It was the usual foggy afternoon as he climbed the long windswept hill

of California Street--one of those bleak, gray intervals that made the

summer a misnomer to any but the liveliest San Franciscan fancy. There

was no warmth or color in earth or sky, no light nor shade within or

without, only one monotonous, universal neutral tint over everything.

There was a fierce unrest in the wind-whipped streets: there was a

dreary vacant quiet in the gray houses. When Ah Fe reached the top of

the hill, the Mission Ridge was already hidden, and the chill sea

breeze made him shiver. As he put down his basket to rest himself, it

is possible that, to his defective intelligence and heathen experience,

this “God's own climate,” as was called, seemed to possess but

scant tenderness, softness, or mercy. But it is possible that Ah

Fe illogically confounded this season with his old persecutors, the

schoolchildren, who, being released from studious confinement, at this

hour were generally most aggressive. So he hastened on, and turning a

corner, at last stopped before a small house.

It was the usual San Franciscan urban cottage. There was the little

strip of cold green shrubbery before it; the chilly, bare veranda, and

above this, again, the grim balcony, on which no one sat. Ah Fe rang

the bell. A servant appeared, glanced at his basket, and reluctantly

admitted him, as if he were some necessary domestic animal. Ah Fe

silently mounted the stairs, and entering the open door of the front

chamber, put down the basket and stood passively on the threshold.

A woman, who was sitting in the cold gray light of the window, with a

child in her lap, rose listlessly, and came toward him. Ah Fe instantly

recognized Mrs. Tretherick; but not a muscle of his immobile face

changed, nor did his slant eyes lighten as he met her own placidly. She

evidently did not recognize him as she began to count the clothes. But

the child, curiously examining him, suddenly uttered a short, glad cry.

“Why, it's John, Mamma! It's our old John what we had in Fiddletown.”

For an instant Ah Fe's eyes and teeth electrically lightened. The child

clapped her hands, and caught at his blouse. Then he said shortly: “Me

John--Ah Fe--allee same. Me know you. How do?”

Mrs. Tretherick dropped the clothes nervously, and looked hard at Ah Fe.

Wanting the quick-witted instinct of affection that sharpened Carry's

perception, she even then could not distinguish him above his fellows.

With a recollection of past pain, and an obscure suspicion of impending

danger, she asked him when he had left Fiddletown.

“Longee time. No likee Fiddletown, no likee Tlevelick. Likee San Flisco.

Likee washee. Likee Tally.”

Ah Fe's laconics pleased Mrs. Tretherick. She did not stop to consider

how much an imperfect knowledge of English added to his curt directness

and sincerity. But she said, “Don't tell anybody you have seen me,” and

took out her pocketbook.

Ah Fe, without looking at it, saw that it was nearly empty. Ah Fe,

without examining the apartment, saw that it was scantily furnished.

Ah Fe, without removing his eyes from blank vacancy, saw that both Mrs.

Tretherick and Carry were poorly dressed. Yet it is my duty to

state that Ah Fe's long fingers closed promptly and firmly over the

half-dollar which Mrs. Tretherick extended to him.

Then he began to fumble in his blouse with a series of extraordinary

contortions. After a few moments, he extracted from apparently no

particular place a child's apron, which he laid upon the basket with the

remark:

“One piecee washman flagittee.”

Then he began anew his fumblings and contortions. At last his efforts

were rewarded by his producing, apparently from his right ear, a

many-folded piece of tissue paper. Unwrapping this carefully, he at

last disclosed two twenty-dollar gold pieces, which he handed to Mrs.

Tretherick.

“You leavee money topside of blulow, Fiddletown. Me findee money. Me

fetchee money to you. All lightee.”

“But I left no money on the top of the bureau, John,” said Mrs.

Tretherick earnestly. “There must be some mistake. It belongs to some

other person. Take it back, John.”

Ah Fe's brow darkened. He drew away from Mrs. Tretherick's extended

hand, and began hastily to gather up his basket.

“Me no takee it back. No, no! Bimeby pleesman he catchee me. He say,

'God damn thief!--catchee flowty dollar: come to jailee.' Me no takee

back. You leavee money topside blulow, Fiddletown. Me fetchee money you.

Me no takee back.”

Mrs. Tretherick hesitated. In the confusion of her flight, she MIGHT

have left the money in the manner he had said. In any event, she had no

right to jeopardize this honest Chinaman's safety by refusing it. So she

said: “Very well, John, I will keep it. But you must come again and see

me--” here Mrs. Tretherick hesitated with a new and sudden revelation

of the fact that any man could wish to see any other than herself--“and,

and--Carry.”

Ah Fe's face lightened. He even uttered a short ventriloquistic laugh

without moving his mouth. Then, shouldering his basket, he shut the door

carefully and slid quietly down stairs. In the lower hall he, however,

found an unexpected difficulty in opening the front door, and, after

fumbling vainly at the lock for a moment, looked around for some help

or instruction. But the Irish handmaid who had let him in was

contemptuously oblivious of his needs, and did not appear.

There occurred a mysterious and painful incident, which I shall simply

record without attempting to explain. On the hall table a scarf,

evidently the property of the servant before alluded to, was lying.

As Ah Fe tried the lock with one hand, the other rested lightly on the

table. Suddenly, and apparently of its own volition, the scarf began to

creep slowly toward Ah Fe's hand; from Ah Fe's hand it began to creep up

his sleeve slowly, and with an insinuating, snakelike motion; and then

disappeared somewhere in the recesses of his blouse. Without betraying

the least interest or concern in this phenomenon, Ah Fe still repeated

his experiments upon the lock. A moment later the tablecloth of red

damask, moved by apparently the same mysterious impulse, slowly gathered

itself under Ah Fe's fingers, and sinuously disappeared by the same

hidden channel. What further mystery might have followed, I cannot say;

for at this moment Ah Fe discovered the secret of the lock, and was

enabled to open the door coincident with the sound of footsteps upon

the kitchen stairs. Ah Fe did not hasten his movements, but patiently

shouldering his basket, closed the door carefully behind him again, and

stepped forth into the thick encompassing fog that now shrouded earth

and sky.

