the hotel, with hasty steps, and mounted to the top of the stage with
much hurried scrambling. Then George left Hetty's window, mounted his
throne, and drove on.
We need not say how Hetty's heart sank with the sinking sun; and only
when George came out of the station-house where they had taken supper,
ready and equipped for the night's drive, did a light rise in her eyes.
"I thought you stopped at this station," she said, as he again leaned at
her window, while the same hasty steps and confused scrambling on the
top of the stage fell, half unconsciously, on her ear.
"Well--yes. As a general thing, I do. But me and Dick's changed off
to-night, so't I can see you into the cars to-morrow morning."
"How tired you will be," she remonstrated.
"Well--mebbe so. Howsomever, Miss Hetty, you didn't stop to think
whether you'd be tired when you started out to find help for me, last
New-Year's eve." And Hetty blushed, as she always did, when her heroism
was spoken of.
George's eyes did look heavy the next morning; but he still kept the
lines, lounging up to the coach-window about the time the stage was
ready to start, and always pointing out something of interest on these
occasions. Once, indeed, when she fancied that her ear caught the sound
of a familiar footfall on the porch of the tavern they were about to
leave, he was so anxious she should see the owl just vanishing into the
squirrel-hole, on the opposite side of the road, that he laid his hand
on her arm to insure her quick attention, just as she was about to turn
her head back in the direction of the porch. Then came the usual
climbing and scrambling overhead, and directly George mounted, too, and
drove on.
The shrill whistle of the locomotive seemed to cut right through Hetty's
heart; and the loneliness she had never felt away down the country, now
suddenly took possession of the girl's soul. No one could have been more
attentive than George; the best seat in the cars was picked out for her;
the daily papers laid beside her, and then--then she was left alone.
George only, of all her down-country friends, had made the unconditional
promise to visit her in San Francisco. She was thinking of this after he
had left her, and she sat watching the cars filling with passengers for
the city--travellers gathered together here from watering-place and
pleasure-resort, from dairy-ranch and cattle-range. Was there another
being among these all as lonely as she? And she turned her face to the
window, and looked steadily over toward the hills, yellow and parched
now, in the late summer--so fresh and green from the winter's rains when
she had last seen them. It looked as if her life, too, were in the "sere
and yellow;" the heavy, throbbing pain that was in her heart and rising
to her throat--would it ever give place again to the bright fancies she
had indulged in when coming this way--oh! how many weeks ago? She tried
to count; but counting the weeks brought the events of each in turn
before her, and she desisted; she must keep a calm face and a clear eye.
She heard the cry of the fruit-venders outside, and saw their baskets
laden with fruits, tempting and delicious, raised to the car-windows,
where passengers had signified their wish to purchase. Mechanically, her
eyes followed the movements of the young man in front of her. Grapes,
with the dew still on them; apples, with one red cheek, and peaches with
two; plums, larger than either, and far more luscious, were transferred
from the heavy basket into the lap of the lady beside him--evidently his
new-made wife--who said, "Thanks, dear," with such a happy, grateful
smile, that Hetty grew quite envious. She tried to think it was of the
fruit; but pending the decision she laid her head on the back of the
seat in front of her, and before she thought of what she was doing, the
tears were trickling down her cheeks. Then her shoulders began to jerk
quite ridiculously, and she was ready to die of shame, when a light hand
was laid on them, and her name was spoken.
"Hetty!" the voice said again; but she did not raise her head, only
answering, "Yes," as she would have done in a dream.
"Hetty!" once more, "see what I have brought you." Apples, and peaches,
and plums--all these things were showered into her lap, and when she
raised her head, she looked at them steadily a moment, and then said,
with a long breath, "Oh, Frank!" before she turned to where he sat. As
she stretched out both hands to meet his, the fruit, now forgotten, fell
plump, plump, to the floor, and rolled all over the cars; and when the
train moved slowly away from the depot a little later, Hetty, looking up
at the lady in front of her, said to herself, that she envied her no
longer--neither the apples nor--. She made a full stop here; perhaps
because of George's sudden appearance, and the hilarity in which he and
Frank indulged.
"Oh, Miss Hetty!" he laughed; "I couldn't make you see that owl this
morning, could I?"
