worse. It
was a tragedy. But--he mustn't give his friends the laugh on him.
That would be the last straw. No. The whole thing should remain a
secret between his father and himself. He almost broke into a sweat as
he suddenly remembered the Press. What wouldn't the Press do with the
story. The son and heir of James Carbhoy, the well-known
multi-millionaire, leaving home to show the world how to make one
hundred thousand dollars in record time! A stupendous farce. Then the
swarm of reporters buzzing about him like a cloud of flies in summer
time. The prospect was too depressing. Think of the columns in the
Press, especially the cheaper Press. They would haunt him from New
York to--Timbuctoo!
It couldn't be done. He felt certain that in such circumstances
suicide would be justifiable. Thoughts such as these swept on through
his disturbed brain as he sped up Broadway on his way to say good-by to
his mother and sister. He had been lucky in finding his father's
high-powered automobile standing outside the palatial entrance of the
towering Carbhoy Building. Nor had he the least scruple in
commandeering it.
His visit to the east side of Central Park was in the nature of a
whirlwind. He had no desire to be questioned, and he knew his young
sister, Gracie, too well to give her a chance in that direction. Their
friends were wont to say that, for one so young--she was only
thirteen--she was all wit and intellect. He felt that that was because
she was his father's daughter. For himself he was positive she was all
precocity and impertinence. And he told himself he was quite
unprejudiced.
As for his mother, she was one of those gentle Southern women who
declare that no woman has the right to question the doings of the male
members of her household, and, in spite of the luxury with which she
was surrounded, and which she never failed to feel the burden of--she
was originally a small farmer's daughter--still yearned for that homely
meal of her youth, "supper"--a collation of coffee, cakes, preserves
and cold meats.
Experience warned him that he must give her no inkling of the real
facts. She would be too terribly shocked at the revelation.
So, for an hour or more, in the little family circle, in his mother's
splendid boudoir, he talked of everything but his own affairs. Nor was
it until he was in the act of taking his leave that he warned them both
that he was leaving the city for six months. He felt it was a cowardly
thing to do, but, having fired his bombshell in their midst, he fled
precipitately before its stunning effect had time to pass away.
Off he sped, the automobile urged to a dangerous speed, and it was with
a great sense of relief that he finally reached his own apartment on
Riverside Drive.
Letting himself in, he found his man, Harding, waiting for him.
"Mrs. Carbhoy has been ringing you up, sir," he said in the level tones
of a well-trained servant. "She wants to speak to you, sir--most
important."
Gordon hardened his heart.
"Disconnect the 'phone then," he said sharply, and flung himself into a
great settle which stood in the domed hall.
"Very good, sir."
The man was moving away.
"If my mother or sister should come here, I'm out. Send word down to
the office that there's no one in."
The valet's face was quite expressionless. Gordon Carbhoy had his own
way of dealing with his affairs. Harding understood this. He was also
devoted to his master.
"Yes, sir."
He vanished out of the hall.
Left alone a great change came over Gordon. The old buoyancy and humor
seemed suddenly to fall from him. For once his eyes were perfectly,
almost painfully serious. He stared about him, searching the
remoteness of his surroundings, his eyes and thoughts dwelling on the
luxury of the apartment he had occupied for the last three years. It
was a two-floored masterpiece of builder's ingenuity. It was to be his
home no longer.
That splendid domed hall had been the scene of many innocent revels.
Yes, in spite of the accusation of immorality, his parties had been
innocent enough. He had entertained the boys and girls of his
acquaintance royally, but--innocently. Well, that was all done with.
It was just a memory. The future was his concern.
The future. And that depended on his own exertions. For a moment the
seriousness of his mood lifted. Surely his own exertions as a business
man was a broken reed to---- What about failure? What was to
follow--failure? He hadn't thought of it, and his father hadn't spoken
of it.
Suddenly the cloud settled again, and a sort of panic swept over him.
Did his father intend to--kick him out? It almost looked like it. And
yet---- Had he intended this stake as his last? What a perfect fool
he had been to refuse the hundred thousand dollars. Then, in a moment,
his panic passed. He was glad he had done so--anyway.
He selected a cigar from his case and sniffed at it. He remembered his
father's. His handsome blue eyes were twinkling. His own cigars cost
half a dollar more than his father's, and the fact amused him. He cut
the end carefully and lit it. Then he leaned back on the cushions and
resigned himself to the reflection that these things, too, must go with
the rest. They, too, must become a mere memory.
"Harding!" he called.
The man appeared almost magically.
"Harding, have you ever smoked a--five-cent cigar?" he inquired
thoughtfully.
The valet cleared his throat.
"I'm sorry to say, sir, I haven't."
"Sorry?" Gordon's eyes were smiling.
"A mere figure of speech, sir."
"Ah--I see. They must be--painful."
"Very, I should think, sir. But, beg pardon, sir, I believe in
some--ahem--low places, they sell two for five cents!"
"Two? I--I wonder if the sanitary authorities know about it."
Gordon smiled into the serious face of his devoted henchman. Then he
went on rapidly--
"What baggage do you suggest for a six months' trip?"
"Europe, sir?"
"No."
"South, sir?"
"I--haven't made up my mind."
"General then, sir. That'll need more. There's the three large
trunks. The steamer trunk. Four suit cases. Will you need your polo
kit, sir, and your----?"
Gordon shook his head.
"Guess your focus needs adjusting. Now, suppose you were getting a man
ready for a six months' trip--a man who smoked those two-for-five
cigars. What would you give him?"
Harding's eyelids flickered. He sighed.
"It would be difficult, sir. I shouldn't give him clean
under-garments, sir. I should suggest the oldest suit I could find.
You see, sir, it would be waste to give him a good suit. The axles of
those box cars are so greasy. I'm not sure about a toothbrush."
"Your focus is adjusting itself."
"Yes, sir, thank you, sir."
"And the five-cent-cigar man?"
Harding's verdict came promptly.
"A hand bag with one good suit and ablutionary utensils, sir. Also
strong, warm under-garments, and a thick overcoat. One spare pair of
boots. You see, sir, he could carry that himself."
"Good," cried Gordon delightedly. "You prepare for that
five-cent-cigar man. Now I want some food. Better ring down to the
restaurant."
"Yes, sir. An oyster cocktail? Squab on toast, or a little pheasant?
What about sweets, sir, and what wine will you take?"
"Great gods no, man! Nothing like that. Think of your five-cent-cigar
man. What would he have? Why, sandwiches. You know, nice thick ones,
mostly bread. No. Wait a bit. I know. A club sandwich. Two club
sandwiches, and a bottle of domestic lager. Two things I
hate--eternally. We must equip ourselves, Harding. We must mortify
the flesh. We must readjust our focus, and outrage all our more
delicate susceptibilities. We must reduce ourselves to the
requirements of the five-cent-cigar man, and turn a happy, smiling
world into a dark and drear struggle for existence. See to it, good
Harding, see to it."
The man withdrew, puzzled. Used as he was to Gordon's vagaries, the
thought of his master dining off two hideous club sandwiches and a
bottle of _domestic_ lager made his staunch stomach positively turn.
His perfect training, however, permitted of no verbal protest. And he
waited on the diner with as much care for punctilio as though a formal
banquet were in progress. Then came another violent shock to his
feelings. Gordon leaned back in his chair with a sigh of amused
contentment.
"Do you think you could get me a--five-cent cigar, Harding?" he
demanded. "Say, I enjoyed that food. That unique combination of
chicken, hot bacon and--and something pickly--why, it's great. And as
for _domestic_ lager--it's got wine beaten a mile. Guess I'm mighty
anxious to explore a--five-cent cigar."
Harding cleared his throat.
"I'll do my best, sir. It may be difficult, but I'll do my best. I'll
consult the clerk downstairs. He smokes very bad cigars, sir."
"Good. You get busy. I'll be around in my den."
"Yes, sir," Harding hesitated. Then with an unusual diffidence,
"Coffee, sir? A little of the '48 brandy, sir?"
Gordon stared.
"Can I believe my ears? Spoil a dinner like that with--'48 brandy?
I'm astonished, Harding. That focus, man; that five-cent-cigar focus!"
Gordon hurried off into his den with a laugh. Harding gazed after him
with puzzled, respectful eyes.
Once in the privacy of his den, half office, half library, and wholly a
room of comfort, Gordon forgot his laugh. His mind was quite made up,
and he knew that a long evening's work lay before him.
He picked up the receiver of his private 'phone to his father's office
and sat down at the desk.
"Hello! Hello! Ah! That you, Harker? Splendid. Guess I'm glad I
caught you. Working late, eh? Sure. It's the way in er--big finance.
Yes. Got to lie awake at nights to do the other feller. Say. No.
Oh, no, that's not what I rang you up for. It's about--finance. Ha,
ha! It's a check for me. Did the governor leave me one? Good. Five
thousand dollars, isn't it? Well, say, don't place it to my credit.
Get cash for it to-morrow, and send it along to---- Let me see. Yes,
I know. You send along a bright clerk with it. He can meet me at the
Pennsylvania Depot to-morrow, at noon--sharp. Yes. In the
waiting-room. Get that? Good. So long."
"That's that," he muttered, as he replaced the receiver. "Now for
Charlie Spiers."
He turned to the ordinary 'phone, picked up the receiver, gave the
operator the number, and waited.
"Hello! Hello, hello, hello! That you, Charlie? Bully. I wasn't
sure getting you. Guess my luck's right in. How are you? Goo----
No, better not come around to-night. Fact is, I'm up to my back teeth
packing and things. I've got to be away awhile. Business--important."
He laughed. "Don't get funny. It's not play. No. Eh? What's that?
A lady? Quit it. If there's a thing I can't stand just about now it's
a suggestion of immorality. I mean that. The word 'immoral' 's about
enough to set me chasing Broadway barking and foaming at the mouth. I
said I'm going away on business, and it's so important that not even my
mother knows where I'm going. Yes. Ah, I'm glad you feel that way.
It's serious. Now, listen to me; it's up to you to do me a kindness.
I'm going to write the mater now and again. But I can't mail direct,
or she'll know where I am, see? Well, I can send her mail under cover
to you, and you can mail it on to her. Get me? Now, that way, you'll
know just where I am. That's so. Well, you've got to swear right
along over the wire you won't tell a soul. Not the governor, or the
mater, or Gracie, or--or anybody. No, I don't need you to cuss like a
railroader about it. Just swear properly. That's it. That's fine.
On your soul and honor. Fine. I'm glad you added the 'honor' racket,
it makes things plumb sure. Oh, yes, your soul's all right in its way.
But---- Good-by, boy. I'll see you six months from to-day. No. Too
busy. So long."
Gordon hung up the receiver and turned back to his desk with a sigh.
He opened a drawer and took out his check-book, and gave himself up to
a few minutes of figures. There was not a great deal of money to his
credit at the bank, but it was sufficient for his purposes. He wrote
and signed three checks. Then he tore the remaining blanks up and
flung them into the waste-basket.
After that he turned his attention to a systematic examination of his
papers. It was a long, and not uninteresting process, but one that
took a vast amount of patience. He tore up letter after letter,
photographs, bills, every sort of document which a bachelor seems
always to accumulate when troubled by the disease of youth.
In the midst of his labors he came across his father's private code for
cable and telegraph. It brought back to him the memory of his position
as one of his father's secretaries. He smiled as he glanced through
it. It must be sent back to the office. He would hand it to the clerk
who brought him his money in the morning. So he placed it carefully in
the inside pocket of his coat and continued his labors.
Half an hour later Harding appeared.
"Beg pardon, sir," he said. "I had some difficulty, but"--he held up
an oily-looking cigar with a flaming label about its middle, between
his finger and thumb--"I succeeded in obtaining one. I had to take
three surface cars, and finally had to go to Fourth Avenue. It was a
lower place than I expected, sir, seeing that it was a five-cent cigar."
"That means it cost me twenty cents, Harding--unless you were able to
transfer."
Gordon eyed the man's expressionless face quizzically.
"I'm sorry, sir. But I forgot about the transfer tickets."
Gordon sighed with pretended regret.
"I'm sure guessing it's--bad finance. We ought to do better."
"I could have saved the fares if I'd taken your car, sir," said
Harding, with a flicker of the eyelids.
"Splendid, gasoline at thirteen cents, and the price of tires going up."
Gordon drummed on the desk with his fingers and became thoughtful. He
had a painful duty yet to perform.
"Harding," he said at last, with a genuine sigh, his eyes painfully
serious. "We've got to go different ways. You've--got to quit."
The valet's face never moved a muscle.
"Yes, sir."
"Right away."
"Yes, sir."
Then the man cleared his throat, and laid the oily-looking cigar on the
desk.
"I trust, sir, I've given satisfaction?"
"Satisfaction?" Gordon's tone expressed the most cordial appreciation.
"Satisfaction don't express it. I couldn't have kept up the farce of
existence without you. You are the best fellow in the world. Guess
it's I who haven't given satisfaction."
"Yes, sir."
"Oh--you agree?"
"Yes, sir. That is, no, sir."
Harding passed one thin hand across his forehead, and the movement was
one of perplexity. It was the only gesture he permitted himself as any
expression of feeling.
"I'm going away for six months--as a five-cent-cigar man," Gordon went
on, disguising his regret under a smile of humor. "I'm going away
on--business."
"Yes, sir." The respectful agreement came in a monotonous tone.
"So you'll--just have to quit. That's all."
"Yes, sir."
"Ye-es."
"You will--need a man when you come back, sir?" The eagerness was
unmistakable to Gordon.
"I--hope so."
Harding's face brightened.
"I will accept temporary employment then, sir. Thank you, sir."
Gordon wondered. Then he cleared his throat, and held out two of the
checks he had written.
"Here's two months' wages," he said. "One is your due. Guess the
other's the same, only--it's a present. Now, get this. You'll need to
see everything cleared right out of this shanty, and stored at the
Manhattan deposit. When that's done, get right along and report things
to my father, and hand him your accounts for settlement. All my cigars
and cigarettes and wine and things, why, I guess you can have for a
present. It don't seem reasonable to me condemning you to five-cent
cigars and domestic lager. Now pack me one grip, as you said. I'll
wear the suit I've got on. Mind, I need a grip I can tote
myself--full."
"Very good, sir. Thank you, sir. Anything else, sir?"
"Why, yes." Gordon was smiling again. "Hand this check in at the bank
when it opens to-morrow, and get me cash for it, and bring it right
along. That's all, except you'd better get me another disgusting
sandwich, and another bottle of tragedy beer for my supper. There's
nothing else."
With a resolute air Gordon turned back to his work, as, with an obvious
sigh of regret, Harding silently withdrew.
CHAPTER III
GORDON ARRIVES
Gordon Carbhoy sat hunched up in his seat. His great shoulders, so
square and broad, seemed to fill up far more space than he was entitled
to. His cheerful face showed no signs of the impatience and
irritability he was really enduring. A seraphic contentment alone
shone in his clear blue eyes. He was a picture of the youthful
conviction that life was in reality a very pleasant thing, and that
there did not exist a single cloud upon the delicately tinted horizon
of his own particular portion of it.
In spite of this outward seeming, however, he was by no means easy.
Every now and again he would stand up and ease the tightness of his
trousers about his knees. He felt dirty, too, dirty and untidy,
notwithstanding the fact that he had washed himself, and brushed his
hair, many times in the cramped compartment of the train devoted to
that purpose. Then he would fling himself into his corner again and
give his attention to the monotonously level landscape beyond the
window and strive to forget the stale odor so peculiar to all railroad
cars, especially in summer time.
These were movements and efforts he had made a hundred times since
leaving the great terminal in New York. He had slept in his corner.
He had eaten cheaply in the dining-car. He had smoked one of the
delicious cigars, from the box which the faithful Harding had secreted
in his grip, in the smoker ahead. He had read every line in the
magazines he had provided himself with, even to the advertisements.
The time hung heavily, drearily. The train grumbled, and shook, and
jolted its ponderous way on across the vast American continent. It was
all very tedious.
Then the endless stream of thought, often fantastic, always
unconvincing, always leading up to those ridiculous cyphers
representing one hundred thousand dollars. If only they were numerals.
Nice, odd numerals. He was a firm believer in the luck of odd numbers.
But no. It was always "noughts." Most disgusting "noughts."
He yawned for about the thousandth time on his two days' journey, and
wondered hopelessly how many more times he would yawn before he reached
the Pacific.
Hello! The conductor was coming through again. Going to tear off more
ticket, Gordon supposed. That tearing off was most interesting. He
wondered if the ticket would last out till he reached Seattle. He
supposed so.
Seattle! The Yukon! The Yukon certainly suggested fortune, the making
of a rapid fortune. But how? One hundred thousand dollars! There it
was again.
His eyes were following the movements of the rubicund conductor. The
man looked enormously self-satisfied, and was certainly bursting with
authority and adipose tissue. He wondered if he couldn't annoy him
some way. It would be good to annoy some one. He closed his smiling
eyes and feigned sleep.
The vast bulk of blue uniform and brass buttons bore down upon him. It
reached his "pew," dropped into the seat opposite, and tweaked him by
the coat sleeve.
Gordon opened his eyes with a pretended start.
"Where are we?" he demanded irritably.
"Som'eres between the devil an' the deep sea, I guess," grinned the
man. "Your--ticket."
Gordon began to fumble slowly through his pockets. He knew precisely
where his ticket was, but he searched carefully and deliberately in
every other possible place. The man waited, breathing heavily. He
displayed not the slightest sign of the annoyance desired. At last
Gordon turned out the inside pocket of his coat. The first thing he
discovered amongst its contents was his father's private code book, and
the annoyance was in his eyes rather than in those of the conductor.
His resolve to return it had been entirely forgotten.
He forthwith produced his ticket.
"The devil's behind us, I s'pose," said Gordon. "Anyway, we're told
it's the right place for him. I'll be glad when we reach the sea."
The conductor examined the ticket, while Gordon returned the code book
to his pocket.
"Ah, Seattle," the brassbound official murmured. Then he looked into
the now smiling face before him. "You ain't for Snake's Fall?"
"Guess I shouldn't have paid for a ticket to Seattle if I were," Gordon
retorted with some sarcasm.
"That's so," observed the official, quite undisturbed. "I knew one guy
was for Seattle. I was kind o' wondering 'bout him. Se-attle," he
murmured reflectively.
"On the coast. A seaport. Puget Sound," said Gordon objectionably.
"A low down sailor town on the side of a hill, wher' if you ain't
climbin' up you're mostly fallin' down. Wher' it rains nigh six months
o' the year, an' parboils you the rest. Wher' every bum going to or
coming from the Yukon gets thoroughly soused and plays the fool
gener'ly."
The man's retort was as pointedly objectionable as Gordon's had been,
and the challenge of it stirred the latter's sense of humor.
"Guess I'm one of the bums 'going to,'" he said cheerfully. The man's
fat-surrounded eyes ceased to grin.
"Startin' fer the Yukon in--July? Never heard of it," he said, with a
shake of the head. "It's as ridiculous as startin' fer hell in summer
time. You'll make Alaska when she freezes up, and sit around till she
opens next spring. Say----"
"You mean I'll get hung up for--ten months?" cried Gordon aghast.