From her high casement window, Mrs. Tretherick watched Ah Fe's figure

until it disappeared in the gray cloud. In her present loneliness, she

felt a keen sense of gratitude toward him, and may have ascribed to

the higher emotions and the consciousness of a good deed that certain

expansiveness of the chest, and swelling of the bosom, that was really

due to the hidden presence of the scarf and tablecloth under his blouse.

For Mrs. Tretherick was still poetically sensitive. As the gray fog

deepened into night, she drew Carry closer toward her, and, above

the prattle of the child, pursued a vein of sentimental and egotistic

recollection at once bitter and dangerous. The sudden apparition of Ah

Fe linked her again with her past life at Fiddletown. Over the dreary

interval between, she was now wandering--a journey so piteous, willful,

thorny, and useless that it was no wonder that at last Carry stopped

suddenly in the midst of her voluble confidences to throw her small arms

around the woman's neck, and bid her not to cry.

Heaven forefend that I should use a pen that should be ever dedicated

to an exposition of unalterable moral principle to transcribe Mrs.

Tretherick's own theory of this interval and episode, with its feeble

palliations, its illogical deductions, its fond excuses, and weak

apologies. It would seem, however, that her experience had been hard.

Her slender stock of money was soon exhausted. At Sacramento she

found that the composition of verse, although appealing to the highest

emotions of the human heart, and compelling the editorial breast to the

noblest commendation in the editorial pages, was singularly inadequate

to defray the expenses of herself and Carry. Then she tried the stage,

but failed signally. Possibly her conception of the passions was

different from that which obtained with a Sacramento audience; but it

was certain that her charming presence, so effective at short range, was

not sufficiently pronounced for the footlights. She had admirers enough

in the greenroom, but awakened no abiding affection among the audience.

In this strait, it occurred to her that she had a voice--a contralto of

no very great compass or cultivation, but singularly sweet and touching;

and she finally obtained position in a church choir. She held it for

three months, greatly to her pecuniary advantage, and, it is said, much

to the satisfaction of the gentlemen in the back pews, who faced toward

her during the singing of the last hymn.

I remember her quite distinctly at this time. The light that slanted

through the oriel of St. Dives's choir was wont to fall very tenderly on

her beautiful head with its stacked masses of deerskin-colored hair, on

the low black arches of her brows, and to deepen the pretty fringes

that shaded her eyes of Genoa velvet. Very pleasant it was to watch

the opening and shutting of that small straight mouth, with its quick

revelation of little white teeth, and to see the foolish blood faintly

deepen her satin cheek as you watched. For Mrs. Tretherick was very

sweetly conscious of admiration and, like most pretty women, gathered

herself under your eye like a racer under the spur.

And then, of course, there came trouble. I have it from the soprano--a

little lady who possessed even more than the usual unprejudiced judgment

of her sex--that Mrs. Tretherick's conduct was simply shameful; that her

conceit was unbearable; that, if she considered the rest of the choir

as slaves, she (the soprano) would like to know it; that her conduct on

Easter Sunday with the basso had attracted the attention of the whole

congregation; and that she herself had noticed Dr. Cope twice look up

during the service; that her (the soprano's) friends had objected to her

singing in the choir with a person who had been on the stage, but

she had waived this. Yet she had it from the best authority that Mrs.

Tretherick had run away from her husband, and that this red-haired child

who sometimes came in the choir was not her own. The tenor confided to

me behind the organ that Mrs. Tretherick had a way of sustaining a note

at the end of a line in order that her voice might linger longer with

the congregation--an act that could be attributed only to a defective

moral nature; that as a man (he was a very popular dry goods clerk on

weekdays, and sang a good deal from apparently behind his eyebrows on

the Sabbath)--that as a man, sir, he would put up with it no longer.

The basso alone--a short German with a heavy voice, for which he seemed

reluctantly responsible, and rather grieved at its possession--stood up

for Mrs. Tretherick, and averred that they were jealous of her because

she was “bretty.” The climax was at last reached in an open quarrel,

wherein Mrs. Tretherick used her tongue with such precision of statement

and epithet that the soprano burst into hysterical tears, and had to

be supported from the choir by her husband and the tenor. This act was

marked intentionally to the congregation by the omission of the usual

soprano solo. Mrs. Tretherick went home flushed with triumph, but

on reaching her room frantically told Carry that they were beggars

henceforward; that she--her mother--had just taken the very bread out

of her darling's mouth, and ended by bursting into a flood of penitent

tears. They did not come so quickly as in her old poetical days; but

when they came they stung deeply. She was roused by a formal visit from

a vestryman--one of the music committee. Mrs. Tretherick dried her long

lashes, put on a new neck ribbon, and went down to the parlor. She staid

there two hours--a fact that might have occasioned some remark but that

the vestryman was married, and had a family of grownup daughters. When

Mrs. Tretherick returned to her room, she sang to herself in the glass

and scolded Carry--but she retained her place in the choir.

It was not long, however. In due course of time, her enemies received a

powerful addition to their forces in the committeeman's wife. That lady

called upon several of the church members and on Dr. Cope's family.

The result was that, at a later meeting of the music committee, Mrs.

Tretherick's voice was declared inadequate to the size of the building

and she was invited to resign. She did so. She had been out of a

situation for two months, and her scant means were almost exhausted,

when Ah Fe's unexpected treasure was tossed into her lap.

The gray fog deepened into night, and the street lamps started into

shivering life as, absorbed in these unprofitable memories, Mrs.

Tretherick still sat drearily at her window. Even Carry had slipped away

unnoticed; and her abrupt entrance with the damp evening paper in

her hand roused Mrs. Tretherick, and brought her back to an active

realization of the present. For Mrs. Tretherick was wont to scan

the advertisements in the faint hope of finding some avenue of

employment--she knew not what--open to her needs; and Carry had noted

this habit.