"No; but I think I must have been as blind as an owl myself, not to have
seen whom you were hiding," she answered, taking the contagion.
Again shrieked the locomotive, but not with the "heart-rending" cry of a
while ago; and George, bringing their hands quickly together in his
parting clasp, sprang from the cars and left Frank and Hetty there.
Loud was the anger of good Mrs. Sutton on discovering that Frank had
accompanied Hetty to San Francisco. In vain Father Sutton disclaimed all
fore-knowledge of the young man's intention, and asserted that Frank had
never mentioned a tour to the city. Mrs. Sutton said she knew the old
man was in league with him. At the end of a week Frank returned without
so much as bringing the fur sack as a peace-offering. In course of time
he reconciled his mother to some extent by again carrying messages to
Lolita, and sometimes bringing Lolita herself in return, just as in
Hetty's time.
Autumn came; and still, to the determined schemer's dissatisfaction,
Frank had not yet secured the prize she so coveted for him. The season
brought with it many cares as well as pleasures to the ranchero. At a
_rodeo_, looked upon by the young people generally as a pleasant
entertainment, Frank was the admired of many eyes, as his lasso
unfailingly singled out the animal "in demand," among the dense herds
moving in a circle. The horse he rode was full of fire, and more
impetuous, if possible, than his rider; and Lolita, who was among the
guests at the Yedral Ranch, had never thought Frank so handsome and so
well worth winning before.
To Hetty the white walls and the spacious rooms of the grammar-school,
to which she had returned, seemed a prison and a wilderness in one. Her
sister's house, with the six young Tartars, was more like Bedlam than
ever; but Hetty had grown older and firmer, and she declared, to her
sister's amazement, that unless she could withdraw herself from the mob
unmolested, at her option, she should seek a home with more congenial
associates. The sister opened her eyes wide, as if only now discovering
that Hetty was full-grown; and she assented silently.
First, after her return, letters from Frank lighted up her life at
intervals. But when the early rains of autumn, after an Indian summer
full of sunny days and glorious memories of vanished springs, turned to
the settled melancholy of "a wet winter," these letters ceased, leaving
in Hetty's existence a blank that nothing else could fill. Christmas
came, with its vacations and merry-makings, and beside the dull, deep
pain in Hetty's heart, there was still the unselfish wish to give others
pleasure, though she herself could never again feel that glad emotion.
From morn to night her deft hands flew, sewing, stitching,
sketching--busy always, yet never for herself.
It was very near Christmas now--so near that Hetty, eager to have all
things ready for the joyous eve, had sat down to her work without the
usual care for neat appearance. Perhaps it was because her curls were a
little neglected, and her collar was not pinned on with the usual
precision, that her face looked worn this morning; her eyes were
languid, and the flush on her cheeks could not cover the deficiency of
flesh which became painfully visible.
Thus she sat, stitching, ever stitching. The silent parlor, with its
covered furniture and light carpeting, seemed the right place for ghosts
to flit through, and peer, mayhap, with dull, glazed eyes into the fire,
as Hetty caught herself just now. But she drove back the ghosts--are
they not always our own memories, woven out of unfulfilled wishes,
useless regrets, and profitless remorse?--and hastily resumed her work.
The ringing of the door-bell seemed so much the doing of one of these
ghosts, that she paid no attention to it, but kept on stitching, quietly
stitching. Directly the parlor-door was thrown open, and the Mongolian
servitor, looking with calm indifference on the little streams of muddy
water oozing at every step from the boots of the new-comer, returned to
the kitchen, heedless, to all appearances, of the scream with which
Hetty flew to meet the stranger.
"George!" she cried, "oh! George!" and she clasped the damp arm of the
man, gotten up on the grizzly-bear pattern, as though there could be no
pleasure greater than this in all the world.
Though a man, George was wise enough to know that he was not indebted to
his personal attractions for this affectionate greeting; but taking both
her hands in his, he said, "Yes, Miss Hetty, I've come to tell you all
about it."