"Jest depends on your business."
"Yes, of course."
Gordon's heart sank as the man grunted up from his seat, and handed him
back his mutilated ticket. He watched him pass on down the car and
finally vanish through the doorway of the parlor-car beyond. Then his
eyes came back to his surroundings. He stared at the heads of his
fellow travelers dotting the tops of the seats about him. Then his
eyes dropped to his grip on the opposite seat lying under his overcoat,
and again, later, they turned reflectively towards the window. Ten
months. Ten months, and he only had six before him in which to
accomplish his purpose. Was there ever a more perfect imbecile? Was
there ever such a fool trick?
A smile of chagrin grew in his eyes as he remembered how he had arrived
at the Pennsylvania Depot, and had studied the list of places to which
he could go, seeking to find in the names an inspiration for the
accomplishment of his purpose. There had been so many that his amazed
head had been set whirling. There he had stood, wondering and gawking
like some foolish country "Rube," without one single idea beyond the
fact that he must go somewhere and make one hundred thousand dollars in
six months' time.
Then had come that one illuminating flash. He saw the name in great
capital letters in an advertisement. "The Yukon." Of course. It was
the one and only place in the world for quick fortunes, and forthwith
he had booked his passage to Seattle.
Nor was he likely to forget his immense satisfaction when he heard
Harding's respectful "Yes, sir," in response to his information. Now
he certainly was convinced that he was own brother to the finest bred
jackass in the whole wide world. However, there was nothing to be done
but go on to Seattle. He had paid for his ticket, and, Providence
willing, to Seattle he would go.
But Providence had its own ideas upon the matter. Furthermore,
Providence began at once to set its own machinery working in his
behalf. It was the same Providence that looks after drunken men and
imbeciles. Half an hour later it impelled him to gather up his traps
and pass forward into the smoker, accompanied by one of his own big,
expensive cigars.
He pushed his way into the car through the narrow door of
communication. A haze of tobacco smoke blurred his view, but at once
he became aware of a single, melancholy, benevolent eye gazing steadily
at him.
It was an amiable eye and withal shrewd. Also it was surrounded by a
shaggy dark brow. This had a fellow, too, but the eye belonging to the
fellow was concealed beneath what was intended to be a flesh-tinted
cover, secured in place by elastic round its owner's head.
The surrounding face was rugged and weather tanned. And it finished
with a mop of iron-gray hair at one end, and an aggressively tufted
chin beard at the other. But the thrusting whisker could not disguise
the general strength of the face.
Below this was a spread of large body clad in a store suit of some
pretensions, but of ill fit, and a heavy gold watchchain and a large
diamond pin in the neckwear suggested opulence. Furthermore, One Eye
suggested the prime of middle life, and robust health and satisfaction.
There was only one other occupant of the car. He was two or three
seats away, across the aisle. He promptly claimed Gordon's attention.
He was amusing himself by shooting "crap" on a baize-covered
traveling-table. Both men were smoking hard, and, by the density of
the atmosphere, and the aroma, the newcomer estimated that they, unlike
himself, were not five-cent-cigar men.
He paused at the dice thrower's seat and watched the proceedings. The
man appeared not to notice his approach at all, and continued to labor
on with his pastime, carrying on a muttered address to the obdurate
"bones."
"Come 'sev,'" he muttered again and again, as he flung the dice on the
table with a flick of the fingers.
But the "seven" would not come up, and at last he raised a pair of keen
black eyes to Gordon's face.
"Cussed things, them durned bones," he said briefly, and went on with
his play.
Gordon smiled.
"It's like most things. It's luck that tells."
The player grinned down at the dice and nodded agreement, while he
continued his muttered demands. Gordon flung his traps into another
seat, and sat himself down opposite the man. Crap dice never failed to
fascinate him.
The melancholy benevolence of One Eye remained fixed upon the pair.
The seven refused to come up, and finally the player desisted.
"Sort of workin' calculations," he explained, with an amiable grin.
"An' they don't calc worth a cent. As you say, the hull blamed thing
is chance. Sevens, or any other old things 'll just come up when they
darned please, and neither me nor any other feller can make 'em
come--playin' straight."
The man bared his gold-filled teeth in another amiable grin. And
Gordon fell.
His unsuspicious mind was quite unable to appreciate the obvious cut of
the man. The rather flashy style of his clothes. The keen, quick,
black eyes. The disarming ingenuousness of his manner and speech.
These things meant nothing to him. The men he knew were as ready to
win or lose a few hundred dollars on the turn of a card as they were to
drink a cocktail. The thought of sharp practice in gambling was
something which never entered their heads.
He drew out a dollar bill and laid it on the table. The sight of it
across the aisle made One Eye blink. But the black-eyed stranger
promptly covered it, and picked up the dice. He shook them in the palm
of his hand and spun them on the baize, clipping his fingers sharply.
"Come 'sev,'" he muttered.
The miracle of it. The seven came up and he swept in the two dollars.
In a moment he had replaced them with a five-dollar bill. Gordon
responded.
"I'll take two dollars of that," he said, and staked his money.
The man spun the dice, and a five came up. Then it was Gordon's turn
to talk to the dice, calling on them for a seven each time the man
threw. The play became absorbing, and One Eye, from across the aisle,
craned forward. The seven came up before the five, and Gordon won, and
the dice passed.
The game proceeded, and the luck alternated. Then Gordon began to win.
He won consistently for awhile, and nearly twenty dollars had passed
from the stranger's pocket to his.
It was an interesting study in psychology. Gordon was utterly without
suspicion, and full of boyish enthusiasm. His blue eyes were full of
excited interest. He followed each throw, and talked the jargon of the
game like any gambler. All his boredom with the journey was gone. His
quest was thrust into the background. Nothing troubled him in the
least. The joy of the rolling dice was on him, and he laughed and
jested as the wayward "bones" defied or acquiesced to his requirements.
The stranger was far more subtle. For a big powerful man he possessed
absurdly delicate hands. He handled the dice with an expert touch,
which Gordon utterly lacked. He talked to the dice as they fell in a
manner quite devoid of enthusiasm, and as though muttering a formula
from mere habit. He grumbled at his losses, and remained silent in
victory, and all the while he smoked, and smoked, and watched his
opponent with furtive eyes.
One Eye watched the game from the corner without a sign.
A stranger, on his way through the car, paused to watch the game.
Presently he passed on, and then returned with another man.
After awhile Gordon's luck began to wane. His twenty dollars dropped
to fifteen. Then to ten. Then to five. The stranger threw a run of
"sevens." Then the dice passed. But Gordon lost them again, and
presently the five dollars he was still winning passed out of his hands.
From that moment luck deserted him entirely. The stranger threw a
succession of wins. Gordon increased his stakes to five-dollar bills.
Now and again he pulled in a win, but always, it seemed, to lose two
successive throws immediately afterwards. There were times when it
seemed impossible to wrest the dice from his opponent. Whenever he
held them himself he lost them almost immediately.
"Seventy-five dollars, that makes," he said, after one such loss.
"They're going your way, sure."
"It's the luck of things," replied the stranger laconically.
One Eye across the aisle smiled to himself, and abandoned his craning.
Gordon plunged. He doubled his bets with the abandon of youth and
inexperience. And the stranger never failed to tempt him that way when
they were his dice. He always laid more stake than he believed his
opponent would accept.
The hundred dollars was reached and passed in Gordon's losses. Still
the game went on. He passed the hundred and fifty--and then Providence
stepped in.
By this time a number of onlookers had gathered in the car. The place
was full of smoke. They were standing in the aisle. They were sitting
on the arms of the seats of the two players. One or two were leaning
over the backs of the seats.
Suddenly the speeding train jolted heavily over some rough points. It
swayed for a moment with a sort of deep-sea roll. The onlooker seated
on the arm of the stranger's seat was jerked from his balance and
sprawled on the player. In his efforts to save himself he grabbed at
the table, which promptly toppled. The gambler made a lunge to save
it, and, in the confusion of the moment, a second pair of crap dice,
identical with the pair Gordon was about to shoot, rolled out of his
hand.
Just for an instant there was a breathless pause as Gordon pounced on
them. Then one word escaped him, and his face went deathly white as he
glared furiously at the man across the table.
"Loaded!"
One Eye again craned forward. But now the patch was entirely removed
from his second eye.
The next part of Providence's little game was played without a single
word. One great fist shot out from Gordon's direction, and its impact
with its object sounded dull and sodden. The gambler's head jolted
backwards, and he felt as though his neck had been broken. Then the
baize-covered table was projected across the car by Gordon's other
great hand, while the spectators fled in the direction of the doorways,
and pushed and scrambled their ways through.
Then ensued a wild scene. The animal was stirred to offense with a
sublime abandon.
One Eye remained in his corner, his eyes alight with an appreciation
hardly to have been expected, contemplating humorously the tangle of
humanity as it moved, with lightning rapidity, all over the car. Once,
as the battle swayed in his direction, he even moved his traps under
the seat, lest their bulk should incommode the combatants.
For a moment, at the outset, the two men appeared to be a fair match.
But the impression swiftly passed. The youth, the superb training, the
skill of Gordon became like the sledge-hammer pounding of superior
gunnery in warfare. He hit when and where he pleased, and warded the
wilder blows of his opponent with almost unconcern. But the narrowness
of the aisle and the presence of the seats saved the gambler, and both
men staggered and bumped about in a way that deprived Gordon of much of
the result of his advantage.
The train began to slow up. One Eye glanced apprehensively out of the
window. He gathered up his belongings, and picked up the litter of
money scattered on the floor.
Then he sat watching the fight--and his opportunity.
The men had closed. Regardless of all, they fought with a fury and
abandon as cordial as it now became unscientific. The gambler,
clinging to his opponent, strove to ward off the blows which fell upon
his features like a hailstorm. Gordon, with superlative ferocity, was
bent on leaving them unrecognizable. It was a bloody onslaught, but no
more bloody than Gordon intended it to be. He was stirred now, a young
lion, fighting for the only finish that would satisfy him.
One Eye's opportunity came. He made a run for the door as the train
pulled up with a jolt.
But the fight went on. The stopping of the train conveyed nothing to
the fighting men. Neither saw nor cared that one of the doors was
suddenly flung open. Neither saw the rush of men in uniform. The
invasion of their ring by the train crew meant nothing to them.
Then something happened.
CHAPTER IV
GORDON LANDS AT SNAKE'S FALL
Gordon sat up and rubbed his eyes. Then one blood-stained hand went up
to his head, and its fingers passed through his ruffled hair. It
smoothed its way down one cheek, and finally dropped to the ground on
which he was sitting.
Where was he?
Suddenly he became aware of the metal track in front of him,
and--remembered. He glanced down the track. Far in the distance he
could see the speeding train. Then his eyes came back to his immediate
surroundings, and discovered that he was sitting on the boarded footway
of a small country railroad depot.
How did he get there? How on earth did he get there?
As no answer to his mute inquiry was forthcoming he explored further.
He discovered that his grip and overcoat were beside him, also his hat.
And some distance away a number of loungers were idly watching him,
with a smile of profound amusement on every face.
The latter discovery filled him with a swiftly rising resentment, and,
grabbing his hat and thrusting it on his head, he leaped to his feet.
He had no intention of permitting amusement at his expense.
"I guess you sure had some good time," said a deep, musical voice at
his elbow.
Gordon swung about and stood confronting the man, One Eye, whom he had
seen in the train. For a moment he had it in mind to make some
furiously resentful retort. But the man's appearance held his
curiosity and diverted his purpose. The patch had been removed from
his second eye, which now beamed upon him in company with its fellow.
"Guess these are yours," the man went on, thrusting a roll of bills out
towards him. "That 'sharp' dropped his wad during the scrap. I hated
to think a grafting train boss was goin' to collect it. You see, I
guessed how that scrap would end."
"Are they mine?" Gordon was not quite sure he wasn't dreaming.
"Mostly."
The stranger's reply was full of dry humor. Suddenly Gordon's eyes lit.
"Where is that 'sharp'? I haven't done with----"
The stranger pointed after the train.
"You'll need to hustle some."
The anger died out of Gordon's eyes and he began to laugh. With some
diffidence he accepted the money.
"Say, it's--mighty decent of you," he cried cordially. Then, for want
of better means of expression, "Mighty decent."
The two men stood steadily regarding each other. Tall and broad as
Gordon was, the stranger was no less. But he added to his stature the
massiveness of additional years.
Gordon's feelings were under perfect control now. His eyes began to
brighten with their native humor. He was longing to solve the mystery
of that eye-shade which had disappeared from his companion's face, but
was constrained to check his curiosity.
"You said you guessed how the scrap would end?" he said. "There's a
sort of blank in my--memory. I mean about the finish."
The big stranger began to rumble in his throat. To Gordon the sound
was comforting in its wholesome enjoyment.
"It don't need a heap of guessing when a train 'sharp,' who's got the
conductor grafted from his brassbound cap to the soles of his rotten
feet, gets into a scrap how things are going to end. I'd sort of hoped
you'd 'out' him before the crew come along. Guess you'd have done it
if there'd been more room. That's the worst of scrappin' in a railroad
car," he added regretfully. "That train boss got along with his crew
and threw you out--on your head. They kept the 'sharp' aboard, being
well grafted, and figgered to hold up your baggage. I guessed
diff'rently. That all your baggage?" he inquired anxiously.
Gordon gazed down at the grip and coat.
"That's all," he said. Then he impulsively threw out a hand, and the
stranger took it. "It's decent--mighty decent of you." Again his
buoyant laugh rang out. "Say, I surely do seem to have had some good
time."
The twinkling eyes of the stranger nearly closed up in a cordial grin.
"Seems to me you're fixed here till to-morrow, anyway. There ain't any
sort of train west till then. You best come along over to the hotel.
They call it 'hotel' hereabouts. I'm goin' that way."
Gordon agreed, gathered up his property, and fell in beside his
companion.
They moved across the track, and as they went he caught some impression
of the ragged little prairie town at which he had so inadvertently
arrived. There seemed to him to be but a single, unpaved street,
consisting of virgin prairie beaten bare and hard by local traffic.
This was lined on one side by a fringe of wooden houses of every size
and condition, with gaps here and there for roads, yet to be made,
turning out of it. These houses were mostly of a commercial nature.
Back of this he vaguely understood there to be a sparse dotting of
other houses, but their purpose and arrangement remained a mystery to
him. Still farther afield he beheld the green eminence of foothills,
and still farther on, away in the distance, the snowy ramparts of the
Rocky Mountains. The town seemed to occupy only one side of the
track--the south side. The depot was beyond it, on the other.
They picked their way across the track and debouched upon the Main
Street, the name of which Gordon discovered painted in indifferent
characters upon a disreputable signboard. Then they turned westwards
in the direction of an isolated building rather larger than anything
else in the village.
After awhile, as his companion made no further effort at conversation,
Gordon's interest and curiosity refused to permit the continued silence.
"What State are we in?" he inquired.
"Montana."
Gordon glanced quickly at his companion.
"What place is this?"
"Snake's Fall."
The announcement set Gordon laughing.
"What's amiss with Snake's Fall?" inquired the other sharply.
"Why, nothing. I was just thinking. You see, the conductor told me
'most everybody was making for Snake's Fall on the train. I'm sorry
that 'sharp' wasn't. Say----"
"What?"
Gordon laughed again.
"I remember you in the smoker, only--you seemed to have a--a patch over
your left eye."
"Sure."
"Now you haven't got it?"
"No."
"I'm not curious, only----"
The stranger's eyes lit ironically.
"Sure you ain't. That's the hotel. Peter McSwain's. He's the boss.
He's a friend of mine, an' I guess he'll fix you right for the night."
The snub was decided but gentle. The man's deep, musical voice
contained no suggestion of displeasure. However, he had made the other
feel that he had been guilty of unpardonable rudeness.
He was reduced to silence for the rest of the journey to the hotel, and
gave himself up to consideration of this new position in which he now
found himself. The one great fact that stood out in his mind was that
he had gained another day on the wrong side of his ledger, and, however
wrong he had been in his first attempt at fortune, his course had been
hopelessly diverted into a still more impossible channel. The
absurdity of the situation inclined him to amusement, but the knowledge
of the real seriousness of it held him troubled.
As they neared the hotel his curiosity further made itself felt. The
place was an ordinary frame building with a veranda. It was square and
squat, like a box. It was two-storied, with windows, five in all, and
a center doorway. These were dotted on the face of it like raisins in
a pudding. Its original paint was undoubtedly white, but that seemed
to have long since succumbed to the influence of the weather, and now
suggested a hopeless hue which was anything but inspiriting.
Leaning against the door-casing, in his shirt-sleeves, was a smallish,
florid man with ruddy hair. His waistcoat was almost as cheerful as
his face, and, judging by the sound of his voice as he talked to a
number of men lounging on the veranda, the latter quite matched the
pattern of his violently checked trousers.
"That's Peter," remarked One Eye, the name, failing a better, Gordon
still thought of his companion by. "He's a bright boy, is Peter," he
added, chuckling.
"The proprietor of the--hotel?" said Gordon, interested.
"Sure."
Then a hail reached them from the veranda.
"Got back, Silas?" cried the loud-voiced hotel-keeper.
"Just what you say yourself," retorted Silas amiably. "Seems to me I
bought a ticket and just got off the train. Still, ther' ain't nothing
certain in this world except--graft."
"That's so," laughed the other. "Still, ther' ain't much of a shadow
'bout you, so we'll take it as real. Who's your friend?"
The hotel-keeper eyed Gordon with a view to trade. The man called
Silas laughed and turned to Gordon.
"Guess I didn't get your name. Mine's Mallinsbee--Silas Mallinsbee.
I'm a rancher, way out ther' in the foothills."
Gordon thought for a moment. Then he decided to use two of his given
names in preference to his father's.
"Mine's Gordon Van Henslaer. Glad to meet you."
"Van Henslaer?" Mallinsbee's eyes twinkled. "Guess the first and last
letters on your grip are spare. Kind of belong back east. How-do?"
Then, without waiting for a reply, he turned to McSwain and the men on
the veranda who were interestedly surveying Gordon. "This is Mister
Gordon Van Henslaer from New York. Thought he'd like to break his
journey west and get a look around Snake's Fall."
Gordon laughed.
"I was persuaded at the last minute," he added. "Can you let me have a
room?"
McSwain became active.
"Sure. Guess we're pretty busy these times, with the town gettin'
ready to boom. But I guess I ken fix any friend of Silas Mallinsbee.
Ther's a room they calculated makin' into a bathroom back of the house,
but some slick Alec figured the boys of Snake's Fall were prejudiced,
so cut it out. It's small, but we got a bed fixed ther', an' you ken
clean yourself at the trough out back. Come right along in."
Gordon was half inclined to protest, but Mallinsbee's voice came
opportunely--
"I told you Peter 'ud fix you right. I've slept in that room myself,
and you'll find it elegant sleepin', if you don't get a nightmare and
get jumping around. We'll go right in."
Gordon's protest died on his lips. Mr. Mallinsbee had a persuasion all
his own. There was a humorous geniality about him that was quite
irresistible to the younger man, nor could he forget the manner in
which he had helped him after the debacle on the train. He felt that
it would have been churlish to refuse his good offices.