Mrs. Tretherick mechanically closed the shutters, lit the lights, and

opened the paper. Her eye fell instinctively on the following paragraph

in the telegraphic column:

FIDDLETOWN, 7th.--Mr. James Tretherick, an old resident of this place,

died last night of delirium tremens. Mr. Tretherick was addicted to

intemperate habits, said to have been induced by domestic trouble.

Mrs. Tretherick did not start. She quietly turned over another page of

the paper, and glanced at Carry. The child was absorbed in a book. Mrs.

Tretherick uttered no word, but during the remainder of the evening was

unusually silent and cold. When Carry was undressed and in bed, Mrs.

Tretherick suddenly dropped on her knees beside the bed, and, taking

Carry's flaming head between her hands, said:

“Should you like to have another papa, Carry, darling?”

“No,” said Carry, after a moment's thought.

“But a papa to help Mamma take care of you, to love you, to give you

nice clothes, to make a lady of you when you grow up?”

Carry turned her sleepy eyes toward the questioner. “Should YOU, Mamma?”

Mrs. Tretherick suddenly flushed to the roots of her hair. “Go to

sleep,” she said sharply, and turned away.

But at midnight the child felt two white arms close tightly around her,

and was drawn down into a bosom that heaved, fluttered, and at last was

broken up by sobs.

“Don't ky, Mamma,” whispered Carry, with a vague retrospect of their

recent conversation. “Don't ky. I fink I SHOULD like a new papa, if he

loved you very much--very, very much!”

A month afterward, to everybody's astonishment, Mrs. Tretherick was

married. The happy bridegroom was one Colonel Starbottle, recently

elected to represent Calaveras County in the legislative councils of the

State. As I cannot record the event in finer language than that used by

the correspondent of THE SACRAMENTO GLOBE, I venture to quote some of

his graceful periods. “The relentless shafts of the sly god have been

lately busy among our gallant Solons. We quote 'one more unfortunate.'

The latest victim is the Hon. C. Starbottle of Calaveras. The fair

enchantress in the case is a beautiful widow, a former votary of

Thespis, and lately a fascinating St. Cecilia of one of the most

fashionable churches of San Francisco, where she commanded a high

salary.”

THE DUTCH FLAT INTELLIGENCER saw fit, however, to comment upon the fact

with that humorous freedom characteristic of an unfettered press. “The

new Democratic war horse from Calaveras has lately advented in the

legislature with a little bill to change the name of Tretherick

to Starbottle. They call it a marriage certificate down there. Mr.

Tretherick has been dead just one month; but we presume the gallant

colonel is not afraid of ghosts.” It is but just to Mrs. Tretherick

to state that the colonel's victory was by no means an easy one. To

a natural degree of coyness on the part of the lady was added the

impediment of a rival--a prosperous undertaker from Sacramento, who

had first seen and loved Mrs. Tretherick at the theater and church, his

professional habits debarring him from ordinary social intercourse, and

indeed any other than the most formal public contact with the sex. As

this gentleman had made a snug fortune during the felicitous prevalence

of a severe epidemic, the colonel regarded him as a dangerous rival.

Fortunately, however, the undertaker was called in professionally to lay

out a brother senator, who had unhappily fallen by the colonel's pistol

in an affair of honor; and either deterred by physical consideration

from rivalry, or wisely concluding that the colonel was professionally

valuable, he withdrew from the field.

The honeymoon was brief, and brought to a close by an untoward incident.

During their bridal trip, Carry had been placed in the charge of

Colonel Starbottle's sister. On their return to the city, immediately on

reaching their lodgings, Mrs. Starbottle announced her intention of at

once proceeding to Mrs. Culpepper's to bring the child home. Colonel

Starbottle, who had been exhibiting for some time a certain uneasiness

which he had endeavored to overcome by repeated stimulation, finally

buttoned his coat tightly across his breast, and after walking

unsteadily once or twice up and down the room, suddenly faced his wife

with his most imposing manner.

“I have deferred,” said the colonel with an exaggeration of port that

increased with his inward fear, and a growing thickness of speech--“I

have deferr--I may say poshponed statement o' fack thash my duty ter

dishclose ter ye. I did no wish to mar sushine mushal happ'ness, to

bligh bud o' promise, to darken conjuglar sky by unpleasht revelashun.

Musht be done--by God, m'm, musht do it now. The chile is gone!”

“Gone!” echoed Mrs. Starbottle.

There was something in the tone of her voice, in the sudden

drawing-together of the pupils of her eyes, that for a moment nearly

sobered the colonel, and partly collapsed his chest.

“I'll splain all in a minit,” he said with a deprecating wave of the

hand. “Everything shall be splained. The-the-the-melencholly event

wish preshipitate our happ'ness--the myster'us prov'nice wish releash

you--releash chile! hunerstan?--releash chile. The mom't Tretherick

die--all claim you have in chile through him--die too. Thash law. Who's

chile b'long to? Tretherick? Tretherick dead. Chile can't b'long dead

man. Damn nonshense b'long dead man. I'sh your chile? no! whose chile

then? Chile b'long to 'ts mother. Unnerstan?”

“Where is she?” said Mrs. Starbottle, with a very white face and a very

low voice.

“I'll splain all. Chile b'long to 'ts mother. Thash law. I'm lawyer,

leshlator, and American sis'n. Ish my duty as lawyer, as leshlator, and

'merikan sis'n to reshtore chile to suff'rin mother at any coss--any

coss.”

“Where is she?” repeated Mrs. Starbottle, with her eyes still fixed on

the colonel's face.

“Gone to 'ts m'o'r. Gone East on shteamer, yesserday. Waffed by fav'rin

gales to suff'rin p'rent. Thash so!”

Mrs. Starbottle did not move. The colonel felt his chest slowly

collapsing, but steadied himself against a chair, and endeavored to beam

with chivalrous gallantry not unmixed with magisterial firmness upon her

as she sat.