At the fall _rodeo_ on the Yedral Ranch, Frank's horse had fallen,
covering its rider with its weighty body. He recovered from a death-like
swoon with wandering mind; and the spine being injured, according to
the doctor's statement, it seemed doubtful that he would ever leave his
bed, except as imbecile or cripple. Reason returning, Frank felt that
his friends' fears of his remaining a cripple were not without
foundation, and a hopeless gloom settled on his spirit. Many a time,
when George had made "fast time" and spent the half-hour gained at
Frank's bed, did Hetty's name rise to his lips; but it was never
pronounced. Only this: looking up out of deep sunken eyes, one day,
quite recently, Frank had said to him, "George, I shall get well, and
not be a cripple. If only--" "It's all right," had been George's answer;
and he had hurried from the house as though charged with the most urgent
commission.
After an hour's conversation, Hetty had only one question to ask.
Looking up with shy eagerness, she almost said below her breath, "And
Lolita?"
For answer, George took the flushed face between his hands.
"You've grown mighty thin, Miss Hetty," he simply said. Then he
continued, with great _nonchalance_, "Lolita got stuck after the new
schoolmaster--they've got a man in your place. But come, Miss Hetty, you
'peared to me last New-Year's eve like an angel, in my distress; suppose
you do as much now for Frank Sutton. We can get down there on New-Year's
eve, and give you lots of time to spend Christmas here first. What d'ye
say?"
No lover could have pleaded more earnestly. All her objections were
overruled, and when at last she said, almost breathlessly, "Oh, but his
_mother_, George!" he answered, with all his honest heart: "It's my firm
belief, Miss Hetty, that you were cut out for a real hero-ine; and a
hero-ine you've got to be to the end of the chapter--which I don't say
but the last trial of your hero-ism will be greater than the first."
And sure enough, on New-Year's eve, came the rumbling of wheels and the
tramp of horses' hoofs close up to the veranda of the ranch-house on the
Yedral. None of the inmates seemed startled, though none had expected
company. Without a word Father Sutton sprang to the door--alas! that the
old man was swifter of foot now than the young giant of a year
ago--caught the lithe figure that sprang from the stage in his arms and
set her down, as Frank had done, in the middle of the room. But she was
not cold, dripping wet now, only blinded by the light one moment, and
the next on her knees by the lounge, where a pale, haggard man lay
stretched. He half raised himself to catch her in his arms, and for a
wonder did not sink back with the moan that had become so painful to his
father's ears. For once Hetty had cast aside all timidity, and she
looked up brightly into Father Sutton's face, while one arm circled
Frank's neck and the other hand lay unresistingly in his.
"Hey!" shouted the old man; "now we know whose gal you are; I used to
call you mine once. Mother, get some supper; I reckon she is wellnigh
starved and perished with the cold. Lively, Johnny! bring some more
wood; Hetty'll stay for good, and you'll get time enough to hang 'round
the gal to-morrow."
And what a bright to-morrow it was! Such a New-Year's day had never
dawned on Yedral Ranch before. Every one seemed to have found a
treasure, even to Mrs. Sutton. Together with Hetty's trunk had come a
large, promising-looking box, and when Father Sutton presented this to
his better-half, she almost screamed--
"Oh, I know! it's my new fur sack!"
_A WOMAN'S TREACHERY._
"How much you resemble Mrs. Arnold!" exclaimed the Doctor's wife, after
an hour's acquaintance, the day we reached Fort ----. It was not the
first time I had heard of my resemblance to this, to me, unknown lady
remarked on. A portion of the regiment of colored troops to which Doctor
Kline belonged, and which we met on their way in to the States, as we
were coming out, had been camped near us one night; and a colored
laundress, who had good-naturedly come over to our tent to take the
place of my girl, who was sick, had broken into the same exclamation on
first beholding me. Captain Arnold belonged to the same regiment, and
was expecting, like all the volunteers then in the Territory, to be
ordered home and mustered out of service, as soon as the body of regular
troops, to which my husband belonged, could be assigned their respective
posts. Their expectations were not to be realized for some time yet; and
when I left the Territory, a year later, a part of these troops were
still on the frontier.