They passed into the building. The office was plainly furnished. A
few Windsor chairs, a table, an empty stove, a few nigger pictures on
the walls, and a large register for guests' names. This was the whole
scheme.
Gordon flung down his grip.
"Well, I'm thankful to be off that train, anyway," he said. "Sign
here, eh?" as Peter threw the book towards him. "Say," he added,
glancing at the list of names above his, "you sure are busy."
Peter grinned complacently, while Mallinsbee looked on.
"You've hit this city at the psychological moment in its history, sir,"
he declared expansively. "You've hit it, sir, when, if I ken be
allowed to use the expression, the snow's gone an' all the earth's jest
bustin' with new life. You've hit it, sir, when fortunes are just
going to start right into full growth with all the impetus of virgin
soil. Snake's Fall, sir, is about to become the greatest proposition
in the Western States, as a sure thing for soaking dollars into it.
And here, sir, standing right at your elbow, is the courage, enterprise
and intellect that's made it that way. Mr. Silas Mallinsbee is the
father of this city, sir; he's more--he's the creator of it. And, sir,
I congratulate you on the friendship of such a man, a friendship, sir,
in which I have the honor to share."
He grabbed a filthy piece of blotting-paper and dabbed it cheerfully
over Gordon's name in the book, while the latter smiled at the monument
of enterprise himself.
"I was quite unaware----" he began. But Mallinsbee cut him short.
"Peter's a good feller," he declared, "but some seven sorts of a galoot
once told him he ought to go into Congress, and he's been talking ever
since. Ther's jest one thing 'll stop Peter talking, and that's
orderin' a drink. Which I'm doin' right now. Peter, you'll jest hand
us two cocktails. Your specials. And take what you like yourself."
Peter accepted the order with alacrity. His admiration of and
friendship for Mallinsbee could not be doubted for a moment. And
somehow Gordon felt it was a good sign. He returned in a few moments
with the cocktails, and a glass of rye whiskey for himself.
"I know a better play than my special cocktails," he said, a huge wink
distorting most of his ginger-hued features. "They're all right for
customers, but I ain't no use fer picklin' my liver. How?"
"Here's to the extermination of all 'sharps,'" said Mallinsbee in his
deep, rolling voice, and with a meaning glance in Gordon's direction.
Gordon nodded.
"And here's to the confusion of graft and grafters."
All three drank and set their glasses down.
"Graft?" said Mallinsbee thoughtfully. Then he shrugged his massive
shoulders and laughed. "It's not a heap of use blaming grafters for
their graft. They can't help it, any more than you can help scrappin'
when a feller hits your wad on the crook. Graft--why, I just hate to
think of the ways of graft. But you can't get through life without it;
anyway, not life on this earth. I used to think graft a specialty of
this country, but guess I was wrong. I'd localized. It don't belong
to any one country more than another. It belongs to life; to our human
civilization. It's the time limit of life causes the trouble. Nature
makes it a cinch we've all got to be rounded up in the get-rich-quick
corral. We start life foolish. Then for a while we get a sight more
foolish. Then for a few mousy years we take on quite a nice bunch of
sense. After that we start getting foolish again, and then the time
limit comes right down on the backs of our necks like an ax. Well, I
guess those years of sense are so mighty few we've got to get rich
quick against the time we start on the foolish racket again, and graft,
of one sort or another, is the short cut necessary.
"You see, there's every sort of graft. All through life we're looking
around for something we ain't got. Did you ever see a kid around his
parents? Graft; it's all graft. No kiddy ever acted right because he
fancied that way. He's lookin' ahead fer something he's needing, and
his pop or his momma are the folks to pass it along to him. Did you
ever know a kid take his physic without the promise of candy, or the
certainty it would come his way? That's graft. Say, ain't the gal you
fancy the biggest graft of all? You don't get nowhere with her without
graft. She'll eat up everything you can hand her, from automobiles and
jewels down to five-cent candy. Then when you've started getting old
and sick and foolish again, having grafted a pile out of life yourself,
don't every grafter you ever knew come around an' hand you cures and
listen to your senile wisdom just as though they thought you the
greatest proposition ever and hated to see you sick? That's graft.
You've got a pile and they're needin' it."
The twinkle in the big man's eyes while he was talking found a joyous
response in Gordon's. The tongue in the cheek of this native of
Snake's Fall pleased him mightily. But the wide-eyed sunset of Peter
McSwain's features was one of sober earnestness and admiration.
"Gee!" he cried, with prodigious appreciation. "He orter write a book!"
CHAPTER V
A LETTER HOME
The bathroom proved to be a veritable rabbit hutch, though clean. But
Gordon was astonished to find how far the old life had fallen away
behind him. The bareness of the room did not disturb him in the least,
and, after a wash in the trough at the back of the hotel, and having
dried himself on a towel that may have seen cleaner days, and refused
to be inveigled by the attraction of an unclean comb, securely tied to
a defective mirror in the passage to the back door, he came back to his
bedroom with an added appreciation for its questionable luxury.
Mallinsbee had ridden off on a great chestnut horse, nor, until Gordon
saw him in the saddle, was he definitely able to classify him in his
mind. Big as the amiable stranger was, he sat in the saddle as though
he had been born in it, and he handled his horse as only a cattle man
can.
At supper-time he had an opportunity of studying something of his
fellow guests in the house. They were a mixed gathering, but every
table in the dining-room was full to overflowing. Certainly McSwain
was justified in his claim to a rush of business.
It was quickly obvious to Gordon that these people were by no means
natives of the place. The majority were undoubtedly business men.
Shrewd, keen men of the speculative type, judging from the babel of
talk going on about him. As far as he could make out the whole
interest of the place was land. Land--always land--and again land.
In view of Mallinsbee's friendship Peter McSwain had requested him to
sit beside him at his especial table. And he forthwith began to
question his host.
"Seems to be a big talk of land going on," he said, as he ate his
macaroni soup.
Peter gulped violently at a long tube of macaroni and nearly choked.
"Sure," he said, his eyes wide with an expression the meaning of which
Gordon was never quite certain about. It might have meant mere
astonishment, but it also suggested resentment. "Sure it's land. What
else, unless it's coal, would they talk in Snake's Fall? Every blamed
feller you see settin' around in this room is what Silas Mallinsbee
calls a ground shark. Which means," he added, with a grin, "they're
out to buy or steal land around Snake's Fall. We guess they prefer
stealing. The place is bung full with 'em."
Gordon's interest deepened.
"But why, if you'll forgive me, around--Snake's Fall?"
"Young man," said Peter severely, "you're new to the place, and that's
your excuse for such ignorance." He pushed his half-finished soup
aside and adopted an impressive pose with both elbows on the table, his
hands together, and one finger describing acrobatic gyrations to point
his words. The manner of it fascinated his hearer. "Let me tell you,
sir, that Snake's Fall is the new coalfield of this great country.
Sir," he added, with great dramatic effect, "Snake's Fall is capable of
supplying the coal of the _world_! There's hundreds of billions of
tons of high-grade coal underlying these silly-lookin' hummocks they
call the foothills. All this land around Snake's Fall was Silas
Mallinsbee's ranch, and he found the coal. That's why I said Silas
Mallinsbee was the father of Snake's Fall. He sold this land to a
great coal corporation, and bought land away further up in the hills,
where he still runs his ranch. He's a great man with a pile of
dollars. And he's clever, too. He's kep' for himself all the land
either side of the railroad, except this town. And that's why all
these land pirates, or ground sharks, are around. The railroad ain't
declared their land yet, and everybody's waiting to jump in. The
coal's five miles west of here, and the railroad has got to say if
they'll keep the depot where it is, or build a new one further along,
right on the coal seams. That's the play we're all watching. We want
to buy right. We want to buy for the boom. These guys here are out to
get in on the ground floor, and see prices go sky high--when they've
bought. There'll be some dandy piles made in this play--and lost."
By the time he had finished Gordon was agog with excitement. It had
stirred as the man began to talk, without his fully understanding the
meaning of it. Then, as he proceeded, it grew, and with its growth
came enlightenment. Vaguely he saw the hand of Providence in the
affairs of the last few days.
He had planned his own little matters, or rather he had drifted into
them, and then the gods of fortune had taken a hand. And the way of
it. He began to smile. A strangely impish mood must have stirred
them. His journey. His discovery of the absurdity of his own plans in
the nick of time. His visit to the smoker. His play with a "sharp."
His fight, and his sudden and uncalculated arrival at Snake's Fall.
Here he was, quite without the least intention of his own, landed into
the only sort of place in which it could be reasonably hoped he might
pick up a fortune quickly. He wondered how he was likely to fare in
competition with these ground sharks about him. And the thought made
him begin to laugh.
McSwain eyed him doubtfully.
"Amusin', ain't it?" he said, without appreciation.
Gordon shook his head.
"If you only knew--it is."
Peter went on with his food for a few moments in silence.
"I s'pose the boom will come big when it does start?" hazarded Gordon
presently.
"Big? Say, you ain't got a grip on things yet. Snake's Fall could
supply the whole--not half--world with high-grade stove coal. Does
that tell you anything? No? Wal, it jest means that when the railroad
says the word, hundred-dollar plots 'll fetch a thousand dollars in a
week, and maybe ten thousand in a month or less. I tell you right here
that in six months from the time the railroad talks there'll be fifty
thousand speculators right here, and we'll most of us rake in our
piles. We only got to jump in at the start, maybe a bit before, and
the game's right in our hands. Get me? I tell you, sir, this is
bigger than the first Kootenay rush and nigh as big as the Cobalt boom
in Canada."
Gordon was impressed.
"And to think I came here by accident."
"Accident?"
"You see, I was persuaded--against my will."
His eyes were twinkling.
"Ah, Mallinsbee persuaded you--being a friend of his."
"No. As a matter of fact I think it was the train conductor who
persuaded me."
"He's a wise guy, then."
"Ye-es. I don't guess I'll see him again. I surely owe him something
for what he did."
Peter nodded seriously as he gazed at the humorous eyes of his
companion.
"He's given you the chance of--a lifetime, sir. And that's a thing
ther' ain't many in this country yearning to do."
After that the meal progressed in silence until the pie was handed
round.
Gordon was thinking hard. He was wondering, in view of what he had
heard, what he ought to do. Land. What did he know about land? How
could he measure his wits against the wits of such land speculators as
he saw about him? He studied the faces of some of the clamorous crowd
in the dining-room. They were a strangely mixed lot. There were
undoubtedly men of substance among them, but equally surely the
majority were adventurers looking to step into the arena of the coming
boom and wrest a slice of fortune by hook, or, more probably, by crook.
What did he know? What could he do? And his mind went back to the
sharp on the train, and the way he had fallen to the man's snare.
Again he wanted to laugh. He had counted the bills which Mallinsbee
had handed him, in the privacy of his bathroom. He only remembered to
have lost about two hundred dollars to the gambler. The dollars handed
to him amounted to well over three hundred. The miracle of it all. He
had nearly killed the gambler, and, instead of losing, he had made over
a hundred dollars on the deal. The miracle of it!
"Do you believe in miracles?" he laughed abruptly.
Peter glanced up from his plate suspiciously. Then he promptly joined
in the other's amusement. He always remembered that this newcomer was
a friend of Silas Mallinsbee.
"Meracles?" he said reflectively. "I can't say I always did. But one
or two things have made some difference that way. Takin' one extra
drink saved my life once. The takin' of that drink wasn't jest a
meracle," he added dryly. "It was more of a habit them days. Still,
it was a meracle in a way. Me an' my brother wer' on a bust. We were
feeling that good we was handin' out our pasts in lumps to each other,
same as if we was strangers, and wasn't raised around the same cabbige
patch. Wal, he'd borrowed an automobile and left the saloon to wind it
up, and get things fixed. While he was gone the boys handed me another
cocktail. Then the bartender slung one at me, an' I hadn't no more
sense than to buy another one myself. Then some damn fool thought rye
was the best mix for drinkin' on top o' cocktails, an' so they put me
to bed. Guess I never see my brother get back from that joy ride." He
sighed. "I allow they had to bury a lot of that automobile with him,
he was so mussed up. Sort o' meracle, you'd say? Then there was
another time. Guess it was my wife. She was one o' them females who
make you feel you want to associate with tame earthworms. Sort o'
female who never knew what a sick headache was, an' sang hymns of a
Sunday evening, and played a harmonium when she was feelin' in sperits.
Sort o' female who couldn't help smellin' out when you was lyin' to
her, an' gener'ly told you of it. A good woman though, an' don't yer
fergit it. Wal, I got sick once an' when I got right again she guessed
it was up to 'em to insure myself in her favor. Guess I'd just paid my
first premium when she goes an' takes colic an' dies. I did all I
knew. I give her ginger, an' hot-water bags, an' poultices. It didn't
make no sort o' difference. She died. I ain't paid no premiums since.
Sort o' meracle that," he added, with a satisfied smile. "Then there's
this coal. I hadn't started this hotel six months when Mallinsbee gets
busy an' makes his deal with the corporation. You ain't goin' to make
a pile out of a bum country hotel without a--meracle."
The man's gravity was impressive, and Gordon strove for sympathy.
"Yes," he declared, with smiling emphasis. "There are such things as
miracles. One has happened this day--and here. My arrival here was
certainly a miracle. A peculiarly earthy miracle, but, nevertheless,
a--miracle. Say, I'll have to write some in the office. See you
again."
Gordon pushed back his chair and hurried away through the crowded room
towards the office. But here again was a crowd. Here again was
"land"--always "land." And in desperation he betook himself to his
bathroom. He felt he must write to his mother. He felt that on this
his arrival in Snake's Fall he could do no less than reassure her of
his well-being.
Mrs. James Carbhoy sighed contentedly as she raised her eyes from the
last of a number of sheets of paper in her lap. Her husband turned
from his contemplation of the scorching streets, and the parched
foliage of the wide expanse of trees beyond the window.
"Well?" he inquired. "Where is the boy?"
There was the faintest touch of anxiety in his inquiry, but his face
was perfectly controlled, and the humor in his eyes was quite unchanged.
Mrs. Carbhoy sighed again.
"I don't know. He doesn't say. Nor does he give the slightest clew."
She examined the envelope of the letter. "It was mailed here in New
York. It's a rambling sort of letter. I hope he is all right. This
hot weather is---- Do you think he----"
Her husband laughed.
"I guess he's all right. You see I don't fancy he wants us to know
where he is. That's come through some friend, I'd say. Just read it
out."
Gordon's mother leaned back in her chair again. She was more than
ready to read her beloved boy's letter again, in spite of her
misgivings. Besides, there was a hope in her thoughts that she had
missed some clew as to his whereabouts which her clear-sighted husband
might detect.
"DEAREST MUM:
"Destinations are mighty curious things which have a way of making up
their minds as to whom they are terminals for, regardless of the
individual. Most of us think the matter of destination is in our own
hands. We make up our minds to go to the North Pole; well, if we get
there it's because no other terminal on the way has made up its mind to
claim us. I've surely arrived at my destination, a place I wasn't
going to, nor had heard of, nor dreamed of--even when I had nightmare.
I guess this place must have said to itself, 'Hello, here's Gordon
Carbhoy on the train; he's every sort of fool, he don't know if it's
Palm Sunday or Candlemas, he hasn't got more sense than an old hen with
kittens, let's divert him where we think he ought to go.' So I arrived
here quite suddenly this afternoon and, in consequence, have wasted
some fifty odd dollars of passage money. It's a good beginning, and
one the old Dad 'll surely appreciate.
"Talking of the old Dad, I'd like you to tell him from me that I don't
think graft is confined to--big finance. This is a discovery he's
likely to be interested in. Also, since he's largely interested in
railroads, though not from a traveling point of view, I would point out
that much might be done to improve accommodation. The aisles are too
narrow and the corners of the seats are too sharp. Furthermore, the
best money-making scheme I can think of at the moment is a billet as a
conductor of a transcontinental express.
"However, these things are just first impressions.
"There are other impressions I won't discuss here. They relate to
arrival platforms of depots. When a fellow gets out on his own in the
world, there are many things with which he comes into contact liable to
strike him forcibly. Those are the things in life calculated to teach
him much that may be useful to him afterwards. I have already come
into contact with such things, and though they are liable to leave an
impression of soreness generally, their lessons are quite sound.
"On the whole, in spite of having lost fifty odd dollars on my railroad
ticket, my first two or three days' adventures have left me with a
margin of profit such as I could not reasonably have expected. I
mention this to show you, presuming that the Dad has told you the
object of my going, that my eye is definitely focused on the primary
purpose of my ramblings.
"I am keeping my eyes well open and one or two of my observations might
be of interest to you.
"I have discovered that the luxurious bath is not actually necessary to
life, and, from a hygienic point of view, there's no real drawback to
the kind of soap vulgarly known as 'hoss.' Furthermore, the filtration
of water for ablutionary purposes is quite unnecessary. All it needs
is to be of a consistency that'll percolate through a fish net.
Moreover, judging from observations only, I have discovered that a comb
and brush, if securely chained up, can be used on any number of heads
without damaging results.
"Observation cannot be considered complete without its being turned
upon one's fellow-creatures. I have already come into contact with
some very interesting specimens of my kind. Without worrying you with
details I have found some of them really worth while. Generalizing,
I'd like to say right here that man seems to be a creature of curious
habits--many of which are bad. I don't say this with malice. On the
contrary, I say it with appreciation. And, too, I never realized what
a general hobby amongst men the collecting of dollars was. It must be
all the more interesting that, as a collection, it never seems
completed. I'd like to remark that view points change quickly under
given circumstances, and I am now bitten with the desire to become a
collector.
"Furthermore, my focus had readjusted itself already. For instance, I
feel no repulsion at the manners displayed in the dining-room of a
small country 'hotel.' I feel sure that the man who eats with his
mouth open and snores at the same time is quite justified, if he
happens to be bigger and stronger than the man who hears and sees him.
I also feel that a man is only within his rights in having two or even
three helpings of every dish in a hotel run on the American plan,
unless the limit to a man's capacity is definitely estimated on the
printed tariff. Another observation came my way. Honesty seems to be
a matter of variable quality. A nice ethical problem is suggested by
the following incident. A man robs his victim; a righteously indignant
onlooker sees the transaction, and his honesty-loving nature rebels.
He forthwith robs the robber and hands the proceeds of his robbery to
the original victim. This seems to me to open up a road to discussion
which I'm sure the Dad and I would enjoy--though not at this distance.
"I have already learned that there are plenty of great men in the world
whose existence I had never suspected. I have a feeling that local
celebrities have a greater glory than national heroes. George
Washington never told a lie, it is true, and his birthday forms an
adequate excuse for a certain stimulation in the enjoyments of a
people. But he never discovered a paying field for speculation by the
dollar chasers. Until a man does that he can have no understanding of
real glory.
"I hope you and Gracie are well. I think it would be advisable to
check Gracie's appetite for candy. I am already realizing that luxury
can be overdone. She might turn her attention to peanuts, which I
observe is a popular pastime amongst the people with whom I have come
into contact. I would suggest to the old Dad that five-cent cigars
have merits in spite of rumor to the contrary. I feel, too, that the
dollar ninety-five he would thus save on his smoke might, in time,
become a valuable asset.