“Your feelin's, m'm, do honor to yer sex, but conshider situashun.

Conshider m'or's feelings--conshider MY feelin's.” The colonel paused,

and flourishing a white handkerchief, placed it negligently in his

breast, and then smiled tenderly above it, as over laces and ruffles, on

the woman before him. “Why should dark shed-der cass bligh on two sholes

with single beat? Chile's fine chile, good chile, but summonelse chile!

Chile's gone, Clar'; but all ish'n't gone, Clar'. Conshider dearesht,

you all's have me!”

Mrs. Starbottle started to her feet. “YOU!” she cried, bringing out a

chest note that made the chandeliers ring--“You that I married to give

my darling food and clothes--YOU! a dog that I whistled to my side to

keep the men off me--YOU!”

She choked up, and then dashed past him into the inner room, which had

been Carry's; then she swept by him again into her own bedroom, and then

suddenly reappeared before him, erect, menacing, with a burning fire

over her cheekbones, a quick straightening of her arched brows and

mouth, a squaring of jaw, and ophidian flattening of the head.

“Listen!” she said in a hoarse, half-grown boy's voice. “Hear me! If

you ever expect to set eyes on me again, you must find the child. If you

ever expect to speak to me again, to touch me, you must bring her back.

For where she goes, I go; you hear me! Where she has gone, look for me.”

She struck out past him again with a quick feminine throwing-out of her

arms from the elbows down, as if freeing herself from some imaginary

bonds, and dashing into her chamber, slammed and locked the door.

Colonel Starbottle, although no coward, stood in superstitious fear

of an angry woman, and, recoiling as she swept by, lost his unsteady

foothold and rolled helplessly on the sofa. Here, after one or two

unsuccessful attempts to regain his foothold, he remained, uttering from

time to time profane but not entirely coherent or intelligible protests,

until at last he succumbed to the exhausting quality of his emotions,

and the narcotic quantity of his potations.

Meantime, within, Mrs. Starbottle was excitedly gathering her valuables

and packing her trunk, even as she had done once before in the course

of this remarkable history. Perhaps some recollection of this was in her

mind; for she stopped to lean her burning cheeks upon her hand, as if

she saw again the figure of the child standing in the doorway, and heard

once more a childish voice asking, “Is it Mamma?” But the epithet now

stung her to the quick, and with a quick, passionate gesture she dashed

it away with a tear that had gathered in her eye. And then it chanced

that, in turning over some clothes, she came upon the child's slipper

with a broken sandal string. She uttered a great cry here--the first she

had uttered--and caught it to her breast, kissing it passionately again

and again, and rocking from side to side with a motion peculiar to her

sex. And then she took it to the window, the better to see it through

her now streaming eyes. Here she was taken with a sudden fit of coughing

that she could not stifle with the handkerchief she put to her feverish

lips. And then she suddenly grew very faint. The window seemed to recede

before her, the floor to sink beneath her feet; and staggering to the

bed, she fell prone upon it with the sandal and handkerchief pressed

to her breast. Her face was quite pale, the orbit of her eyes dark; and

there was a spot upon her lip, another on her handkerchief, and still

another on the white counterpane of the bed.

The wind had risen, rattling the window sashes and swaying the white

curtains in a ghostly way. Later, a gray fog stole softly over the

roofs, soothing the wind-roughened surfaces, and in-wrapping all things

in an uncertain light and a measureless peace. She lay there very

quiet--for all her troubles, still a very pretty bride. And on the

other side of the bolted door the gallant bridegroom, from his temporary

couch, snored peacefully.

A week before Christmas Day, 1870, the little town of Genoa, in the

State of New York, exhibited, perhaps more strongly than at any other

time, the bitter irony of its founders and sponsors. A driving snowstorm

that had whitened every windward hedge, bush, wall, and telegraph pole,

played around this soft Italian Capital, whirled in and out of the great

staring wooden Doric columns of its post office and hotel, beat upon the

cold green shutters of its best houses, and powdered the angular, stiff,

dark figures in its streets. From the level of the street, the four

principal churches of the town stood out starkly, even while their

misshapen spires were kindly hidden in the low, driving storm. Near

the railroad station, the new Methodist chapel, whose resemblance to

an enormous locomotive was further heightened by the addition of a

pyramidal row of front steps, like a cowcatcher, stood as if waiting for

a few more houses to be hitched on to proceed to a pleasanter

location. But the pride of Genoa--the great Crammer Institute for Young

Ladies--stretched its bare brick length and reared its cupola plainly

from the bleak Parnassian hill above the principal avenue. There was

no evasion in the Crammer Institute of the fact that it was a public

institution. A visitor upon its doorsteps, a pretty face at its window,

were clearly visible all over the township.

The shriek of the engine of the four-o'clock Northern express brought

but few of the usual loungers to the depot. Only a single passenger

alighted, and was driven away in the solitary waiting sleigh toward the

Genoa Hotel. And then the train sped away again, with that passionless

indifference to human sympathies or curiosity peculiar to express

trains; the one baggage truck was wheeled into the station again; the

station door was locked; and the stationmaster went home.

The locomotive whistle, however, awakened the guilty consciousness

of three young ladies of the Crammer Institute, who were even then

surreptitiously regaling themselves in the bakeshop and confectionery

saloon of Mistress Phillips in a by-lane. For even the admirable

regulations of the Institute failed to entirely develop the physical

and moral natures of its pupils. They conformed to the excellent dietary

rules in public, and in private drew upon the luxurious rations of their

village caterer. They attended church with exemplary formality, and

flirted informally during service with the village beaux. They received

the best and most judicious instruction during school hours, and

devoured the trashiest novels during recess. The result of which was

an aggregation of quite healthy, quite human, and very charming young

creatures that reflected infinite credit on the Institute. Even Mistress

Phillips, to whom they owed vast sums, exhilarated by the exuberant

spirits and youthful freshness of her guests, declared that the sight of

“them young things” did her good, and had even been known to shield them

by shameless equivocation.