Fort ---- was not our destination; to reach it, we should be obliged to
pass through, and stop for a day or two at, the very post of which
Captain Arnold had command--which would afford me excellent and ample
opportunity for judging of the asserted likeness between this lady and
myself. I must explain why we were, in a measure, compelled to stop at
Fort Desolation (we will call it so). It was located in the midst of a
desert--the most desolate and inhospitable that can be imagined--in the
heart of an Indian country, and just so far removed from the direct
route across the desert as to make it impracticable to turn in there
with a command, or large number of soldiers; for which reason, troops
crossing here always carried water-barrels filled with them. A small
party, however, such as ours was then, could not with any safety camp
out the one night they must, despite the best ambulance-mules, pass on
the desert.
With most pardonable curiosity, I endeavored to learn something more of
the woman who was so much like me in appearance; and I began straightway
to question Mrs. Kline about her. The impression of a frank, open
character, which this lady had made on me at first, vanished at once
when she found that Mrs. Arnold was to be made the subject of
conversation between us.
"Is she pretty?"
"Yes--quite so." Ahem! and looked like me. But my mother's saying, that
there might be a striking resemblance between a very handsome and a very
plain person, presented itself to my memory like an uninvited guest, and
I concluded not to fall to imagining vain things on so slight a support.
"What kind of a man is Captain Arnold?"
"The most good-natured man in the world."
"Oh!" Something in the manner of her saying this in praise of Captain
Arnold made me think she wanted to say nothing further; so I stopped
questioning.
We left the Doctor and his wife early the next morning, and reached Fort
Desolation at night-fall. The orderly had preceded us a short distance,
and, when the ambulance stopped at the Captain's quarters, Mrs. Arnold
appeared on the threshold, holding a lantern in her hand. She raised it,
to let the light fall into the ambulance; and as the rays fell on her
own face, I could see that she looked like--a sister I had. The Captain
was absent, inspecting the picket-posts he had established along the
river, and would return by morning, Mrs. Arnold said; and she busied
herself with me in a pleasant, pretty manner. She could not resemble me
in height or figure, I said to myself, for she was smaller and more
delicately made; nor had any one in our family such deep-blue eyes, save
mother--we children had to content ourselves with gray ones.
The night outside was dark and chilly; but in the Captain's house there
were light and warmth, and it was bright with the fires that burned in
the fireplaces of the different rooms--all opening one into the other. I
was forcibly struck with the difference between the quarters at Fort
---- and Mrs. Arnold's home at Fort Desolation. Comforts (luxuries, in
this country) of all kinds made it attractive: bright carpets were on
the floors here; while at the Doctor's quarters at Fort ----, one was
always reminded of cold feet and centipedes, when looking at the naked
_adobe_ floors. Embroidered covers were spread on the tables and white
coverlets on the beds; while at the Doctor's all these things were made
hideous by hospital-linen and gray blankets. Easy-chairs and lounges,
manufactured from flour-barrels, saw-bucks, and candle-boxes, were made
gorgeous and comfortable with red calico and sheep's-wool; but the
crowning glory of parlor, bed-room, and sitting-room was a dazzling
toilet-set of china--gilt-edged, and sprinkled with delicate bouquets of
moss-roses and foliage.
"Where _did_ you get it?" I asked, in astonishment--_not_ envy.
"Isn't it pretty?" she asked, triumphantly. "The Captain's
quartermaster, Lieutenant Rockdale, brought it from Santa Fé for me, and
paid, a mint of money for it, no doubt."
At the supper-table I saw Lieutenant Rockdale, who commanded the post in
the Captain's absence, being the only officer there besides the Captain;
and, as he messed with them altogether, I need not say that the table
was well supplied with all the delicacies that New York and Baltimore
send out to less highly favored portions of the universe, in tin cans.
Lieutenant Rockdale was a handsome man--a trifle effeminate, perhaps,
with languishing, brown eyes, and a soft voice. He seemed delighted with
our visit, and took my husband off to his own quarters, while Mrs.
Arnold and I looked over pictures of her friends, over albums, and at
all the hundred little curiosities which she had accumulated while in
the Territory. The cares of the household seemed to sit very lightly on
her; a negro woman, Constantia, and a mulatto boy, of twelve or
thirteen, sharing the labor between them. The boy seemed to be a
favorite with Mrs. Arnold, though she tantalized and tormented him, as I
afterwards found she tormented and tantalized every living creature over
which she had the power.