"Your loving son,
"GORDON."
CHAPTER VI
GORDON PROSPECTS SNAKE'S FALL
It was a blazing day. The dust of the prairie street smothered boots
and trouser-legs with a fine gray powder which even rose high enough to
get into the throats of pedestrians, and drive them headlong to the
nearest place where they could hope to quench a raging thirst.
There was no shelter from the sun, unless it were to be found upon the
verandas with which many of the Snake's Fall houses were fronted.
Gordon's face was rapidly blistering as he idly wandered through the
town. Great streams of perspiration coursed from beneath his soft felt
hat. His double collar felt sticky, and suggested imminent collapse.
To all of which discomforts were now added a swarm of flies buzzing
about his moist face with a distracting persistence which tried even
his patience.
Gordon was abroad fairly early. He was abroad for several reasons. He
possessed a haunting dread of the rapid passing of time. He had slept
healthily, if not altogether comfortably. Nor had he yet made up his
mind whether the floor of his room would not be preferable to his bed
for the passing of future nights. The floor was smooth, there were no
hummocks on it. Then, too, the sorely tried and thoroughly slack
bed-springs would be avoided, and the horrible groans of a protesting
frame would remain silent. It was a matter to be given consideration
before the day ended, and, being really of a very thorough nature, he
decided to consider it after supper.
He had lain awake for a long time that first night under the shelter of
Peter McSwain's hospitable roof, and in the interim of dodging the
flock hummocks he had closely considered his future movements.
He argued, if things were as he had been told they were in Snake's
Fall, he did not see how he could do better than throw his lot in with
the crowd of "ground sharks" awaiting the boom. Having convinced
himself in this direction, he felt that at the very earliest
opportunity he must reassure himself of Peter McSwain's veracity. He
felt that no member of the get-rich-quick brigade could dare to ignore
the claims of a great coal discovery about to boom. Besides, the whole
thing had been pitched into his lap; or rather it was he who had been
pitched. Nor did the roughness of the method of his arrival detract
from the chances spreading out before his astonished eyes.
Now he was searching the place for those signs which were to tell him
of the accuracy of his information. Nor was it long before he realized
that such a search on his part was scarcely likely to prove productive.
His knowledge of coal had never been more intimate than the payment of
certain fuel bills presented to him at intervals in the past by the
faithful Harding. While as for indications of a boom--well, he had
heard that a boom came along, everybody robbed everybody else, and in
the end a number of widows and orphans found themselves deprived of
their savings, and a considerable body of attorneys had increased their
year's income out of all proportion to their just deserts. He felt his
weakness keenly. However, he persisted. He felt the only thing was to
attack the problem with an open mind. He did so, and it quickly became
filled with a humorous interest that had nothing to do with his purpose.
Surveying his surroundings, he thought that never in his life had he
even imagined such a quaint collection of habitations. The long,
straight street, running parallel to the railroad track suggested a row
of jagged, giant teeth. Each building was set in its own section of
jawbone, distinct from its nearest neighbor. Then they reared their
heads and terminated in a pointed fang or a flat, clean-cut edge of
high boarding. Sometimes they possessed a mere sloping roof, like a
well-worn tooth, and, here and there, a half-wrecked building, with its
roof fallen in, stood out like a severely decayed molar.
Most of the stores--and he counted a dozen or more--suggested a
considerable trade. In this direction he noted a hardware store
particularly. A drug store, too, with an ice-cream soda fountain,
seemed to be in high favor, as also did several dry-goods stores,
judging by the number of females in attendance. But the small candy
stores were abandoned to the swarming flies.
The people were interesting. There certainly was a considerable number
about, in spite of the heat. They, anyway the men, all looked hot like
himself, but seemed to be surcharged with an energy that appeared to
him somewhat artificial. They hurried unnecessarily. They paused and
spoke quickly, and passed on. Here and there they fell into groups,
and their boisterous laughter suggested the inevitable funny story or
risque tale. There were a great number of vehicles rattling
about--buggies, buckboards, democrat wagons--while several times he was
passed by speeding saddle-horses which smothered him in the dust raised
by their unshod hoofs.
At last he came to the end of the street, and turned to retrace his
steps. It was all too interesting to be readily abandoned on this his
first day beyond the conventions of life as his father's son.
Just outside a large livery barn he came to an abrupt halt, and stood
stupidly staring at the entrance of the largest dry-goods store in the
street. The whole thing had caught and held him in a moment. He
seemed to remember having seen something of the sort in a moving
picture once; perhaps it was years ago. But in real life--never.
A great chestnut saddle-horse had dashed up to the tying-post outside
the store. It had reined up with a jerk, and its rider had flung out
of the saddle with the careless abandon he had read about or seen in
the pictures. Hooking the reins over a peg, the rider hurried towards
the store. It was then Gordon obtained a full view.
In a moment the flies were forgotten and the heat of the day meant
nothing to him. What a vision was revealed! The coiled masses of
auburn hair, the magnificent hazel eyes and the delightful sun-tanned
oval of the face, the trim figure and perfect carriage, the costume!
The long habit coat and loose riding-breeches terminated in the
daintiest of tan riding-boots and silver spurs. Splendid! What a
picture for his admiring eyes! A picture of grace, and health, and
beauty.
But the vision was gone in a moment. The girl had passed into the
store, and it was only left to the enthusiastic spectator to turn to
the magnificent chestnut horse she had so unconcernedly left waiting
for her.
Almost immediately, however, his attention was diverted into another
direction. A dark, sallow-faced man had promptly taken up his position
at the entrance of the store, and stood gazing in after the vanished
figure of the girl.
For some absurd reason Gordon took an intense dislike to the man. He
looked unhealthy, and he hated that look in a man. Besides, the
impertinence of standing there spying upon a lady who was doubtless
simply bent on an ordinary shopping expedition. It was most
exasperating. All unconsciously he straightened his great figure and
squared his shoulders. It would not have required much to have made
him go and ask the man what he meant by it.
He was rapidly working himself up into a superlative rage, when the
girl in the fawn riding-costume reappeared. A delightful smile broke
over his good-looking face, but only to be promptly swallowed up in a
scowl. The girl had paused, and was speaking to the anaemic creature
whose presence he felt to be an outrage.
He noted her smile. What a delightful smile! Yes, he could distinctly
make out two dimples beyond the corners of her pretty mouth. His
dislike of the favored man merged into a regret for himself.
Hello! The smile had gone from the girl's face. Her beautiful hazel
eyes were sparkling with resentment. The man was looking angry, too.
Gordon rubbed his hands. Then he began to grin like a revengeful and
malicious schoolboy. The girl had moved on to her horse, and in doing
so it almost looked as if she had deliberately pushed past the
white-livered creature attempting to detain her.
She leaped into the saddle and swung the horse about almost on its
haunches. The next moment she was lost in a cloud of dust as she raced
down the street.
"Mighty fine horsemanship that," said a voice, as Gordon gazed
open-mouthed after the girlish vision. "A smart gal, too, eh?"
Gordon turned. A small man was sitting at the open doors of the livery
barn upon an upturned box. He was leaning forward lazily, with his
elbows on his knees and his hands clutching his forearms. His towzled,
straw-colored hair stuck out under the brim of his prairie hat, and a
chew of tobacco bulged one thin, leathery cheek. His trousers were
fastened about his waist with a strap, and his only upper garment was a
dirty cotton shirt which disclosed an expanse of mahogany-colored chest
below the neck.
"Smart gal?" retorted Gordon enthusiastically. "That don't say a
thing. She might have stepped right out of the pages of a book." Then
he added, as an afterthought, "And it would have to be a mighty good
book, too."
"Sure," nodded the other in agreement.
"Who is she?"
The man grinned and spat.
"Why, that's Miss Hazel. Every feller in this city knows Miss Hazel.
If you need eddication you want to see her astride of an unbroken colt.
Ther' never was a cowpuncher a circumstance aside o' her. She's the
dandiest horseman out."
"I'd say you're right, all right."
"Right? Guess ther' ain't no argument. Hosses is my trade. I was
born an' raised with 'em. It don't take me guessin' twice 'bout a
horseman. I got forty first-class hosses right here in this barn, an'
I got a bunch runnin' on old Mallinsbee's grazin'. Y'see, a livery
barn is a mighty busy place when a city starts to think o' booming.
All them rigs an' buggies you see chasin' around are hired right here,"
he finished up proudly.
Gordon became interested. He felt the man was talking because he
wanted to talk. He was talking out of the prevailing excitement which
seemed to actuate everybody on the subject of the coming boom. He
encouraged him.
"I'd say a livery barn should be a mighty fine speculation under these
conditions," he said, while the keen gray eyes of the barn proprietor
quietly sized him up. "There ought to be a pile hanging to it."
"Ye-es."
The man's demur roused the other's curiosity.
"Not?" he inquired.
"'Tain't that. Ther's dollars to it, but--they don't come in bunches.
Y'see, I'm out after a wad--quick. We all are. When the railroad
talks we'll know where we are. But it's best to be in before. See?
Oh, I guess the barn's all right. 'Tain't that. Say, I'd hand you
this barn right here, every plug an' every rig I got, if you could jest
answer me one question--right."
"And the question?" Gordon smiled.
"Wher' is the bloomin' depot to be? Here, or yonder to the west at
Buffalo Point? Answer that right, an' you can have this caboose a
present."
The little man sighed, and Gordon began to understand the strain of
waiting for these people looking for a big pile quick. He shook his
head.
"I'm beginning to think I'd like to know myself. Say, I s'pose you
figure this is a great place to make money? I s'pose you fancy it's a
sure thing?"
The man unfolded his arms and waved one hand in a comprehensive gesture.
"Do you need to ask me that?" he inquired, almost scornfully. "What
does them big coal seams tell you? Can you doubt? Hev' you got two
eyes to your head which don't convey no meaning to your brain? Them
coal seams could stoke hell till kingdom come, an' shares 'ud still be
at a premium. That's the backbone. Wal, we ain't got shares in that
corporation, but the quickest road to the pile o' dollars we're
yearning for is in town plots. An'," he added regretfully, "every day
brings in more sharps, an' every new sharp makes it harder. It's that
blamed railroad we're waiting for, an' that railroad needs to graft its
way in before it'll talk."
"Graft? Graft again," laughed Gordon.
"Why, cert'nly." The livery man opened his eyes in astonishment.
"Folks don't do nothin' for nix that I ever heard. Specially
railroads. That depot 'll be built where their interests lie, an'
we'll have to go on guessin' till they get things fixed."
"I see."
"Which says you ain't blind."
"No, I don't think I'm blind exactly. It's just--lack of experience.
I must get a peek at those seams. Mallinsbee's the man who'll know
about things as soon as anybody, I s'pose. He owns all the land along
the railroad, doesn't he?"
The man rubbed his hands and grinned.
"Sure. He'll know, an' through him us as he's let in on the ground
floor. Say, he's a heap of a good feller--an' bright. Y'see, him an'
us, some of us fellers who been here right along before the coal was
found, are good friends. There's some of us got stakes down Buffalo
Point way as well as up here. See? O' course, our pile lies Buffalo
Point way, an' we're hopin' he'll fix the railroad corporation that
way. If he does, gee! he's the feller we're gamblin' on."
Gordon's interest had become almost feverish as he listened. He was
gathering the corroboration he needed with an ease he had never
anticipated.
"I suppose one hundred thousand dollars would be nothing to make
if--things go right?"
"If things go our way, I'd say a hundred thousand wouldn't be a
circumstance," cried the man enthusiastically. "I'd make that out of a
few hundred dollars without a worry--if things went right. But it
ain't the way of things to go right when you figger up."
"No, I s'pose it's a matter of chance. The chance comes, and you've
just got to grab it right and hold it."
"Sure. Chance! If chance hits you, why, don't go to hit back. Jest
hug it--same as you would your best gal."
Gordon laughed and peered into the shadowy interior of the barn.
"Guess that's good talk," he said, "and I'm going to listen. I've got
right hold of that chance, and I'm hugging it. Seems to me I'll need
to get out and get a peek at Silas Mallinsbee's coal. Can you hire me
a rig?"
"I got a dandy top buggy an' team," cried the man, now alert and ready
for business. "Ten dollars to supper-time. How?"
Gordon nodded, and the man vanished within the barn.
Left alone, he reflected on the rapidity of the movement of events. He
had had a luck that he surely could not have anticipated. Why, under
the influence of the prevailing enthusiasm of the place, he seemed to
feel that the whole thing was too utterly simple. He wondered what his
father would have said had he been there. It would be a glorious coup
to return home with that one hundred thousand dollars well before the
expiry of his time limit.
From the dark interior of the barn came the sounds of horses' hoofs
clattering on the boarded floor.
Presently his thoughts drifted from the important matters in hand to a
far less consequent matter. It was not in his nature to be long
enamored of the hunt for fortune, no matter what the consequences
attached to it.
He began to think of the vision in fawn-colored riding-costume. So her
name was Hazel. Hazel--what? he wondered. A pretty name, and well
suited to her. Hazel. Those eyes, and the gorgeous masses of her
hair! He sighed. For a moment he thought of inquiring of the livery
man her other name. Then he smilingly shook his head and decided to
let that remain a secret for the present. It added to the romance of
the thing. Of one thing he was certain: he must contrive to see her
again, and get to know her. Fortune or no fortune, if his father were
to cut him off with the proverbial shilling as a spendthrift and
waster, if he never saw a partnership in the greatest financial
corporation in the United States, that girl could not be allowed to
flash into his life like a ray of spring sunshine, and pass out of it
again because he hadn't the snap to get to know her.
He had known so many women in his own set at home. He had admired, he
had flirted harmlessly enough, he had shed presents and given parties,
but somehow he felt that amongst all those society beauties there had
not been one comparable to this wild rose of the foothills.
"Say, it's a bright team an' 'll need handlin'," said the doubtful
voice of the livery man.
"Don't worry," returned Gordon, shocked into the affairs of the moment
by the anxious voice.
"Good." The man sounded relieved.
"Which is the best way?"
"Why, chase the trail straight away west. You can't miss it. I'll
take that ten dollars."
Gordon paid and climbed into the buggy. The next moment the vehicle
rolled out of the barn.
CHAPTER VII
"MISS HAZEL"
Gordon was in no mood to take things easily. Something of the
atmosphere of the place had already got into his blood. His was
similar to the mood of those whom he had seen hurrying unnecessarily in
the town. Those whom he had seen exchanging hurried words and passing
on.
Although he lived in the age of automobiles and aeroplanes, nothing of
his education had been forgotten by his father. He was a perfect whip
with a four-in-hand, and now, as he handled a "bright" team of livery
horses, it was child's play to him. He bustled his horses until he had
left the ragamuffin town behind him, then he settled down to a steady,
round gait, and gave himself up to the prospect of the contemplation of
those scenes of industry which he shortly hoped to discover.
Within ten minutes of leaving the town he discovered the first signs.
Men and horses appeared in the distance upon the hills. At one point
he discerned a traction engine hauling a string of laden wagons. It
was the first breaking up of the monotonous green of the low hills.
And it promptly suggested that, in the hidden hollows, he would
probably discover far more energetic signs of the work of the coal
corporation, which doubtless must have already begun in real earnest.
Things were becoming interesting. He wondered how much work had been
done. There was no sign of the coal itself yet. He remembered to have
visited coal mines once, and then everything had been black and gloomy.
Vast heaps of slack had been piled everywhere, and the pit heads had
been surmounted by hauling machinery. There had been great black
wastes dotted by houses and streets, which seemed to have taken to
themselves something of the hue of the deposits which had brought them
into existence. Even the men and women, and particularly the children,
had been living advertisements for the great industry which supported
them. Here, as yet, there were no such signs. However, doubtless
further on there would----
All in a moment his thoughts of coal were broken off, and all his
interest vanished like a puff of that coal's smoke in a gale. Coal no
longer meant anything to him. He didn't care if the whole wide world
starved for coal for all eternity. A chestnut horse was on the trail
ahead, and a figure was stooping beside it examining its nearside
forefoot. The figure was clad in a _fawn-colored riding-costume_.
The electric current of his feelings communicated itself to his team
through the whip as its conductor. The team reared and plunged, then,
under his strong hands, they bowled merrily along the dusty trail at a
great though well-controlled speed towards the distant figures.
The girl dropped the horse's hoof and straightened herself abruptly.
She turned with a quick movement, and gazed back over the trail, her
eyes alert and questioning. Her wide prairie hat was thrust slightly
from her forehead, and a coil of abundant auburn hair was displayed
beneath its brim. Her finely penciled eyebrows were drawn together in
an unmistakable question, and her pretty eyes were obviously
speculative.
She waited while the buggy drew nearer. She recognized the team as
from Mike Callahan's barn, but the occupant of the vehicle was a
stranger to her.
The latter fact drew her attention more closely. For a moment she had
hoped that it was someone she knew. She needed someone she knew just
now. Anyway, a stranger was always interesting, even though he could
not afford her the assistance she just now happened to need.
She descried a boyish, eager face on the top of a pair of wonderful
shoulders. But that which made a strong appeal to her was the manner
in which he was handling his horses. There was nothing here of the
slovenly prairie teamster. The stranger, whoever he was, was a master
behind a good team of horses. She delighted in a horseman, whether he
were in the driving-seat or the saddle.
But all of a sudden she became aware that her regard had been observed,
and, with a little smile twinkling in the depths of her hazel eyes, she
picked up her horse's forefoot again, and once more probed with her
gauntleted finger for the cause of the desperate lameness with which he
had been suddenly attacked.
She heard the buggy come up. She was aware that the team had swung out
to avoid collision. Then a cheery voice greeted her ears with its
pleasant and welcome inquiry--
"You seem to be in a fix. Can I help any?"
Before the girl looked round she was aware that the teamster had
alighted. Then when she finally released her hold of the injured hoof,
and stood up, she found herself confronted by Gordon's smiling blue
eyes, as he stood bare-headed before her.
Somehow or other a smiling response was unavoidable.
"That's real kind of you," she said, "but I don't guess you can. You
see, poor Sunset's dead lame with a flint in his frog, and--and I just
can't get the fool thing out."
Gordon endeavored to look serious. But the trouble was incomparable in
his mind with the delightful charm of this girl, in her divided
riding-suit. However, his effort to conceal his admiration was not
without some success.
"I don't guess we can stand for any old thing like an impertinent
flint," he said impulsively. "Sunset must be relieved. Sunset must be
put out of pain. I'm not just a veterinary surgeon, but I'm a
specialist on the particular flint which happens to annoy you. Just
grab these lines while I have a look."
The frank unconventionality of the man was wholly pleasing, and the
girl found herself obeying him without question.
"It's the nearside," she explained.
Then she remained silent, watching the assured manner in which the
stranger set about his work. He picked up the hoof and examined it
closely. Then he drew out a folding button-hook from a trouser pocket.
Then, for a few moments, she watched his deft manipulation of it.
Presently he stood up holding a long, thin, sharp splinter of flint
between finger and thumb.
"Say," he remarked, as he returned the buttonhook to his pocket, while
his eyes shone merrily, "I believe if some bright geologist were to set
out chasing these flints to their lair, I've a notion he'd pull up
in--in--well, aspirate a certain measure in cloth and I'd guess you get
the answer right away. It's paved with 'em. That's my secret belief.