“Four o'clock, girls! and, if we're not back to prayers by five, we'll

be missed,” said the tallest of these foolish virgins, with an aquiline

nose, and certain quiet elan that bespoke the leader, as she rose

from her seat. “Have you got the books, Addy?” Addy displayed three

dissipated-looking novels under her waterproof. “And the provisions,

Carry?” Carry showed a suspicious parcel filling the pocket of her sack.

“All right, then. Come, girls, trudge--Charge it,” she added, nodding to

her host as they passed toward the door. “I'll pay you when my quarter's

allowance comes.”

“No, Kate,” interposed Carry, producing her purse, “let me pay; it's my

turn.”

“Never!” said Kate, arching her black brows loftily, “even if you do

have rich relatives, and regular remittances from California. Never!

Come, girls, forward, march!”

As they opened the door, a gust of wind nearly took them off their feet.

Kindhearted Mrs. Phillips was alarmed. “Sakes alive, galls! ye mussn't

go out in sich weather. Better let me send word to the Institoot, and

make ye up a nice bed tonight in my parlor.” But the last sentence was

lost in a chorus of half-suppressed shrieks as the girls, hand in hand,

ran down the steps into the storm, and were at once whirled away.

The short December day, unlit by any sunset glow, was failing fast. It

was quite dark already, and the air was thick with driving snow. For

some distance their high spirits, youth, and even inexperience kept them

bravely up; but, in ambitiously attempting a short cut from the highroad

across an open field, their strength gave out, the laugh grew less

frequent, and tears began to stand in Carry's brown eyes. When they

reached the road again, they were utterly exhausted. “Let us go back,”

said Carry.

“We'd never get across that field again,” said Addy.

“Let's stop at the first house, then,” said Carry.

“The first house,” said Addy, peering through the gathering darkness,

“is Squire Robinson's.” She darted a mischievous glance at Carry that,

even in her discomfort and fear, brought the quick blood to her cheek.

“Oh, yes!” said Kate with gloomy irony, “certainly; stop at the squire's

by all means, and be invited to tea, and be driven home after by your

dear friend Mr. Harry, with a formal apology from Mrs. Robinson, and

hopes that the young ladies may be excused this time. No!” continued

Kate with sudden energy. “That may suit YOU; but I'm going back as I

came--by the window, or not at all” Then she pounced suddenly, like a

hawk, on Carry, who was betraying a tendency to sit down on a snowbank

and whimper, and shook her briskly. “You'll be going to sleep next.

Stay, hold your tongues, all of you--what's that?”

It was the sound of sleigh bells. Coming down toward them out of the

darkness was a sleigh with a single occupant. “Hold down your heads,

girls: if it's anybody that knows us, we're lost.” But it was not, for a

voice strange to their ears, but withal very kindly and pleasant, asked

if its owner could be of any help to them. As they turned toward him,

they saw it was a man wrapped in a handsome sealskin cloak, wearing

a sealskin cap; his face, half-concealed by a muffler of the same

material, disclosing only a pair of long mustaches, and two keen

dark eyes. “It's a son of old Santa Claus!” whispered Addy. The girls

tittered audibly as they tumbled into the sleigh; they had regained

their former spirits. “Where shall I take you?” said the stranger

quietly. There was a hurried whispering; and then Kate said boldly, “To

the Institute.” They drove silently up the hill, until the long, ascetic

building loomed up before them. The stranger reined up suddenly. “You

know the way better than I,” he said. “Where do you go in?” “Through the

back window,” said Kate with sudden and appalling frankness. “I see!”

responded their strange driver quietly and, alighting quickly, removed

the bells from the horses. “We can drive as near as you please now,”

he added by way of explanation. “He certainly is a son of Santa Claus,”

whispered Addy. “Hadn't we better ask after his father?” “Hush!” said

Kate decidedly. “He is an angel, I dare say.” She added with a delicious

irrelevance, which was, however, perfectly understood by her feminine

auditors, “We are looking like three frights.”

Cautiously skirting the fences, they at last pulled up a few feet from

a dark wall. The stranger proceeded to assist them to alight. There

was still some light from the reflected snow; and as he handed his fair

companions to the ground, each was conscious of undergoing an intense

though respectful scrutiny. He assisted them gravely to open the window,

and then discreetly retired to the sleigh until the difficult and

somewhat discomposing ingress was made. He then walked to the window.

“Thank you and good night!” whispered three voices. A single figure

still lingered. The stranger leaned over the window sill. “Will you

permit me to light my cigar here? It might attract attention if I struck

a match outside.” By the upspringing light he saw the figure of Kate

very charmingly framed in by the window. The match burnt slowly out

in his fingers. Kate smiled mischievously. The astute young woman had

detected the pitiable subterfuge. For what else did she stand at the

head of her class, and had doting parents paid three years' tuition?

The storm had passed, and the sun was shining quite cheerily in the

eastern recitation room the next morning when Miss Kate, whose seat

was nearest the window, placing her hand pathetically upon her heart,

affected to fall in bashful and extreme agitation upon the shoulder of

Carry, her neighbor. “HE has come,” she gasped in a thrilling whisper.

“Who?” asked Carry sympathetically, who never clearly understood when

Kate was in earnest. “Who?--Why, the man who rescued us last night! I

saw him drive to the door this moment. Don't speak; I shall be better in

a moment--there!” she said, and the shameless hypocrite passed her hand

pathetically across her forehead with a tragic air.

“What can he want?” asked Carry, whose curiosity was excited. “I don't

know,” said Kate, suddenly relapsing into gloomy cynicism. “Possibly to

put his five daughters to school; perhaps to finish his young wife, and

warn her against us.”

“He didn't look old, and he didn't seem like a married man,” rejoined

Addy thoughtfully.

“That was his art, you poor creature!” returned Kate scornfully. “You

can never tell anything of these men, they are so deceitful. Besides,

it's just my fate!”