I had noticed, while Constantia and Fred were clearing off the table,
that she had cut him a slice from a very choice cake, toward which the
child had cast longing looks. Placing it carefully on a plate, when he
had to leave it for a moment to do something his mistress had bidden
him, in the twinkling of an eye she had hidden it; and when the boy
missed it, she expressed her regret at his carelessness, and artfully
led his suspicions toward Constantia. Hearing him whimpering and
sniffling as he went back and forth between dining-room and kitchen, his
childish distress at losing the cake seemed to afford her the same
amusement that a stage-play would, and she laughed till the tears rolled
down her cheeks. Later, he was summoned to replenish the fire; and,
knowing the little darkey's aversion for going out of the house
bare-headed (he had an idea that his cap could prevent the Indian arrows
from penetrating his skull), she hid the cap he had left in the
adjoining room, and then laughed immoderately at his terror on leaving
the house without it. The next morning, she led me out to the stables to
show me her horse--a magnificent, black animal, wild-eyed, with a
restless, fretful air. Crossing the space in front of the house, she
called to a soldier with sergeant-chevrons on his arms--a man with just
enough of negro blood in his veins to stamp him with the curse of his
race.
"Harry!" she called to him, "Harry, come hold Black for me; I want to
give him a piece of sugar." She opened her hand to let him see the
pieces, and he touched his cap and followed us. He loosened the halter
and led the horse up to us, but the animal started back when he saw Mrs.
Arnold, and would not let her approach him. Harry patted his neck and
soothed him, and Mrs. Arnold holding the sugar up to his view, the horse
came to take it from her hand; but she quickly clutched his lip with her
fingers, and blew into his face till the horse reared and plunged so
that Harry could hold him no longer. Laughing like an imp, she called to
Harry:
"Get on him and hold him, if you cannot manage him in that way: get on
him anyhow, and let Mrs. ---- see him dance."
The mulatto's flashing black eyes were bent on her with a singularly
reproachful look; but the next moment he was on the horse's back, the
horse snorting and jumping in a perfectly frantic manner.
When Mrs. Arnold had sufficiently recovered from her merriment, she
explained that the horse had not been ridden for a month; the last time
she had ridden him he had thrown her--she had pricked him with a pin to
urge him on faster.
About noon the Captain arrived; and I found him, as Mrs. Kline had
described, "the most good-natured man in the world," and, to all
appearances, loving his wife with the whole of his big heart. He was big
in stature, too, with broad shoulders, pleasant face, and cheerful,
ringing voice. The shaggy dog, who had slunk away from Mrs. Arnold, came
leaping up on his master when he saw him; the horse he had ridden rubbed
his nose against his master's shoulder before turning to go into his
stable, and Constantia and Fred beamed on him with their white teeth and
laughing eyes from the kitchen-door. Later in the afternoon, he asked
what I thought of his quarters, and told me how hard his colored
soldiers had worked to build the really pretty _adobe_ house in strict
accordance with his wishes and directions. But I could not quite decide
whether he was more proud of the house or of the affection his men all
had for him. Then he told me the story of almost every piece of
furniture in the house; and, moving from room to room, we came to where
their bed stood. Resting beside it was his carbine, which the orderly
had brought in. Taking it in his hand to examine it, he pointed it at
his wife's head with the air of a brigand, and uttered, in unearthly
tones:
"Your money, or your life!"
With a quick, cat-like spring, she was by the bed, had thrust her hands
under the pillow, and the next instant was holding two Derringers close
to his breast. Throwing back her head, like a heroine in velvet trousers
on the stage, she returned, in the same strain:
"I can play a hand at that game, too, and go you one better!"
She laughed as she said it--the laugh that she laughed with her white
teeth clenched--but there was a "glint" in her eye that I had never seen
in a blue eye before.
When once more on the way, my husband asked me how I liked Mrs. Arnold.
"Very well," said I; "but--," and I did not hesitate to tell him of the
peculiarities I had noticed about her. He himself was charmed with her
sprightliness, so he only responded with, "Pshaw! woman!" after which I
maintained an offended (he said, offensive) silence on the subject.