I could write a treatise on 'em. I've discovered every breed and every
species. I tell you if you want to study these rocks right, you need
to run an automobile, and find yourself in a hurry, having forgotten to
carry spare tires. Ugh!" He flung the stone away from him and turned
again to the horse.
Still watching him, the girl saw him deliberately tear off a piece of
his handkerchief, and, with the point of his pocket-knife, stuff it
into the jagged gash in poor Sunset's frog.
"That'll keep out some of Snake's Fall," he observed, returning the
rest of his handkerchief to his pocket. "We'll take it out when we get
him home." Then he deliberately turned to his team and tied Sunset
alongside. After that, in the most practical manner, he moved the
wheels of the buggy apart. "Jump right in. Guess you know the way, so
you can show it me. You see, I'm a stranger. Say, it's an awful thing
to be a stranger. Life's rotten being a stranger."
The girl was gazing at him with wide, wondering eyes that were half
inclined to resentment. She was not accustomed to being ordered about
in this cavalier fashion. She had no intention of being incontinently
swept off her feet.
"Thanks," she said, with an assumption of hauteur. "If you'll untie
Sunset I'll ride home."
"Ride home? Say, you're joking. Why, you can't ride Sunset with that
gash in his frog. Say, you couldn't be so cruel. Think of the poor
fellow silently suffering. Think of the mute anguish he would endure
at each step. It--it would be a crime, an outrage, a--a----" He broke
off, his eyes twinkling merrily.
The girl wanted to be annoyed. She told herself she was annoyed, but
she nevertheless began to laugh, and Gordon knew he was to have his way.
"I really couldn't think of accepting your---- Besides, you weren't
going to Buffalo Point. You know you weren't."
"Do I?" Gordon's eyes were blankly inquiring. "Now how on earth do I
know where I was going? Say, I guess it's true I had in my mind a
vision of the glinting summer sun, tinting the coal heaps with its
wonderful, golden, ripening rays--though I guess it would be some work
ripening stove coal--but as to my ever getting there--well, that just
depended on the trail I happened to take. As I said, I'm a stranger.
And I may as well admit right here that I've a hobby getting mussed up
with wrong trails."
The girl's laughter dispelled her last effort at dignity.
"I knew you were a stranger. You see, I get to know everybody here--by
sight."
Gordon made a gesture of annoyance.
"There," he exclaimed in self-disgust, "I ought to have thought of that
before. How on earth could I expect you to ride in a stranger's buggy,
with said stranger on the business end of the lines? Then the hills
are so near. Why, you might be spirited off goodness knows where, and
your loving relatives never, never hear of you no more, and---- Say,
we can easily fix that though. My name's--Van Henslaer. Gordon Van
Henslaer from New York. Now if you tell me--what's the matter?"
A merry peal of laughter had greeted his announcement, and Gordon
looked on in pretended amazement, waiting for her mirth to subside.
"Oh dear, oh dear," the girl cried at last. "I might have known. Say,
of course I ought to have known. You came here yesterday on the
train--by mistake. You----"
"That's so. I'd booked through to Seattle, but--some interfering pack
of fools guessed I'd made a--mistake,"
The girl nodded. Her pretty eyes were still dancing with merriment.
"Father came by the same train, and told me of someone who got mixed up
in--in a fight, and they threw----"
"Don't say another word," Gordon cried hurriedly. "I'm--I'm the man.
And your father is----?"
"Mallinsbee--Silas Mallinsbee!"
"Then you are Hazel Mallinsbee."
"How do you know my first name?"
"Why, I saw you in town, and the livery man told me you were 'Miss
Hazel.' Say, this is bully. Now we aren't strangers, and you can ride
in my buggy without any question. Jump right in, and I'll drive
you--where is it?"
Hazel Mallinsbee obeyed without further demur. She sprang into the
vehicle, and Gordon promptly followed. The next moment they were
moving on at a steady, sober pace.
"It's Buffalo Point," the girl directed. "It's only four miles. Then
you can go on and enjoy your beautiful pathetic picture of the coal
workings. But you won't have much time if we travel at this gait," she
added slyly.
Gordon shook his head.
"It's Sunset," he said. "We must consider his poor foot."
There was laughter in Hazel's eyes as she sighed.
"Poor Sunset. Perhaps--you're right."
"Without a doubt," Gordon laughed. "He might get blood poisoning, or
cancer, or dyspepsia, or something if we bustled him."
Hazel pointed a branching trail to the north.
"That's the trail," she said. "Father's at home. He'll be real glad
to see you. Say, you know father ought to know better--at his age.
He--he just loves a scrap. He was telling me about you, and saying how
you 'hammered'--that's the word he used--the 'sharp.' He was most
upset that the train crew spoiled the finish. You know father's a
great scallywag. I don't believe he thinks he's a day over twenty.
It's--it's dreadful--with a grown-up daughter. He's--just a great big
boy for all his gray hair. You should just see him out on the range.
He's got all the youngsters left standing. It must be grand to grow
old like he does."
Gordon listened to the girl's rich tones, and the enthusiasm lying
behind her words, and somehow the whole situation seemed unreal. Here
he was driving one of the most perfectly delightful girls he had ever
met to her home, within twenty-four hours of his absurd arrival in a
still more absurd town. Nor was she any mere country girl. Her whole
style spoke of an education obtained at one of the great schools in the
East. Her costume might have been tailored on Fifth Avenue, New York.
Yet here she was living the life of the wonderful sunlit prairie, the
daughter of an obscure rancher in the foothills of the Rockies.
"Say, your father is just a bully feller," he agreed quickly. "He
didn't know me from--a grasshopper, but he did me all sorts of a good
service. It don't matter what it was. But it was one of those things
which between men count a whole heap."
The girl's enthusiasm waxed.
"Father's just as good as--as he's clever. But," she added tenderly,
"he's a great scallywag. Oh dear, he'll never grow up." A few minutes
later she pointed quickly ahead with one gauntleted hand.
"That's Buffalo Point," she said. "There where that house is. That's
our house, and beyond it, half a mile, you can see the telegraph poles
of the railroad track."
Gordon gazed ahead. They still had a good mile to go. The lonely
house fixed his attention.
"Say, isn't there a village?" he inquired. "Buffalo Point?"
The girl shook her head.
"No. Just that little frame house of ours. Father had it built as--a
sort of office. You see, we're both working hard on his land scheme.
You see, it's--it's our hobby, the same as losing trails is yours."
Gordon laughed.
"That's plumb spoiled my day. I'd forgotten the land business. Now
it's all come over me like a chill, like the drip of an ice wagon down
the back of my neck. I s'pose there'll always be land around, and
we've always got to have coal. It seems a pity, doesn't it. Say,
there hasn't been a soul I've met in twenty-four hours, but they've
been crazy on--on town sites. They're most ridiculous things, town
sites. Four pegs and four imaginary lines, a deal of grass with a
substrata of crawly things. And for that men would scrap, and cheat,
and rob, and--and graft. It's--a wonder."
Hazel Mallinsbee checked her inclination to laugh again. Her eyes were
gazing ahead at the little frame house, and they grew wistfully serious.
"It isn't the land," she said simply. "The scrap, and cheat, and rob,
and graft, are right. But it's the fight for fortune. Fortune?" she
smiled. "Fortune means everything to a modern man. To some women,
too, but not quite in the way it does to a man. You see, in olden days
competition took a different form. I don't know if, in spite of what
folks say about the savagery of old times, they weren't more honest and
wholesome than they are now. However, nature's got to compete for
something. Human nature's got to beat someone. Life is just one
incessant rivalry. Well, in old times it took the form of bloodshed
and war, when men counted with pride the tally of their victories. Now
we point with pride to our civilization, and gaze back in pity upon our
benighted forefathers. Instead of bloodshed, killing, fighting,
massacring and all the old bad habits of those who came before us, we
point our civilization by lying, cheating, robbing and grafting."
Gordon smiled.
"Put that way it sounds as though the old folks were first-class saints
compared with us. There's a deal of honesty when two fellers get right
up on their hind legs and start in to mush each other's faces to a
pulp. But it isn't just the same when you creep up while the other
feller isn't wise and push the muzzle of a gun into his middle and
riddle his stomach till it's like a piece of gruyere cheese."
Hazel shook her head. Her eyes were still smiling, but Gordon detected
something of the serious thought behind them. He vainly endeavored to
sober his mood in sympathy.
"Guess it's the refinement of competition due to the claims of our much
proclaimed culture and civilization. I think civilization is a--a
dreadful mockery. To call it a whitewash would be a libel on a
perfectly innocent, wholesome, sanitary process. That's how I always
feel when I stop to think. But--but," her eyes began to dance with a
joyous enthusiasm, "I don't often think--not that way. Say, I just
love the battle, I mean the modern battle for fortune. It's--it's
almost the champagne of life. I know only one thing to beat it."
Gordon had forgotten the team he was driving, and let them amble
leisurely on towards the house, now so rapidly approaching.
"What's--the real champagne?" he inquired.
The girl turned and gazed at him with wide eyes.
"Why," she cried. "Life--just life itself. What else? Say, think of
the moment your eyes open to the splendid sunlight of day. Think of
the moment you realize you are living--living--living, after a long,
delicious night's sleep. Think of all the perfect moments awaiting you
before night falls, and you seek your bed again. It is just the very
essence of perfect joy."
"It's better after breakfast, and you've had time to get around some."
The ardor of the girl's mood received a sudden douche. Just for a
moment a gleam of displeasure shadowed her eyes. Then a twinkling
smile grew, and the clouds dispersed.
"Isn't that just a man? Where's your enthusiasm? Where's your joy of
life? Where's your romance, and--and spirit of hope?"
A great pretense of reproach lay in her rapid questions.
"Oh, they're all somewhere lying around, I guess," returned Gordon
simply. "Those things are all right, sure. But--but it's a mighty
tough proposition worrying that way on--on an empty stomach. It seems
to me that's just one of life's mistakes. There ought to be a law in
Congress that a feller isn't allowed to--to think till he's had his
morning coffee. The same law might provide for the fellow who fancies
himself a sort of canary and starts right in to sing before he's had
his bath. I'd have him sent to the electric chair. That sort of
fellow never has a voice worth two cents, and he most generally has a
repertoire of songs about as bright as Solomon's, and a mighty deal
older. Sure, Miss Mallinsbee, I haven't a word to say against life in
a general way, but it's about as wayward as a spoilt kid, and needs as
much coaxing."
Hazel Mallinsbee watched the play of the man's features while he
talked. She knew he meant little or nothing of what he said. The
fine, clear eyes, the smiling simplicity and atmosphere of virile youth
about him, all denied the sentiments he was giving vent to. She nodded
as he finished.
"At first I thought you meant all--that," she said lightly. "But now I
know you're just talking for talking's sake." Then, before he could
reply, she pointed excitedly at the house, now less than a hundred
yards away. "Why, there's father, standing right there on the
veranda!" she exclaimed.
Gordon looked ahead. The old man was waving one great hand to his
daughter.
CHAPTER VIII
AT BUFFALO POINT
To Gordon's mind Hazel Mallinsbee attached far greater importance to
her father's presence on the veranda than the incident warranted. It
did not seem to him that there was the least necessity for his being
there at all. Truth to tell, the matter appeared to him to be a
perfect nuisance. He had rather liked Silas Mallinsbee when he had met
him under somewhat distressing circumstances in the town. Now he felt
a positive dislike for him. His strong, keen, benevolent face made no
appeal to his sympathies now whatsoever.
Besides, it did not seem right that any man who claimed parentage of
such a delightful daughter as the girl at his side should slouch about
in a pair of old trousers tucked into top-boots and secured about his
waist by a narrow strap. And it seemed positively indecent that he
should display no other upper garment than a cotton shirt of such a
doubtful hue that it was impossible to be sure of its sanitary
condition.
However, he allowed none of these feelings betrayal, and replied
appropriately to Hazel's excited announcement. He was glad, later, he
had exercised such control, for their arrival at the house was the
immediate precursor of an invitation to share their midday meal, which
had already been placed on the table by the silent, inscrutable
Hip-Lee, the Chinese cook and general servitor in this temporary abode.
The horses had been housed and fed in the temporary stable at the back
of the house, and a committee of three had sat upon Sunset's injury and
prescribed for and treated it. Now they were indoors, ready for the
homely meal set out for them.
Hip-Lee moved softly about setting an additional place at the table for
the visitor. Silas Mallinsbee was lounging in the doorway, looking out
across the veranda. Hazel was superintending Hip-Lee's efforts.
Gordon was endeavoring to solve the problem of the rapid and unexpected
happenings which had befallen him since his arrival, and at the same
time carry on a conversation with the rumbling-voiced originator of
Snake's Fall boom.
"At one time I guessed I'd bumped right into the hands of the
Philistines," he said. "That's when I was--er arriving. Since then a
Samaritan got busy my way and dumps me right down in the heart of the
Promised Land, which just now seems to be flowing with milk and honey.
I set out to view the dull black mountains of industry, and instead I
arrive at the sparkling plains of delightful ease. Mr. Mallinsbee, you
certainly have contrived to put me under enormous obligation."
Gordon's eyes were pleasantly following the movements of the girl's
graceful figure about the plain but neat parlor. "I suppose all
offices in the West are not like this, because----"
Mallinsbee rumbled a pleasant laugh.
"Office?" he said, without turning. "That's jest how Hazel calls it.
Guess she's got notions since she finished off her education at Boston.
She's got around with a heap of 'em, includin' that suit she's wearin'.
Y'see, she's my foreman hoss-breaker, and reckons skirts and things
are--played out. Office? Why, it's just a shack. Some time you must
get around out an' see the ranch house. It's some place," he added
with simple pride.
Hazel went up to her father and pretended to threaten him by the neck.
"See, Daddy, you can just quit telling about my notions to--folks.
Anyway"--she turned her back to Gordon--"I appeal to you, Mr. Van
Henslaer, isn't an office a place where folks transact big deals and
make fortunes?"
"That's how folks reckon when they rent them," said Gordon. "Of
course, I've known folks to sleep in 'em. Others use 'em as a sort of
club smoking lounge. Then they've been known to serve some men as a
shelter from--home. I used to have an office."
Silas Mallinsbee turned from his contemplation of the horizon. He was
interested, and his shrewd eyes displayed the fact.
Hazel clapped her hands.
"And what did you use it for?" she demanded quizzically.
"I--oh, I--let's see. Well, mostly an address from which to have word
sent to folks I didn't want to see that--I was out. I used to find it
useful that way."
Mallinsbee's chuckle amused Gordon, but Hazel assumed an air of
judicial severity.
"A spirit not to be encouraged." Then, at the sound of her father's
chuckle, "My daddy, you are as bad as he. Now food's ready, so please
sit in. We can talk easier around a table than when people are
dreaming somewhere in the distance on the horizon, or walking about a
room that isn't bigger than the bare size to sit in. Anyway, Mr. Van
Henslaer, this office is for business. I won't have it disparaged by
my daddy, or--or anyone else. It serves a great purpose so far as
we're concerned." Then she added slyly, "You see, we're in the throes
of the great excitement of making a huge pile, for the sheer love of
making it. Aren't we, Daddy, dear?"
Silas Mallinsbee looked up from the food he was eating with the air of
a man who only eats as a matter of sheer necessity.
"Say, Mr. Van Henslaer," he said in his deep tones, "I've been a
rancher all my life. Cattle, to me, are just about the only things in
the world worth while, 'cept horses. I've never had a care or thought
outside 'em, till one day I got busy worrying what was under the ground
instead of keeping to the things I understood above the ground. Y'see,
the trouble was two things," he went on, smiling tenderly in his
daughter's direction. "One was I'd fed the ranch stoves with surface
coal that you could find almost anywheres on my land, and the other was
the fates just handed me the picture of a daughter who caught the
dangerous disease of 'notions' way down east at school in Boston.
Since she's come along back to us I've had coal, coal, coal all chasin'
through my head, an' playing baseball with every blamed common-sense
idea that ever was there before. Wal, to tell things quick, I made a
mighty big pile out of that coal just to please her. We didn't need
it, but she guessed it was up to me to do this. But that didn't finish
it. This gal here couldn't rest at that. She guessed that pile was
made and done with. She needs to get busy in another direction. Well,
she gets to work, and has all my land on the railroads staked out into
a township, and reckons it's a game worth playing. The other was too
dead easy. This time she reckons to measure her brains and energy
against a railroad! She reckons to show that we can match, and beat,
any card they can play. That's the reason of this office."
Hazel laughed and raised an admonishing finger at the smiling face and
twinkling eyes of her father.
"What did I tell you, Mr. Van Henslaer?" she cried. "Didn't I say he
was just a scallywag? Oh, my great, big daddy, I'm dreadfully,
dreadfully ashamed and disappointed in you. I'm going to give you
away. I am, surely. There, there, Mr. Van Henslaer, sits the wicked
plotter and schemer. Look at him. A big, burly ruffian that ought to
know better. Look at him," she went on, pointing a dramatic finger at
him. "And he isn't even ashamed. He's laughing. Now listen to me.
I'm going to tell you my version. He's a rancher all right, all right.
He's been satisfied with that all his life, and prosperity's never
turned him down. Then one day he found coal, and did nothing. We just
used to talk of it, that was all. Then another day along comes a
friend, a very, very old friend and neighbor, whom he's often helped.
He came along and got my daddy to sell him a certain patch of
grazing--just to help him out, he said. He was a poor man, and my
big-hearted daddy sold it him at a rock-bottom price to make it easy
for him. Three months later they were mining coal on it--anthracite
coal. That fellow made a nice pile out of it. He'd bluffed my daddy,
and my daddy takes a bluff from no man. Well, say, he just nearly went
crazy being bested that way, and he said to me--these were his words:
'Come on, my gal, you and me are just goin' to show folks what we're
made of. If there's money in my land we're going to make all we need
before anyone gets home on us. I'm goin' to show 'em I'm a match for
the best sharks our country can produce--and that's some goin'.' There
sits the money-spinner. There! Look at him; he's self-confessed. I'm
just his clerk, or decoy, or--or any old thing he needs to help him in
his wicked, wicked schemes!"
Mallinsbee sat chuckling at his daughter's charge, and Gordon, watching
him, laughed in chorus.
"I'm kind of sorry, Mr. Mallinsbee, to have had to listen to such a
tale," he said at last, with pretended seriousness, "but I guess you're
charged, tried, convicted and sentenced. Seeing there's just two of
you, it's up to me to give the verdict Guilty!" he declared. "Have you
any reason to show why sentence should not be passed upon you? No?
Very well, then. I sentence you to make that pile, without fail, in a
given time. Say six months. Failing which you'll have the
satisfaction of knowing that you have assisted in the ruin of an
innocent life."
In the midst of the lightness of the moment Gordon had suddenly taken a
resolve. It was one of those quick, impulsive resolves which were
entirely characteristic of him. There was nothing quite clear in his
mind as to any reason in his decision. He was caught in the enthusiasm
of his admiration of the fair oval face of his hostess, whose
unconventional camaraderie so appealed to his wholesome nature; he was
caught by the radiance of her sunny smile, by the laughing depths of
her perfect hazel eyes. Nor was the manner of the man, her father,
without effect upon his responsive, simple nature.