“Why, Kate,” began Carry, in serious concern.

“Hush! Miss Walker is saying something,” said Kate, laughing.

“The young ladies will please give attention,” said a slow, perfunctory

voice. “Miss Carry Tretherick is wanted in the parlor.”

Meantime Mr. Jack Prince, the name given on the card, and various

letters and credentials submitted to the Rev. Mr. Crammer, paced the

somewhat severe apartment known publicly as the “reception parlor” and

privately to the pupils as “purgatory.” His keen eyes had taken in the

various rigid details, from the flat steam “radiator,” like an enormous

japanned soda cracker, that heated one end of the room to the monumental

bust of Dr. Crammer that hopelessly chilled the other; from the Lord's

Prayer, executed by a former writing master in such gratuitous variety

of elegant calligraphic trifling as to abate considerably the serious

value of the composition, to three views of Genoa from the Institute,

which nobody ever recognized, taken on the spot by the drawing teacher;

from two illuminated texts of Scripture in an English letter, so

gratuitously and hideously remote as to chill all human interest, to a

large photograph of the senior class, in which the prettiest girls were

Ethiopian in complexion, and sat, apparently, on each other's heads

and shoulders. His fingers had turned listlessly the leaves of

school-catalogues, the SERMONS of Dr. Crammer, the POEMS of Henry Kirke

White, the LAYS OF THE SANCTUARY and LIVES OF CELEBRATED WOMEN. His

fancy, and it was a nervously active one, had gone over the partings

and greetings that must have taken place here, and wondered why the

apartment had yet caught so little of the flavor of humanity; indeed, I

am afraid he had almost forgotten the object of his visit when the door

opened, and Carry Tretherick stood before him.

It was one of those faces he had seen the night before, prettier even

than it had seemed then; and yet I think he was conscious of some

disappointment, without knowing exactly why. Her abundant waving hair

was of a guinea-golden tint, her complexion of a peculiar flowerlike

delicacy, her brown eyes of the color of seaweed in deep water. It

certainly was not her beauty that disappointed him.

Without possessing his sensitiveness to impression, Carry was, on her

part, quite as vaguely ill at ease. She saw before her one of those men

whom the sex would vaguely generalize as “nice,” that is to say, correct

in all the superficial appointments of style, dress, manners, and

feature. Yet there was a decidedly unconventional quality about him: he

was totally unlike anything or anybody that she could remember; and as

the attributes of originality are often as apt to alarm as to attract

people, she was not entirely prepossessed in his favor.

“I can hardly hope,” he began pleasantly, “that you remember me. It is

eleven years ago, and you were a very little girl. I am afraid I cannot

even claim to have enjoyed that familiarity that might exist between a

child of six and a young man of twenty-one. I don't think I was fond

of children. But I knew your mother very well. I was editor of the

AVALANCHE in Fiddletown when she took you to San Francisco.”

“You mean my stepmother; she wasn't my mother, you know,” interposed

Carry hastily.

Mr. Prince looked at her curiously. “I mean your stepmother,” he said

gravely. “I never had the pleasure of meeting your mother.”

“No; MOTHER hasn't been in California these twelve years.”

There was an intentional emphasizing of the title and of its distinction

that began to interest coldly Prince after his first astonishment was

past.

“As I come from your stepmother now,” he went on with a slight laugh,

“I must ask you to go back for a few moments to that point. After your

father's death, your mother--I mean your stepmother--recognized the fact

that your mother, the first Mrs. Tretherick, was legally and morally

your guardian and, although much against her inclination and affections,

placed you again in her charge.”

“My stepmother married again within a month after father died, and sent

me home,” said Carry with great directness, and the faintest toss of her

head.

Mr. Prince smiled so sweetly, and apparently so sympathetically, that

Carry began to like him. With no other notice of the interruption

he went on, “After your stepmother had performed this act of simple

justice, she entered into an agreement with your mother to defray the

expenses of your education until your eighteenth year, when you were to

elect and choose which of the two should thereafter be your guardian,

and with whom you would make your home. This agreement, I think, you are

already aware of, and, I believe, knew at the time.”

“I was a mere child then,” said Carry.

“Certainly,” said Mr. Prince, with the same smile. “Still the

conditions, I think, have never been oppressive to you nor your mother;

and the only time they are likely to give you the least uneasiness will

be when you come to make up your mind in the choice of your guardian.

That will be on your eighteenth birthday--the twentieth, I think, of the

present month.”

Carry was silent.

“Pray do not think that I am here to receive your decision, even if it

be already made. I only came to inform you that your stepmother, Mrs.

Starbottle, will be in town tomorrow, and will pass a few days at the

hotel. If it is your wish to see her before you make up your mind, she

will be glad to meet you. She does not, however, wish to do anything to

influence your judgment.

“Does Mother know she is coming?” said Carry hastily.

“I do not know,” said Prince gravely. “I only know that if you conclude

to see Mrs. Starbottle, it will be with your mother's permission. Mrs.

Starbottle will keep sacredly this part of the agreement, made ten years

ago. But her health is very poor; and the change and country quiet of

a few days may benefit her.” Mr. Prince bent his keen, bright eyes upon

the young girl, and almost held his breath until she spoke again.

“Mother's coming up today or tomorrow,” she said, looking up.

“Ah!” said Mr. Prince with a sweet and languid smile.

“Is Colonel Starbottle here too?” asked Carry, after a pause.

“Colonel Starbottle is dead. Your stepmother is again a widow.”

“Dead!” repeated Carry.

“Yes,” replied Mr. Prince. “Your stepmother has been singularly

unfortunate in surviving her affections.”

Carry did not know what he meant, and looked so. Mr. Prince smiled

reassuringly.

Presently Carry began to whimper.

Mr. Prince softly stepped beside her chair.

“I am afraid,” he said with a very peculiar light in his eye, and a

singular dropping of the corners of his mustache--“I am afraid you are

taking this too deeply. It will be some days before you are called upon

to make a decision. Let us talk of something else. I hope you caught no

cold last evening.”