But his sentence on Silas Mallinsbee had caught and held both father's
and daughter's attention, and excited their curiosity.
"Why six months?" smiled Hazel.
"Say, it's sure some time limit," growled Mallinsbee.
Gordon assumed an air of judicial severity.
"Is the court to be questioned upon its powers?" he demanded. "There
is a law of 'contempt,'" he added warningly.
But his warning was without effect.
"And the innocent's ruin?" demanded Hazel.
The answer came without a moment's hesitation.
"Mine," said Gordon. And his audience, now with serious eyes, waited
for him to go on.
Hip-Lee had brought in the sweet, and vanished again in his silent
fashion. Then Gordon raised his eyes from his plate and glanced at his
host. They wandered across to and lingered for a moment on the strong
young face of the girl. Then they came back to his plate, and he
sighed.
"Say, if there's one thing hurts me it's to hear everybody telling a
yarn, and my not having one to throw back at 'em," he said, smiling
down at the simple baked custard and fruit he was devouring. "Just now
I'm not hurt a thing, however, so that remark don't apply. You see, my
yarn's just as simple and easy as both of yours, and I can tell it in a
sentence. My father's sent me out in the world with a stake of my own
naming to make one hundred thousand dollars in six months!"
He was surprised to witness, the dramatic effect of his announcement.
Hazel's astonishment was serious and frankly without disguise. But her
father's was less marked by outward expression. It was only obvious
from the complete lack of the smile which had been in his shrewd eyes a
moment before.
"One hundred thousand dollars in six months!" Hazel exclaimed. She had
narrowly escaped scalding herself with the coffee Hip-Lee had just
served. She set her cup down hastily.
"Guess your father's takin' a big chance," said Mallinsbee thoughtfully.
But their serious astonishment was too great a strain for Gordon. He
began to laugh.
"It's my belief life's too serious to be taken seriously, so the chance
he's taken don't worry me as, maybe, it ought," he said. "You see, my
father's a good sportsman, and he sees most things the way every real
sportsman sees 'em--where his son's concerned. Morally I owe him one
hundred thousand dollars. I say morally. Well, I guess we talked
together some. I--well, maybe I made a big talk, like fellows of my
age and experience are liable to make to a fellow of my father's age
and experience. Then I sort of got a shock, as sometimes fellows of my
age making a big talk do. In about half a minute I found a new meaning
for the word 'bluff.' I thought I'd got its meaning right before that.
I thought I could teach my father all there was to know about bluff.
You see, I'd forgotten he'd lived thirty-three more years than I had.
Bluff? Why, I'd never heard of it as he knew it. The result is I've
got to make one hundred thousand dollars in six months or forfeit my
legitimate future." Then he added with the gayest, most buoyant laugh,
"Say, it's a terrible thing to think of. It's dead serious. It's as
serious as an inter-university ball game."
The lurking smile had returned to Mallinsbee's eyes, and Hazel frankly
joined in Gordon's laugh.
"And you've come to Snake's Fall to--to make it?" she cried.
"I can't just say that," returned Gordon.
"No." Mallinsbee shook his head, and the two men exchanged meaning
glances. Then the old man went on with his food and spoke between the
mouthfuls. "You had an office?"
"Sure. You see, I was my father's secretary."
"Secretary?" Mallinsbee looked up quickly.
Gordon nodded.
"That's what he called me. I drew the salary--and my allowance. It
was an elegant office--what little I remember of it."
The old man's regard was very nearly a broad laugh.
"Say, you made a talk about an 'innocent's' life gettin' all mussed up?"
Gordon nodded with profound seriousness.
"Sure," he replied. "Mine. I don't guess you'll deny my innocence."
Mallinsbee shook his head. "Good," Gordon went on; "that makes it
easy. If you don't make good I lose my chance. I'm going to put my
stake in your town plots."
The rancher regarded him steadily for some moments. Then--
"Say, what's your stake?" he inquired abruptly.
Gordon had nothing to hide. There was, it seemed to him, a fatal
magnetism about these people. The girl's eyes were upon him, full of
amused delight at the story he had told; while her father seemed to be
driving towards some definite goal.
"Five thousand dollars. That and a few hundred dollars I had to my
credit at the bank. It don't sound much," he added apologetically,
"but perhaps it isn't quite impossible."
"I don't guess there's a thing impossible in this world for the feller
who's got to make good," said Mallinsbee. "You see, you've got to make
good, and it don't matter a heap if your stake's five hundred or five
thousand. Say, talk's just about the biggest thing in life, but it's
made up of hot air, an' too much hot air's mighty oppressive. So I'll
just get to the end of what I've to say as sudden as I can. I guess my
gal's right, I'm just crazy to beat the 'sharps' on this land scoop,
and I'm going to do it if I get brain fever. Now it's quite a
proposition. I've got to play the railroad and all these ground
sharks, and see I get the juice while they only get the pie-crust. I'm
needing a--we'll call him a secretary. Hazel is all sorts of a bright
help, but she ain't a man. I need a feller who can swear and scrap if
need be, and one who can scratch around with a pen in odd moments.
This thing is a big fight, and the man who's got the biggest heart and
best wind's going to win through. My wind's sound, and I ain't heard
of any heart trouble in my family. Now you ken come in in town plots
so that when the boom comes they'll net you that one hundred thousand
dollars. You don't need to part with that stake--yet. The deal shall
be on paper, and the cash settlement shall come at the finish.
Meanwhile, if need be, for six months you'll put in every moment you've
got on the work of organizing this boom. Maybe we'll need to scrap
plenty. But I don't guess that'll come amiss your way. We'll hand
this shanty over for quarters for you, and we'll share it as an office.
This ain't philanthropy; it's business. The man who's got no more
sense than to call a bluff to make one hundred thousand dollars in six
months is the man for me. He'll make it or he won't. And, anyway,
he's going to make things busy for six months. You ain't a 'sharp'
now--or I wouldn't hand you this talk. But I'm guessin' you'll be
mighty near one before we're through. We've got to graft, and graft
plenty, which is a play that ain't without attractions to a real bright
feller. You see, money's got a heap of evil lyin' around its
root--well, the root of things is gener'ly the most attractive. Guess
I've used a deal of hot air in makin' this proposition, but you won't
need to use as much in your answer--when you've slept over it. Say, if
food's through we'll get busy, Hazel."
Mrs. James Carbhoy was in bed when she received her morning's mail.
Perhaps she and her millionaire husband were unusually old-fashioned in
their domestic life. Anyway, James Carbhoy's presence in the great
bedstead beside her was made obvious by the heavy breathing which, in a
less wealthy man, might have been called snoring, and the mountainous
ridge of bedclothes which covered his monumental bulk.
A querulous voice disturbed his dreams. He heard it from afar off, and
it merged with the scenes he was dwelling upon. A panic followed. He
had made a terrible discovery. It was his wife, and not the president
of a rival railroad, who was stealing the metals of a new track he was
constructing as fast as he could lay them.
He awoke in a cold sweat. He thought he was lying in the cutting
beside the track. His wife had vanished. He rubbed his eyes. No, she
hadn't. There she was, sitting up in bed with a sheaf of papers in her
hand. He felt relieved.
Now her plaint penetrated to his waking consciousness.
"For goodness' sake, James," she cried, "quit snoring and wake up. I
wish you'd pay attention when I'm speaking. I'm all worried to death."
The multi-millionaire yawned distressingly.
"Most folks are worried in the morning. I'm worried, too. Go to
sleep. You'll feel better after a while."
"It's nothing to do with the morning," complained his wife.
"It's--it's a letter from Gordon. The poor boy writes such queer
letters. It's all through you being so hard on him. You never did
have any feeling for--for anybody. I'm sure he's suffering. He never
talked this way before. Maybe he don't get enough to eat; he don't say
where he is either. Perhaps he's just nowhere in particular. You'd
better ring up an inquiry bureau----"
"For goodness' sake read the letter," growled the drowsy man. "You're
making as much fuss as a hen with bald chicks."
Mrs. Carbhoy withered her husband with a glance that fell only upon the
back of his great head. But she had her way. She meant him to share
in her anxiety through the text of the, to her, incomprehensible
letter. She read slowly and deliberately, and in a voice calculated to
rivet any wandering attention.
"DEAREST MUM:
"There's folks who say that no man knows the real meaning of luck, good
or bad, till he takes to himself a wife. This may be right. My
argument is, it's only partially so. There may be considerable luck
about matrimony. For instance, if any fool man came along and married
our Gracie he'd be taking quite a chance. Her native indolence and
peevishness suggest possibilities. Her tongue is vitriolic in one so
young, as I have frequently had reason to observe. This would
certainly be a case where the man would learn the real meaning of luck.
But there wouldn't be a question. His luck would be out--plumb out.
Jonah would have been a mascot beside him.
"This is by the way.
"I argue luck can be appreciated fully through channels less worrying.
When luck gets busy around its coming is kind of subtle. It's sudden,
too; kind of butts in unnoticed, sometimes painfully, and generally
without shouting. Maybe it happens with a bump or a jar. Personally
I'm betting on the 'bump' play. A bump of that nature got busy my way
when I arrived here. I now have a full appreciation of luck. Quite as
full an appreciation as the man would who married our Gracie. But in
my case I guess it's good luck. This isn't going to tell you all
that's in my mind, but, seeing I haven't fallen for fiction yet, I
guess I won't try to be more explicit. Luck, in my present position,
means the coming responsibility of success. You might hand this on to
the old Dad.
"Talking of the old Dad, it seems to me that, for a delicate digestion,
baked custard and fruit have advantages over ice-cream as a sweet.
This again is by the way.
"In my last letter I gave you a few first impressions on arrival at my
destination. Now, if you'll permit, I'll add what I might call the
maturer reflections of a mind wide awake to life as it really is, and
to the inner meaning of those things which are so carefully hidden from
one brought up in luxury, as I have been. One of the 'dead snips' this
way is that cleverness and wisdom are often confused by the ignorant.
Cleverness don't mean wisdom, and--vice versa. For instance, loafing
idly down a main street six inches deep in a dust that would shame a
blizzard when the wind blows, with a blazing sun scorching the marrow
of the spine till it's ready to be spread out on toast, escorted by an
army of disgusting flies moving in massed formation, and not knowing
better than to drive your soul to perdition through the channel of
extreme bad language, don't suggest cleverness. Yet there may surely
be a deal of wisdom in it if it only keeps you from doing something a
heap more foolish. Maybe this don't sound altogether bright, but
there's quite a deal in it. Think it out. Another thought is that
learning's quite a sound proposition. For instance, a superficial
knowledge of geology may come mighty handy at unexpected moments. A
knowledge of this served me at a critical moment only to-day. So you
see an intimate acquaintance with sharp flints, collected--the
acquaintance, not the flints--during my time as the possessor of an
automobile, which the Dad provided me with and for the upkeep of which
he so kindly paid, has likely had more influence upon my future life
than the best talk ever handed out by a Fifth Avenue preacher ever
would have done. I have no thought of being irreverent. I am merely
handing you a fact. People say that missed opportunities always make
you hate to think of them in after life. For my part, I've generally
figured this to be the philosophic hot air of a man who's getting old
and hates to see youth around him, or else the chin mush of some fool
man who's never had any opportunities, talking through the roof of his
head. I kind of see it different now. You gave me the opportunity of
studying all the beauties of the world seen through an artist's life.
I guessed at the time that would be waste of precious moments that
might be spent chasing athletics. It's only to-day I've got wise to
what a heap I've lost in twenty-four years. Colors just seemed to me
messy mixtures only fit to spoil paper and canvas with. Well, to-day
I've hit on something in the way of color that's just about set me
crazy to see it all the time. It's a sort of yellowy, greeny brown.
That don't sound as merry as it might, but to me it talks plenty. It's
just the dandiest color ever. I discovered it out on a 'long, lone
trail'--that's how folks talk in books--where the surroundings weren't
any improvement on just plain grass. Say, Mum, I guess that color is
great. It gets a grip on you so you don't seem to care if a local
freight train comes along and dissects your vitals, and chews them up
ready for making a delicatessen sausage. When I die I'll just have to
have my shroud dyed that color, and my coffin fixed that way, too.
"This isn't so much of a passing thought as the others. Guess some
folks might figure it to be a disease. Maybe the old Dad would. Well,
I shan't kick any if I die of it.
"Talking of Art, I'm just beginning to get a notion that curves are
wonderful, wonderful things. These days of mechanical appliances I've
always regarded drawing such things by hand as positively ridiculous.
I don't think that way now. If I could only draw the wonderful curves
I have in mind now, why, I guess I'd go right on drawing them till the
birds roosted in my beard and my bones were right for a tame ancestral
skeleton.
"The daylight of knowledge is sort of creeping in.
"I've learned that frame houses have got Fifth Avenue mansions beat a
mile, and the smell of a Chinee can become a dollar-and-a-half scent
sachet in given circumstances. I've learned that real sportsmanship
isn't confined to athletics by any means, and a lame chestnut horse can
be a most friendly creature. I've discovered that one man of purpose
isn't more than fifty per cent. of two, when both are yearning one way.
I'm learning that life's a mighty pleasant journey if you let it alone
and don't worry things. It's no use kicking to put the world to
rights. It's going to give you a whole heap of worry, and, anyway, the
world's liable to retaliate. Also I'd like to add that, though I guess
I'm gathering wisdom, I don't reckon I've got it all by quite a piece.
"Having given you all the news I can think of I guess I'll close.
"Your affectionate son,
"GORDON.
"P.S.--My remarks about Gracie are merely the privileged reflections of
a brother. When she grows up I dare say she'll be quite a bully girl.
It takes time to get sense.
"G."
"I don't understand it, anyway," sighed Gordon's mother, as she laid
the letter aside. "You'll have to get him back to home, James. He's
suffering. We'll send out an inquiry----"
She broke off, glancing across at the mass of humanity so peacefully
snoring at the far side of the bed, and, after a brief angry moment,
resigned herself to the reflection that men, even millionaires, were
perfectly ridiculous and selfish creatures who had no right whatever to
burden a poor woman's life with the responsibility of children.
CHAPTER IX
THE FIRST CHECK
It was characteristic of Gordon to act unhesitatingly once a decision
was arrived at. The consideration of Silas Mallinsbee's generous offer
was the work of just as many seconds as it took the rancher to make it
in. Though, verbally, it was left for a decision the next day, Gordon
had no doubts in his mind whatever as to the nature of that decision.
When he returned to McSwain's sheltering roof, when another meal had
been devoured in the evening, when the soup-like contents of the
wash-trough had been stirred in the doubtful effort of cleansing
himself, when the busy flies had gone to join the birds in their
evening roost, he betook himself to his private bathroom, and sat
himself upon his questionable bed and gave himself up to reflection,
endeavoring to apply some of the wisdom he believed himself to have
already acquired.
But the application was without useful effect.
He began by an attempt to review the situation from a purely financial
standpoint, and in this endeavor he stretched out his great muscular
limbs along his bed, and propped his broad back against the wall with a
dogged do-or-die look upon his honest face.
At once a mental picture of Hazel Mallinsbee obscured the problem. He
dwelt on it for some profoundly pleasant moments, and then resolutely
thrust it aside.
Next he started by frankly admitting that Mallinsbee's offer left him a
certain winner all along the line--if things went right. Good. If
things went wrong--but they couldn't go wrong with those wonderful
yellowy brown eyes of Hazel's smiling encouragement upon him. The
thought was absurd.
Again for some time his problem was obscured. But after a few minutes
he set his teeth and attacked it afresh.
Of course, if things did go wrong he was done--absolutely finished.
His six months would have expired, his stake would have melted into
thin air. His whole future---- But he would have spent six months at
Hazel's side, working upon something that was obviously very dear to
her brave and loyal heart. What more could a man desire?
He felt his great muscles thrill with a mighty sense of restrained
effort. Was there any thought in the world so inspiring as that which
had the support of the most wonderful creature he had ever met for its
inspiration? He thought not. His pulses stirred at the bare idea of
being Hazel Mallinsbee's companion all those weeks and months. Of
course it would mean nothing to her. She was far too clever, and--and
altogether brainy to give him a second thought. But he felt he could
help her. He felt that to go back home with the knowledge that he--he
had been one of the prime factors in her achieving the hope of her life
would not be without compensations. Compensations? He wondered what
form such compensations took. They certainly would need to be
considerable for the loss of such a companionship.
He thought of the vision he had seen upon the trail. The beautifully
rounded figure. The graceful movements, so obviously natural. Then
those eyes, and----
He smiled and abandoned all further attempt to consider seriously the
offer he had received. What was the use? His good fortune was
certainly running in a strong tide. To attempt to steer a course was
to fly in the face of his own luck. No, he would swim with it, let it
take him whither it might. Meanwhile, Hazel had promised to meet him
on the morrow, and show him the great coal seam, after which he was to
interview her father, and have supper at the--office. Forthwith he
hastily retired to his nightly game of hide-and-seek amongst the
hummocks of flock in his disreputable bed, that the long hours of night
might the more speedily merge into a golden to-morrow.
The next day Gordon, at an early hour, spent something over fifty
dollars on a pair of ready-made riding-breeches and boots. For once in
his life he felt that the faithful Harding had been found wanting.
Somehow, in arriving at this conclusion, he had forgotten the episode
of the five-cent-cigar man. Anyhow, the purchase had to be made, since
it was necessary to ride out to the coal seams.
It was during the time spent on these matters an incident occurred
which caused him some irritation. He saw in the distance, as he was
making his way to the principal store, the pale-faced, sickly-looking
creature who had accosted Hazel the day before. The sight of the man
put him into a bad temper at once, and he forthwith gave the
storekeeper all the unnecessary trouble he could put him to.
Then, on returning to his hotel, he discovered the man in the office
talking to Peter McSwain. His swift temper left him utterly without
shame, and he stood and stared at the object of his dislike, taking him
in from head to foot with profoundly contemptuous eyes.
Somehow his inspection made him feel glad he disliked the man. He was
a broad-chested person with aggressively cut clothes. His black hair
was obviously greased, and his general cast of features suggested his
Hebrew origin. Gordon had no grudge against him on this latter score.
It was not that. It was the narrow, shifty eyes, the hateful way in
which he smoked his cigar, with its flaming band about its middle. It
was the loud coarse laugh and general air of impertinent arrogance that
set his back bristling. And this--this had spoken to Hazel Mallinsbee
only the day before.
He deposited his parcels in his bathroom, and returned to the office to
find McSwain by himself. He had no hesitation in satisfying his
curiosity.
"Say," he demanded, in a crisp tone. "Who was that rotten-looking
'sharp' you were yarning to when I came in?"
Peter's amiable expression underwent the most trifling change.
"Guess I lost ten thousand dollars talkin' that way once," he said,
smelling cautiously at one of his own cigars.
Gordon promptly snapped back.
"Maybe I've lost more than that. But it don't cut any ice. Who was
he?"
Peter smiled as he lit his cigar.
"David Slosson. Guess he's chief robber for the railroad company.
You've seen him. Are you scared any? Say, we've been waitin' to hear
him talk two days now. I guess you could hand us a bunch of emperors,
an' kings, an' princes, an' dust over 'em a sprinkling of presidents,
but I don't reckon you'd stir a pulse among us like the coming of that
man did to this city. That feller's right here to put the railroad in
on this land scoop. When he's fixed 'em the way he wants we'll hear
from the railroad."
Gordon's eyes were thoughtful.
"Chief grafter, eh? He surely looks it."
"Some of 'em do," agreed Peter. "It's my belief the best of 'em don't,
though," he added reflectively. "Yet he surely ought to be right.
Railroads don't usual graft with anything but the best. He was talkin'
pretty, too."
"Pretty? More than he looked," snorted Gordon. Then he began to
laugh. "Say, you and I are pretty well agreed about miracles. I sort
of feel it'll have to be one of them miracles if the time don't come
when I knock seventeen sorts of stuffing out of that man. I feel it
coming on like a disease. You know, creeping through my bones, and
getting to the tips of my fingers. I'd like to spoil his store suit in
the mud, and beautify his features with your 'hoss' soap, and drown 'em
in--well, what's in your washing-trough."
Peter's smile was cordial enough at the forcefulness of his young
guest. He had not forgotten that Gordon was a friend of Mallinsbee.
"I wouldn't play that way till we see how he's buying," he said
cautiously.
"Play?" Gordon laughed and shook his head. "Well, perhaps you're
right. It certainly will be some play."
After midday dinner Gordon set out on one of Mike Callahan's horses to
keep his appointment with Hazel Mallinsbee. All his ill-humor of the
morning was forgotten, and he looked forward with unalloyed pleasure to
his afternoon, which was to culminate in his entering into his
agreement with her father.
Hazel was waiting for him on the veranda of the office. Her horse, a
fine brown mare, was standing ready saddled. Gordon noted the absence
of Sunset, and understood, but he noted also that her smile of welcome
was lacking something of the joyous spirit she had displayed the night
before.
"Sunset off duty?" he inquired, as he came up and leaped out of the
saddle to assist her.
Hazel scorned his assistance. She was in the saddle almost before he
was aware of her intention.
"Sunset's father's," she said. "The Lady Jane is my saddle horse.
She's the most outrageous jade on the ranch. That's why I like her.
Every moment I'm in the saddle she's trying to get the bit between her
teeth. If she succeeded she'd run till she dropped." Then, with a
deliberate effort, she seemed to thrust some shadow from her mind as
they set off at a brisk canter. "You know, father's just dying to show
you the ranch. He's quite quaint and boyish. He takes likes and
dislikes in the twinkle of an eye, and before all things in his life
comes his wonderful ranch. I'll tell you a secret, Mr. Van Henslaer.
The day you--arrived, after he'd told me just how you had arrived, he
said, 'I'd like to get that boy working around this lay out. I like
the look of him. He don't know a lot, but he can do things.' He's
certainly taken one of his wonderful, impulsive fancies to you. He's
very shrewd, too."
Gordon laughed.
"Now I wonder how I ought to take that. I'm all sorts of a fool, but I
can hit hard. That's about his opinion of me, eh?"
Hazel's eyes were slyly watching him. She shook her head.
"That's not it," she smiled back. "You don't know my daddy. He might
say that, but there's a whole lot of other thoughts stumbling around in
his funny old head. If he wants you he thinks you can do more than hit
hard."
The humor of it all got hold of Gordon.
"Good," he cried, with one of his whole-hearted laughs. "Now I'll let
you into a secret. This is a great secret. One of those secrets a
feller generally hangs on tight to because he's half ashamed of it. I
can do more than hit hard!"
Then he became serious, and it was the girl's turn to find amusement.
"You see, I've been raised in a bit of a hothouse. Maybe it's more of
a wind shelter, though. You know, where the rough winds of modern life
can't get through the crevices and buffet you. That's why I fell for
that sharp on the train. That's why I bumped head first into Snake's
Fall. That's why your daddy thinks I don't know a lot. But I tell you
right here I've got to make that hundred thousand dollars in six
months, and I'm going to do it by hook or crook, if there's half a
smell of a chance. I've no scruples whatsoever. I just _must_ make
it, or--or I'll never face my father ever again. Do you get me?
Whatever you have at stake in this land proposition, it's just nothing
to what I have. And you'll know what I mean when I say it's just the
youthful pride and foolish egoism of twenty-four years. Say, do you
know what it means to a kid when he's dared to do some fool trick that
may cost his life? Well, that's my position, but I've done the daring
for myself. My mood about this thing is the sort of mood in which, if
I couldn't get that money any other way, I'd willingly hold up a
bullion train."
The girl nodded. For a moment she made no attempt to answer him. She
was gazing out ahead at a point where signs of busy life had made
themselves apparent. Something of the shadow that had been in her eyes
at their meeting had returned. Gordon was watching them, and a quick
concern troubled him.
"Say," he observed anxiously. "You're--worried. I saw it when I came
up."
The girl endeavored to pass his inquiry off lightly.
"Worried?" she shook her head. "The anxieties of the business are on
my poor daddy's shoulders, and will soon be on yours. They're not on
mine."
But Gordon was not easily put off. He edged his horse closer to her
side.
"But you _are_ worried," he declared doggedly. Then he added more
lightly, "I'll take a chance on it. It's--a man. And he's got a sort
of whitewash face, and black, shoe-shined hair. He's got a nose you'd
hate to run up against with any vital part. As for his clothes,
well--a blind man would hate to see 'em."
The girl turned sharply.
"What makes you think that way?"
Gordon smiled triumphantly.
"Guess I've been trying to impress you with the fact that
foolishness--like beauty--is only skin deep. The former applies to me.
The latter--well, I guess I must have just read about--that."
"If you're not careful you'll convince me," Hazel laughed.
"That's one of the things I'm yearning to do."
"You're talking of David Slosson," she challenged him.
Gordon nodded.
"The railroad's--chief grafter."
"And a hateful creature."
"Who's started right away to--annoy you--from the time he got around
Snake's Fall."
A great surprise was looking back into Gordon's eyes.
"You're guessing. You can't know that," Hazel said, with decision.
"Maybe. Say,"--Gordon's eyes were half serious, half smiling--"a girl
don't push her way past a man when he's talking to her if--he isn't
annoying her."
"Then you saw him stop me on Main Street yesterday?"
"Sure." Then, after a pause, Gordon went on, "Say, tell me. We're to
be fellow conspirators."
Just for one moment Hazel Mallinsbee looked him straight in the eyes.
She was thinking, thinking swiftly. Nor were her thoughts unpleasant.
For one thing she had realized that which Gordon had wished her to
realize--that he was no fool. She was seeing that something in him
which doubtless her father had been quick to discover. She was
thinking, too, of his direct, almost dogged manner of driving home to
the purpose he had in view, and she told herself she liked it. Then,
too, all unconsciously, she was thinking of the open, ingenuous,
smiling face of his. The handsome blue eyes which were certainly his
chief attraction in looks, although his other features were sound
enough. She decided at once that for all these things she liked him
and trusted him. Therefore she admitted her worries.
"Yes," she said, "it's David Slosson--and your description of him is
too good. He's been here two days. He came here the day before you.
He came out to see father directly he arrived, but, as you know, father
was away. I had to see him. And it wasn't pleasant. Maybe you can
guess his attitude. I don't like to talk of it. He took me for some
silly country girl, I s'pose. Anyway I got rid of him. Then he saw me
yesterday." Suddenly her face flushed, and an angry sparkle shone in
her eyes. "His sort ought to be raw-hided," she declared vehemently.
Then, after a pause, in which she choked her anger back, "We got a note
from him this morning to say he'd be along this afternoon. Father's
going to see him. And I was scared to death you wouldn't get along in
time. That's why I was waiting ready for you, and hustled you off
without seeing father. I was scared the man would get around before we
were away. I haven't said a word to my daddy. You see he'd kill him,"
she finished up, with a whimsical little smile.
Gordon was gazing out ahead at the great coal workings they were now
approaching. But though he beheld a small village of buildings, and an
astonishing activity of human beings and machinery, for the time, at
least, they had no interest for him.
"I knew I was up against that man directly I saw him peeking into that
store after you," he said deliberately. "Miss Mallinsbee, I'm going to
ask you all sorts of a big favor. We three are going to work together
for six months. Well, any time you feel worried any by that feller,
don't go to your daddy, just come right along to me. I guess it would
puzzle more than your daddy to kill him after I've done with him. I
don't guess it's the time to talk a lot about this thing now. I don't
sort of fancy big talk that way, anyhow. All I ask you is to let me
know, and to be allowed to keep my own eyes on him."
Hazel shook her head.
"I don't think I can promise you anything like that," she said
seriously. "But I--thank you all the same. You see, out here a girl's
got to take her own chances, and I'm not altogether helpless that way."
Then she definitely changed the subject and pointed ahead. "There,
what do you think of it?"
"Think of it? Why, he's a low down skunk!" cried Gordon fiercely,
unable any longer to restrain his feelings.
"I wasn't speaking of him. It!" the girl laughed. "The coalpits."
"Oh!" There was no responsive laugh from Gordon. Then he added with
angry pretense of enjoyment, "Fine!"
For nearly two hours they wandered round the embryonic coal village,
examining everything in detail, and not without a keen interest. The
place, hidden away amongst the higher foothills, was a perfect hive of
industry. Great masses of machinery were lying about everywhere,
waiting their turn for the attention of the engineers. Wooden
buildings were in the course of construction everywhere. A small army
of miners and their wives and children had already taken up their
abode, and the men were at work with the engineers in the preparatory
borings already in full operation.
Even to Gordon's unpracticed eye there was little doubt of the accuracy
of the information he had received relating to Snake's Fall. Here
there was everything required to provoke the boom he had been warned
of. Here was an evidence that the boom would be a genuine one built on
the solid basis of great and lasting commercial interest. Long before
they started on their return journey he congratulated himself heartily
upon the accident which had brought him into the midst of such an
enterprise, and thanked his stars for the further chance which had
brought him into contact with the train "sharp," and so with Silas
Mallinsbee.
It was getting on towards the time for the Mallinsbees' evening meal
when the little frame house once more came within view. There was a
decided charm in its isolation. On all sides were the undulations of
grass which denoted the first steps towards the foothills. There was a
wonderful radiance of summer sheen upon the green world about them, and
the brightness of it all, and the pleasantness, set Gordon thinking of
the pity that all too soon it would be broken up almost entirely by
those black and gloomy signs of man's industry when the resources of
the old world have to be tapped.
However, he was content enough with the moment. The sky was blue and
radiant, the earth was all so green, and the wide, wide world opened
out before him in whatever direction he chose to gaze. While beside
him, sitting her mare with that confident seat of a perfect horsewoman,
was the most beautiful girl in all the world, a girl in whose
companionship he was to spend the next six months. The gods of Fortune
were very, very good to him, and he smiled as the vision of his
sportsman father flashed through his mind.
But his moments of pleasant reflection were abruptly cut short.
Hazel had suddenly raised one pointing arm, and a note of concern was
in her voice.
"Look," she cried. "Something's--upset my daddy."
Gordon looked in the direction of the house.
Silas Mallinsbee was pacing the veranda at a gait that left no doubt in
his mind. It was the agitated walk of a man disturbed.
"What's the matter?" demanded Gordon, with some concern.
"It looks like--David Slosson," said Hazel, in a hard voice.
They rode up in silence, and the girl was the first to reach the ground.
"Daddy----" she began eagerly.
But her father cut her short. The flesh-tinted patch, which Gordon had
almost forgotten, which he used to cover his left eye with, was thrust
up absurdly upon his forehead. His heavy brows were drawn together in
an angry frown. His tufty chin beard was aggressively thrust, his two
great hands were stuck in the waist of his trousers, which gave him
further an air of truculence.
"Say," he cried, his deep, rolling voice now raised to a pitch of
thunder, "it's taken me fifty-six years to come up with what I've been
chasing all my life. Say, I've spent years an' years huntin' around to
find something meaner than a rattlesnake. Guess I come up with him
to-day."
"David Slosson," cried Hazel, her eyes wide with her anger.
Her father waved her aside as she came towards him.
"No, don't you butt in. I've got to let off hot air, or--or--I'll
bust."
He paced off down the little veranda, and came back again. Then he
stood still, and suddenly brought one great fist down with terrific
force into his other palm.
"Gee, but it's tough. Say, you ever tried to hold a slimy eel?" he
cried, glaring fiercely into Gordon's questioning eyes. "No? It's a
heap of a dirty and unsatisfact'ry job, but it ain't as dirty as
dealing with Mr. David Slosson, nor half as unsatisfact'ry. You can
stamp your heel on it, and crush it into the ground. With David
Slosson you just got to talk pretty and fence while you know he's got
you beat all along the line, an' all the time you're just needin' to
kill him all to death. Of all the white-livered bums. Say, if only
the good God would push him right into these two hands an' say squeeze
him. Say----" He held out his two clenched fists as though he were
wringing out a sponge.
Gordon raked his hair with one hand.
"Do you need to worry that way, Mr. Mallinsbee? I owe him some myself."
The old man glared for some moments. Then a subtle smile crept into
his eyes. Hazel saw it, and seized the opportunity.
"Let's get right inside and have food. You can tell us then, Daddy.
You see, Mr. Van Henslaer's one of our confederates now. He's come
along to tell you so."
It was with some difficulty that Hazel contrived to pacify her father,
but at last she succeeded in persuading him to partake of the pleasant
meal provided by Hip-Lee.
Gordon was glad when at last they all sat down. The appetizing smell
of coffee, the delicious plates of cold meats, the glass dishes of
preserves, and steaming hot scones, all these things appealed to the
accumulated appetite consequent upon his ride.
"Now tell us all about it," Hazel demanded, when the meal was well
under way.
Old Mallinsbee, still with the absurd eye-shade upon his forehead, had
recovered his humor, and he poured out his story in characteristic
fashion.
"Wall," he said, "maybe I was hot when you come up. He'd been gone
best part of an hour. During that time I'd been sort of bankin' the
furnaces. Gordon Van Henslaer, my boy, I hate meanness worse 'n any
devil hated holy water. Ther's all sorts of meanness in this world,
and ther' ain't no other word to describe it. Killing can be just
every sort of thing from justifiable homicide down to stringin' up some
black scallywag by the neck for doin' the same things white folks do
an' get off with a caution. The feller that steals ain't always to
blame. As often as not we need to blame the general community. Lyin's
mostly a disease, an' when it ain't I guess it's a sort of aggravated
form of commercial enterprise, or the budding of a great newspaper
faculty. You can find excuse, or other name, fer most every crime of
human nature--'cept meanness. David Slosson is just the chief ancestor
of all meanness, an' when I say that, why--it's some talk. He's here
to put the railroad in on the land scoop, and, in that respect, I guess
he's all I could have expected. We were making elegant talk. Or, I
guess, he was mostly. He said his chiefs had sent him up to see how
the general public could best be served by his road with regard to this
coal boom, and I told him I was dead sure that railroads never failed
in their service of the public. I pointed out I had always observed it.
"That talk of mine seemed to open up the road for things, and I handed
him a good cigar and pushed a highball his way. Then he made a big
music of railroads in general, and talked so pious that it set me
yearnin' for my bed. Then I got wide awake. Say, I ain't done a heap
in chapel goin' recently, but I've sort of got hazy recollections of
sitting around dozing, while the preacher doped a lot of elegant hot
air about things which kind of upset your notions of life generally.
Then I seem to recollect getting a sack pushed into my face, and I got
visions of the terrible scare of its coming, and the kind of nervous
chase for that quarter that I could have sworn I'd set ready in my
pocket for such an emergency. That's how I felt--nervous. He was
talkin' prices of plots.
"Wal, I got easy after awhile, and we fixed things elegant. The
railroad was to get a dandy bunch of plots at bedrock prices, if they
built the depot right here at Buffalo Point. And that feller was quick
to see that I was out for the interests of the public, and to make
things easy for the railroad. So he talked pretty. Then--then he
hooked me a 'right.' He asked me plumb out how he stood. I was ready
for him. I said that nothing would suit me better than he should come
in the same way with the railroad." He shook his head regretfully.
"That man hadn't the conscience of a louse. He was yearning for twenty
town plots, in best positions, five of 'em being corner plots, in the
commercial area for--nix! I was feeling as amiable as a she wild-cat,
and I told him there was nothing doing that way. He said he'd hoped
better from my public-spirited remarks. I assured him my public spirit
hadn't changed a cent. He said he was sure it hadn't, and was
astonished what a strong public spirit was shown around the whole of
Snake's Fall. He said that the old town was just the same as Buffalo
Point. They were most anxious to help the railroad out, too. Which,
seeing the depot--the old depot--was already standing there, made it a
cinch for the railroad. They were dead anxious to save the railroad
trouble and expense. I pushed another highball at him, but he guessed
he hadn't a thirst any more, and one cigar was all he ever smoked in an
afternoon. Then he oozed off, and I was glad. I guess homicide has
its drawbacks."
"High 'graft,'" said Gordon.
"Maybe it's 'high,'" said Mallinsbee, with a smile in which there was
no mirth. "Guess I wouldn't spell it that way myself. There's just
one thing certain: if my side of the game has to go plumb to hell David
Slosson don't get his graft the way _he_ wants it. And that's what you
and me are up against."
"And we'll beat him."
"We got to."
"You and----"
"You," cried Mallinsbee, thrusting out a hand towards him across the
table.
The two men gripped. Gordon had joined the conspirators.
CHAPTER X
GORDON MAKES HIS BID FOR FORTUNE
Gordon's new address was Buffalo Point, and, entering upon his duties,
he felt like some Napoleon of finance about to embark upon a
market-breaking scheme in which the brilliancy of his manipulations
were to shine forth for the illumination of the pages of history, yet
to be written.
That was how he felt. Those were the feelings of the moment. Later
the burden of his responsibilities obscured the Napoleonic image, and
raised up in his mind a thought as to the wisdom of butting one's head
against a brick wall.
However, for the time at least the joy of responsibility was
considerable, and the greater joy of the companionship and trust of his
new friends was something which inspired him to great efforts.
He studied the affairs of Buffalo Point with a care for detail and an
assiduity which quickly became the surprise and delight of Silas
Mallinsbee. He went over every foot of the new township as laid out by
a well-known firm of town planners from New York under Mallinsbee's
orders and under State supervision. He spent one entire day in
studying the drawn plans, and, finally, having committed all the
details to memory, he felt himself equipped to devote his whole
attention to the cajoling of the railroad which was the sum and
substance of their combined efforts.
In the first week of his occupation he learned many things which had
been obscure. He took the story of Mallinsbee's operations and
examined it closely, discovering in the process that he possessed a
faculty for clear reasoning altogether surprising. Furthermore, he
discovered that Mallinsbee, though possibly unpracticed in the work of
a big financial undertaking, yet possessed all, and more, of the
shrewdness he had vaguely suspected.