Carry's face shone out again in dimples.

“You must have thought us so queer! It was too bad to give you so much

trouble.”

“None whatever, I assure you. My sense of propriety,” he added demurely,

“which might have been outraged had I been called upon to help three

young ladies out of a schoolroom window at night, was deeply gratified

at being able to assist them in again.” The doorbell rang loudly, and

Mr. Prince rose. “Take your own time, and think well before you make

your decision.” But Carry's ear and attention were given to the sound of

voices in the hall. At the same moment, the door was thrown open, and a

servant announced, “Mrs. Tretherick and Mr. Robinson.”

The afternoon train had just shrieked out its usual indignant protest at

stopping at Genoa at all as Mr. Jack Prince entered the outskirts of the

town, and drove toward his hotel. He was wearied and cynical. A drive

of a dozen miles through unpicturesque outlying villages, past small

economic farmhouses, and hideous villas that violated his fastidious

taste, had, I fear, left that gentleman in a captious state of mind.

He would have even avoided his taciturn landlord as he drove up to the

door; but that functionary waylaid him on the steps. “There's a lady

in the sittin'-room, waitin' for ye.” Mr. Prince hurried upstairs, and

entered the room as Mrs. Starbottle flew toward him.

She had changed sadly in the last ten years. Her figure was wasted

to half its size. The beautiful curves of her bust and shoulders were

broken or inverted. The once full, rounded arm was shrunken in its

sleeve; and the golden hoops that encircled her wan wrists almost

slipped from her hands as her long, scant fingers closed convulsively

around Jack's. Her cheekbones were painted that afternoon with the

hectic of fever: somewhere in the hollows of those cheeks were buried

the dimples of long ago, but their graves were forgotten. Her lustrous

eyes were still beautiful, though the orbits were deeper than before.

Her mouth was still sweet, although the lips parted more easily over the

little teeth, even in breathing, and showed more of them than she was

wont to do before. The glory of her blond hair was still left: it was

finer, more silken and ethereal, yet it failed even in its plenitude to

cover the hollows of the blue-veined temples.

“Clara!” said Jack reproachfully.

“Oh, forgive me, Jack!” she said, falling into a chair, but still

clinging to his hand--“forgive me, dear; but I could not wait longer. I

should have died, Jack--died before another night. Bear with me a little

longer (it will not be long), but let me stay. I may not see her, I

know; I shall not speak to her: but it's so sweet to feel that I am at

last near her, that I breathe the same air with my darling. I am better

already, Jack, I am indeed. And you have seen her today? How did

she look? What did she say? Tell me all, everything, Jack. Was she

beautiful? They say she is. Has she grown? Would you have known

her again? Will she come, Jack? Perhaps she has been here already;

perhaps”--she had risen with tremulous excitement, and was glancing at

the door--“perhaps she is here now. Why don't you speak, Jack? Tell me

all.”

The keen eyes that looked down into hers were glistening with an

infinite tenderness that none, perhaps, but she would have deemed them

capable of. “Clara,” he said gently and cheerily, “try and compose

yourself. You are trembling now with the fatigue and excitement of your

journey. I have seen Carry; she is well and beautiful. Let that suffice

you now.”

His gentle firmness composed and calmed her now, as it had often done

before. Stroking her thin hand, he said, after a pause, “Did Carry ever

write to you?”

“Twice, thanking me for some presents. They were only schoolgirl

letters,” she added, nervously answering the interrogation of his eyes.

“Did she ever know of your own troubles? of your poverty, of the

sacrifices you made to pay her bills, of your pawning your clothes and

jewels, of your--”

“No, no!” interrupted the woman quickly: “no! How could she? I have no

enemy cruel enough to tell her that.”

“But if she--or if Mrs. Tretherick--had heard of it? If Carry thought

you were poor, and unable to support her properly, it might influence

her decision. Young girls are fond of the position that wealth can give.

She may have rich friends, maybe a lover.”

Mrs. Starbottle winced at the last sentence. “But,” she said eagerly,

grasping Jack's hand, “when you found me sick and helpless at

Sacramento, when you--God bless you for it, Jack!--offered to help me to

the East, you said you knew of something, you had some plan, that would

make me and Carry independent.”

“Yes,” said Jack hastily; “but I want you to get strong and well first.

And, now that you are calmer, you shall listen to my visit to the

school.”

It was then that Mr. Jack Prince proceeded to describe the interview

already recorded, with a singular felicity and discretion that shames

my own account of that proceeding. Without suppressing a single fact,

without omitting a word or detail, he yet managed to throw a poetic veil

over that prosaic episode, to invest the heroine with a romantic roseate

atmosphere, which, though not perhaps entirely imaginary, still, I fear,

exhibited that genius which ten years ago had made the columns of THE

FIDDLETOWN AVALANCHE at once fascinating and instructive. It was not

until he saw the heightening color, and heard the quick breathing, of

his eager listener, that he felt a pang of self-reproach. “God help her

and forgive me!” he muttered between his clinched teeth; “but how can I

tell her ALL now!”

That night, when Mrs. Starbottle laid her weary head upon her pillow,

she tried to picture to herself Carry at the same moment sleeping

peacefully in the great schoolhouse on the hill; and it was a rare

comfort to this yearning, foolish woman to know that she was so

near. But at this moment Carry was sitting on the edge of her bed,

half-undressed, pouting her pretty lips and twisting her long, leonine

locks between her fingers as Miss Kate Van Corlear--dramatically

wrapped in a long white counterpane, her black eyes sparkling, and her

thoroughbred nose thrown high in air--stood over her like a wrathful and

indignant ghost; for Carry had that evening imparted her woes and her

history to Miss Kate, and that young lady had “proved herself no friend”

by falling into a state of fiery indignation over Carry's “ingratitude,”

and openly and shamelessly espousing the claims of Mrs. Starbottle.