One of the first efforts of the old man had been to secure the interest
of many of the chief traders in the old township of Snake's Fall. Also
that of the Bude and Sideley Coal Company. This had been done very
simply but effectively. After having marked off the town sites he
required for himself he had then offered, and sold, to pretty well
every landowner in Snake's Fall a certain allotment of sites at a
merely nominal fee. This, as the man himself declared in the course of
his story, left Snake's Fall pretty well "not carin' a whoop which way
the old cat jumped." The "cat" in this instance being the railroad.
In this way direct and active opposition from the landholders of
Snake's Fall was minimized. As he explained, it was "graft," but he
felt that it was justifiable. This left him with the good will of the
citizens and free to act on broader lines. Then he began to pull all
the wires he could command with the coal people, who regarded him in
the friendliest spirit. However, there was difficulty here, though the
difficulty was not insurmountable. Their engineers were at work
already on the plans to be put into almost immediate operation for the
construction of a private track to link up the coalfields with Snake's
Fall. With them it was a question of time. They could not afford
delay, and the exploitation of the new township would mean delay for
them, although they admitted they would be relieved of a great expense
from its proximity to their workings.
Mallinsbee, after stupendous efforts, and careful negotiations of the
right kind, finally effected a compromise. He was given three months,
of which already one week had elapsed, in which to obtain the definite
assurance that the railroad would accept Buffalo Point as the new city.
In the meantime the coal people's construction would be held up, and
they would assist him with all the influence they could command in
persuading the railroad. This concession was not unaided by
considerable graft, and the graft took the form of an agreement that
Mallinsbee, out of his own pocket, would construct them a coal depot
and yards in conjunction with the railroad, and hand them the titles of
the land necessary for it.
He had just returned from the east, where he had been in consultation
with the Bude and Sideley people, and with whom he had ratified this
agreement, and, at the same time, the railroad had been induced to move
in the matter. All along he had triumphed through the agency of graft,
and the crowning point of his triumph had been demonstrated in the
arrival at Snake's Fall of Mr. David Slosson.
Gordon's first impressions of all these things was that Silas
Mallinsbee had contrived with considerable skill, and that all was more
or less plain sailing. All that remained was to go on, with the
grafting hand thrust ready into the pocket for all eventualities, and
he found himself smiling at the thought of his father, and how surely
his own theories of financial undertakings were working out.
That was his first impression. But it only lasted until he became
aware of those subtleties of human nature lying behind human effort and
intention. He had reckoned without David Slosson, and, more than all,
he had reckoned without Silas Mallinsbee himself.
During that first week of his new work David Slosson had called at the
office twice. Once he had encountered only Gordon, and Hazel had
arrived during the visit. The second time he had had another interview
with Silas Mallinsbee. It was immediately after that interview that
Gordon gained some appreciation of the point where human psychology
stepped into the arena of commercial competition.
The revelation came in Silas Mallinsbee's own statement of the result
of that interview.
"Gordon, my boy," he said. He had quickly abandoned the use of
Gordon's formal address. "If that feller gets around here too frequent
with his blackmail, I'm going to kill him."
Then he thrust the patch over his left eye high up on to his forehead,
and Gordon realized the angry light shining in the man's eyes. With
one eye covered his face had almost been expressionless. His evident
surprise at this realization did not fail to attract the rancher's
attention.
His angry eyes softened to a smile of amusement.
"You're wonderin' 'bout that patch?" he went on. "Wal, when I get up
against a feller who's brighter than I am in a deal, I don't figure to
take chances. Ever played 'draw' with a one-eyed man? No? Wal, I
did--once. An' I ain't recovered from all he taught me yet. He taught
me that two eyes can just about give away double as much as one.
Which, in financial dealings, is quite a piece. I guess that patch has
saved me quite a few dollars in its time. An' it makes me kind of sore
to think I didn't meet that one-eyed 'sharp' earlier in life."
Gordon nodded as he folded up the plan of the town lying on his desk.
"You were using it on--Mr. David Slosson. Say, is he smart, or is he
just a--crook?"
Mallinsbee rose from his chair and moved cumbersomely over to the
doorway, and stood with his back turned, gazing out.
"I ain't fixed him that way--yet. He's sure a crook, anyway. That's a
cinch. 'Bout the other we'll know later. Say, I'm open to graft
anybody on this thing--reasonably. It's part of the game. It's more.
It's the game itself. But I don't submit to blackmail."
"There doesn't seem much difference," said Gordon, drawing some
letter-paper towards him, and preparing to write.
The other remained where he was, moodily gazing out at the hills where
his beloved ranch lay.
"You'd think not--but there is," Mallinsbee went on. "You graft an
organization when you're needin' something from them which they ain't
under obligation to themselves to do. That's buying and selling, and,
as things go, there ain't much kick coming. But when you've done that,
and their favor's fixed right, it's blackmail if their servants come
along and refuse to carry out their work if you don't pay _their_
price. This feller Slosson is a servant of the railroad. I'm ready to
graft all they need. He's out for blackmail. That feller wants to be
paid something for nothing. He don't do a thing for us. He's got to
do the work I'm paying the railroad for. See? Say, Gordon, boy,
happen what likes I won't do it. That feller don't make one cent out
of me. I'm on the buck, an' I don't care a curse."
Mallinsbee had turned about to deliver his irrevocable decision, and,
as Gordon met the man's serious, obstinate expression, he realized
something of the psychology lying behind a big financial transaction.
If Slosson had been a man of reasonable grafting disposition, if he had
been a pleasant, amiable personality, if he had been a--man, if Silas
Mallinsbee had been used to affairs such as his father dealt
in--well--. But it was useless to speculate further. He only saw a
troublous situation growing up for him to contend with.
"We've got to get him playing our game," he hazarded.
"That we'll never do. We're playing a straight bid for a win. He
couldn't play a straight bid for anything."
"No." There was a great cordiality in Gordon's negative.
"It's us who've got to play him--someways."
"It's some proposition," mused Gordon.
"It surely is. There's ways." Mallinsbee laughed shortly. "Maybe
I'll hand him over to Hazel." Then he gave another short laugh.
"Guess the ranch 'll interest him some--too."
Gordon's eyes lit apprehensively.
"I wouldn't do that," he said almost sharply.
Mallinsbee faced about.
"Why not? Hazel's a bright girl. She's as wise as any two men. A
crook don't worry her a thing."
"I guess all that's right enough. But--she's a girl, and--I don't seem
to feel it's fair to her."
Mallinsbee remained silent for some moments. Gordon watched the broad
back of the great, lolling figure in the doorway with an alarm he would
not have displayed had he been facing him. Then the sound of
clattering hoofs outside broke up the silence and the old man turned.
"Here she is," he cried, with a shadowy smile. "Guess she can speak
for herself."
Gordon could have cursed the luck that had brought the girl there at
that moment. He understood the depth of her devotion to her father and
his enterprise. Nothing could have been less opportune.
But, in a moment, his annoyance became lost in his delight at the sound
of her cheery greeting.
"Hello, Daddy," he heard her call out.
Gordon remained where he was, waiting to feast his eyes upon the fresh
beauty of this girl, who occupied so large a portion of his thoughts.
Her father stood aside to allow her to pass in, and Gordon had his
reward in her radiant smile.
"How's our junior partner?" she cried gayly.
"Feeling just about ready to turn the office into a twelve-foot ring
and--hurt somebody," the junior partner retorted quickly.
Hazel pulled a long face.
"Is it that way?" she demanded, and turned back to her father. Then
she added playfully: "What's ruffled the atmosphere of our--dovecote?"
The old man began to chuckle.
"Dovecote?" he said. "Guess armed fortress comes nearer describing
this lay out. Anyway the temper of its occupants," he added, his
twinkling eyes on the determined features of his protege. "Guess I'll
get goin' out to the ranch while you two scrap things out. Seems to me
I need to get the cobwebs of David Slosson out of my head."
He took his departure without haste, but with the obvious intention of
avoiding any further discussion of David Slosson for the present. And
Gordon was not sorry for his going. He felt that at all costs his
suggestion that Hazel should take her place in the ring with this man
Slosson was not to be thought of.
But he was reckoning without Hazel herself. He was calculating with
all a man's--a young man's--assurance that this girl would regard his
opinions in the light he regarded them himself.
Hazel sat herself upon the edge of his desk, and flicked the rawhide
quirt against the leg of her top boot. Her prairie hat was thrust back
from her forehead, and her pretty tanned face was turned in a smiling
inquiry upon Gordon.
"What is it?" she asked, with that new alertness the man had come to
regard as a part of her nature, second only to her delightful
camaraderie.
He smiled back into her merry eyes.
"I'm wondering why two men bent on a joint purpose can't see the same
thing in the same light."
"Which means you and my daddy have already started an argument which
I'll have to settle."
Gordon laughed.
"Guess you'll settle it, though--there's no need."
"Why not? If you can't agree?"
"We do agree."
"Then where's the argument?"
"There isn't one."
Hazel began to laugh.
"Why did you say there was?"
"I didn't. It was you who said that."
Hazel's smile had died away.
"It's Slosson, of course," she said decidedly. And Gordon began to
wish she were not so clearsighted, nor so direct in her challenges.
"Oh, he's a constant thorn," he said evasively.
"Has he been here to-day?"
Gordon nodded.
"And the result?"
"Your father is--obdurate. Says he won't submit to blackmail."
"Has Slosson abated his terms?"
"I don't think so."
Hazel rose quickly from her seat on the desk. She walked slowly across
the room and propped herself in the doorway, in precisely the same
position as her father had occupied. Gordon's eyes watched her every
movement. He knew she was considering deeply, and intuition warned him
that the result of her consideration might easily conflict with that
which he had in his mind. But he was not prepared for the announcement
which came a moment later.
She came back to the desk quickly, and took up her old place on it.
Her pretty lips were firmly set, and she gazed soberly and
unflinchingly down into Gordon's apprehensive blue eyes.
"I shall have to deal with David Slosson," she said quietly. Then,
with a light, expressive shrug: "It won't be pleasant--not by quite a
lot. But--it's got to be done, and done quickly. Father won't give
way, so--he must."
But, in a moment, Gordon's protest came with all the enthusiasm of his
impulsive nature. To think of this beautiful child having to defile
herself by cajoling a creature like this Slosson moved him to a pitch
of distraction. Whatever else he did not know, he knew the meaning of
expression when men gaze at women. And he had not forgotten his first
morning in Snake's Fall.
"Miss Mallinsbee," he cried, his big body leaning forward in his
earnestness, and all his feelings displayed in his ingenuous face, "I'd
rather let this thing go plumb smash than that you should be brought
into contact with that filthy scum again. Say, you're too young, and
good, to understand such creatures. I know----"
Hazel was smiling whimsically down into his anxious eyes.
"And you're so old and wise you can see plumb through him," she cried.
Then with an exact reproduction of his manner, she leaned forward so
that their faces were within a foot of each other. "You two Solomons
can't deal with him worth two cents. My daddy's too obstinate, and
you--are too prejudiced. He's got to be dealt with, and I'm going to
do it. In a case like this a girl's wiser than any two men."
"That's--just how your father argued," cried Gordon, in exasperation.
And the next moment he could have bitten off his tongue.
Hazel clapped her hands.
"So that was the argument," she cried delightedly. "My daddy in his
wisdom thought of me, and you--you being just a big, big chivalrous boy
with notions, couldn't see the same way."
Then she sat up, and her eyes grew very serious. That which lay behind
them was completely hidden from her companion, as she intended it to be.
Had it been possible for him to have read her approval of himself in
her attitude, he now made it beyond question by the sudden wave of heat
which swept through his heart.
"I tell you, you've no right to sacrifice yourself," he cried hotly.
"Nor has your father----"
"No right? Sacrifice?" Hazel's eyes opened wide, and in their
beautiful depths a sparkle of resentment shone. "Who says that?" she
demanded. Then in a moment her merry thought banished the clouds of
her displeasure. She began to tease. "Why shouldn't I do this? Say,
you've roused my curiosity. What's the danger? I--I just love danger.
What is the danger I'm running?"
But Gordon's sense of humor was unequal to her teasing on such a
subject. He remained sulkily silent.
"I'm waiting," Hazel urged slyly.
Gordon cleared his throat. He glanced up at her a little helplessly.
Their eyes met, and somehow he caught the infection of her lurking
smile.
He was forced to laugh in spite of himself.
"If--if you don't know, it's not for me to say," he cried at last, with
a shrug. "But I tell you, right here, if you were my sister you
wouldn't go near Slosson, if I had to--to chain you up."
"But I'm not your sister," retorted Hazel, with her dazzling smile.
"And, if I were, I shouldn't be a sister of yours if I didn't." Then
she laughed at herself. "Say, isn't that real bright?" Then with a
great pretense at severity she flourished an admonitory finger at him.
"Gordon Van Henslaer," she said solemnly, "you're just as obstinate as
my daddy, but you haven't got his wisdom." Her pretense passed and she
became suddenly very earnest. "This thing is just all the world to my
daddy," she said, "and I can help him. Wouldn't you help him if you
had such a dear, quaint old daddy as I have? I'm sure you would. What
does it matter to me what I may have to put up with if I can help him
out? True, it doesn't matter a thing. Insults? Why, I'll just deal
with them as they come along." Then her mood lightened. "Say, we're
just two real good friends, Mr. Van Henslaer, aren't we? Friends.
It's got a bully sound. That's just how my daddy and I've been ever
since my poor momma died years and years ago. Heigho!" she sighed.
"And now I've got another friend, and that's you. Say, we're always
going to be friends, too, because you're going to understand that
this--this thing is business, and business isn't play. My daddy wants
to make good, and I'm going to do all I know. And," she added slyly,
"that's quite a lot. Do you know, in this thing I'm dead honest when
I'm dealing with honest folk, and I'm a 'sharp' when I'm dealing with
'sharps'? By that I just mean I'm not scared of a thing. Certainly of
nothing Mr. David Slosson can do. My daddy can trust me, and he's
known me all my life. You've only known me a week, but you can trust
me too. I'm out to help things along, so just let's forget this--this
talk."
Gordon's admiration for the girl was so obvious that no words of his
were necessary to illuminate it, but he shook his head seriously as she
finished speaking.
"I just can't help it, Miss Mallinsbee," he said, a little desperately.
"If anything happened to you I'd never forgive myself. What do you
mean to do?"
Hazel smiled at his manner. Her smile was confident, but it was also
an expression of her regard for him. She had no intention of modifying
her decision, but she liked him for his dogged protest.
"You just leave that to me," she cried buoyantly. "I haven't an idea
in my silly head--yet. All I can say is, David Slosson is to be
encouraged. He's to be flattered. I'm going to make him smile real
prettily with that mealy face of his. Guess I'll have to take him out
rides--but I'll promise you it won't be my fault if he don't break his
wicked neck."
Gordon was forced to join in the girl's infectious laugh, but it was
without enjoyment. To think of this man riding at Hazel's side,
basking in her smiles, enjoying her company just when and where he
pleased. The thought was maddening. And it set his fingers tingling
and itching to possess themselves of his throat and squeeze the life
out of him.
"And how long's this to go on for?" he asked sulkily, in spite of his
laugh.
Hazel's eyes opened wide.
"Why--until he weakens, and we get things fixed."
"And if he beats your game?"
"He'll hate himself first, and then we'll have to reorganize our plans."
"Then I guess I'll get busy on the other plans."
"I shall be beaten?"
Gordon glanced away towards the window. His eyes had become reflective.
"It's the only thing I can see," he said slowly. "He'll finish by
insulting you. I know his kind. He'll insult you, sure. And I--well,
I shall just as surely pretty near kill him. And then we'll need
other--plans."
CHAPTER XI
HAZEL MALLINSBEE'S CAMPAIGN
The seductive mystery of the hills was beyond all words. A wonderful
outlook of wide valleys, bounded in almost every direction by the vast
incline of wood-clad hills, opened out a world that seemed to terminate
abruptly everywhere, yet to go on and on in an endless series of great
green valleys and mountain streams. Darkling wood-belts crept up the
great hillsides, deep in mysterious shadows, stirring imagination, and
carrying it back to all those haunting dreams of early childhood. For
the most part these were all untrodden by human foot, and so their
mystery deepened. Then above, often penetrating into the low-lying
clouds, the crowning glory of alabaster peaks whose snowy sheen dazed
the wondering eyes raised towards them.
In the valleys below, the green, the wonderful green, bright and
delicate, and quite unfaded by the scorching sun of the prairie away
beyond. Pastures beyond the dreams of all animal imagination in their
humid richness. Water, too, and low, broken scrubs and woodland
bluffs--one vast panorama of verdant beauty, such as only the eye of an
artist or the heart of a ranchman could appreciate.
It was the setting of Silas Mallinsbee's ranch, that ranch which was
more to him than all the world, except his motherless daughter. Gordon
had seen it all as he rode out to spend the week-end on a ranch horse,
placed by Mallinsbee at his disposal. He had marveled then at the
delights spread out before his eyes. Now, on the Sunday morning, while
he awaited breakfast, he wondered still more as he examined, even more
closely, that wealth of natural splendor spread out for his delight.
He was lounging on the deep sun-sheltered veranda which faced the
south. The ranch house was perched high up on the southern slope of
one of the lesser hills. Above him the gentle morning breeze sighed in
the rustling tree-tops of a great crowning woodland. Below him, and
all around him, were the widespreading buildings and corrals of a great
ranching enterprise. It seemed incredible to him that within twenty
miles of him, away to the east, there could exist so mundane and sordid
an undertaking as the Bude and Sideley Coal Company, and the vicious
chorus of ground sharks which haunted Snake's Fall. He felt as though
he were gazing out upon some enchanted valley of dreamland, where the
soft breezes and glinting sunlight possessed a magic to rest the
teeming energy of modern highly tuned brain and nerves.
Its seductiveness lulled him to a profound meditation, and into his
dreaming stole the figure of the mistress of these miles of perfect
beauty. Now he had some understanding of that fascinating buoyancy of
spirit, the simple devotion with which she contemplated the life that
claimed her. How could it be otherwise? Here was nature in all its
wonders of simplicity, shedding upon the life sheltering at its bosom
an equal simplicity, an equal strength, an equal singleness of mind
with which it was itself endowed. He felt that if he, too, had been
brought up in such surroundings no city flesh-pots could ever have
offered him any fascination. He, too, must have felt that this--this
alone was the real life of man.
The play of the dancing sunlight through the distant trees held his
gaze. He forgot to smoke, he forgot everything except the beauty about
him, the stirring ranch life below him, and the girl whose fascination
was daily possessing a greater and greater hold upon him.
Then, quite gently, something else subtly merged itself with the
pleasant tide of his meditations. It was the deep note of a voice
which came from close beside him in a rolling bass that afforded no jar.
"A picture that's mighty hard to beat," it said.
Gordon nodded without turning.
"Sure."
"Kind of holds you till you wonder why folks ever build cities and
things."
"Sure."
"There ain't a muck hole in miles and miles around that you could fall
into, and not come out of with a clean conscience an' a wholesome mind.
Kind of different to a city."
Gordon stirred. He turned and looked into Silas Mallinsbee's smiling
eyes.
"It's--all yours?" he inquired.
"For miles an' miles around. I got nigh a hundred miles of grazing in
these hills--and nobody else don't seem to want it. Makes you wonder."
Gordon laughed.
"Say, set a spade into the ground and find a marketable mineral and
tell someb
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