“Why, if the half you tell me is true, your mother and those Robinsons

are making of you not only a little coward, but a little snob, miss.

Respectability, forsooth! Look you, my family are centuries before the

Trethericks; but if my family had ever treated me in this way, and then

asked me to turn my back on my best friend, I'd whistle them down the

wind;” and here Kate snapped her fingers, bent her black brows, and

glared around the room as if in search of a recreant Van Corlear.

“You just talk this way because you have taken a fancy to that Mr.

Prince,” said Carry.

In the debasing slang of the period, that had even found its way

into the virgin cloisters of the Crammer Institute, Miss Kate, as she

afterward expressed it, instantly “went for her.”

First, with a shake of her head, she threw her long black hair over one

shoulder, then, dropping one end of the counterpane from the other like

a vestal tunic, she stepped before Carry with a purposely exaggerated

classic stride. “And what if I have, miss! What if I happen to know a

gentleman when I see him! What if I happen to know that among a thousand

such traditional, conventional, feeble editions of their grandfathers

as Mr. Harry Robinson, you cannot find one original, independent,

individualized gentleman like your Prince! Go to bed, miss, and pray

to Heaven that he may be YOUR Prince indeed. Ask to have a contrite and

grateful heart, and thank the Lord in particular for having sent you

such a friend as Kate Van Corlear.” Yet, after an imposing dramatic

exit, she reappeared the next moment as a straight white flash, kissed

Carry between the brows, and was gone.

The next day was a weary one to Jack Prince. He was convinced in his

mind that Carry would not come; yet to keep this consciousness from

Mrs. Starbottle, to meet her simple hopefulness with an equal degree of

apparent faith, was a hard and difficult task. He would have tried to

divert her mind by taking her on a long drive; but she was fearful that

Carry might come during her absence; and her strength, he was obliged to

admit, had failed greatly. As he looked into her large and awe-inspiring

clear eyes, a something he tried to keep from his mind--to put off day

by day from contemplation--kept asserting itself directly to his inner

consciousness. He began to doubt the expediency and wisdom of his

management. He recalled every incident of his interview with Carry, and

half-believed that its failure was due to himself. Yet Mrs. Starbottle

was very patient and confident; her very confidence shook his faith in

his own judgment. When her strength was equal to the exertion, she was

propped up in her chair by the window, where she could see the school

and the entrance to the hotel. In the intervals she would elaborate

pleasant plans for the future, and would sketch a country home. She had

taken a strange fancy, as it seemed to Prince, to the present location;

but it was notable that the future, always thus outlined, was one of

quiet and repose. She believed she would get well soon; in fact, she

thought she was now much better than she had been, but it might be long

before she should be quite strong again. She would whisper on in this

way until Jack would dash madly down into the barroom, order liquors

that he did not drink, light cigars that he did not smoke, talk with men

that he did not listen to, and behave generally as our stronger sex is

apt to do in periods of delicate trials and perplexity.

The day closed with a clouded sky and a bitter, searching wind. With

the night fell a few wandering flakes of snow. She was still content

and hopeful; and, as Jack wheeled her from the window to the fire,

she explained to him how that, as the school term was drawing near its

close, Carry was probably kept closely at her lessons during the day,

and could only leave the school at night. So she sat up the greater part

of the evening, and combed her silken hair, and as far as her strength

would allow, made an undress toilet to receive her guest. “We must not

frighten the child, Jack,” she said apologetically, and with something

of her old coquetry.

It was with a feeling of relief that, at ten o'clock, Jack received a

message from the landlord, saying that the doctor would like to see him

for a moment downstairs. As Jack entered the grim, dimly lighted parlor,

he observed the hooded figure of a woman near the fire. He was about to

withdraw again when a voice that he remembered very pleasantly said:

“Oh, it's all right! I'm the doctor.”

The hood was thrown back, and Prince saw the shining black hair and

black, audacious eyes of Kate Van Corlear.

“Don't ask any questions. I'm the doctor, and there's my prescription,”

and she pointed to the half-frightened, half-sobbing Carry in the

corner--“to be taken at once.”

“Then Mrs. Tretherick has given her permission?”

“Not much, if I know the sentiments of that lady,” replied Kate saucily.

“Then how did you get away?” asked Prince gravely.

“BY THE WINDOW.”

When Mr. Prince had left Carry in the arms of her stepmother, he

returned to the parlor.

“Well?” demanded Kate.

“She will stay--YOU will, I hope, also--tonight.”

“As I shall not be eighteen, and my own mistress on the twentieth, and

as I haven't a sick stepmother, I won't.”

“Then you will give me the pleasure of seeing you safely through the

window again?”

When Mr. Prince returned an hour later, he found Carry sitting on a low

stool at Mrs. Starbottle's feet. Her head was in her stepmother's lap,

and she had sobbed herself to sleep. Mrs. Starbottle put her finger

to her lip. “I told you she would come. God bless you, Jack! and good

night.”

The next morning Mrs. Tretherick, indignant, the Rev. Asa Crammer,

principal, injured, and Mr. Joel Robinson, Sr., complacently

respectable, called upon Mr. Prince. There was a stormy meeting, ending

in a demand for Carry. “We certainly cannot admit of this interference,”

said Mrs. Tretherick, a fashionably dressed, indistinctive-looking

woman. “It is several days before the expiration of our agreement; and

we do not feel, under the circumstances, justified in releasing Mrs.

Starbottle from its conditions.” “Until the expiration of the school

term, we must consider Miss Tretherick as complying entirely with its

rules and discipline,” imposed Dr. Crammer. “The whole proceeding is

calculated to injure the prospects, and compromise the position, of Miss

Tretherick in society,” suggested Mr. Robinson.

In vain Mr. Prince urged the failing condition of Mrs. Starbottle, her

absolute freedom from complicity with Carry's flight, the pardonable

and natural instincts of the girl, and his own assurance that they were

willing to abide by her decision. And then, with a rising color in

his cheek, a dangerous look in his eye, but a singular calmness in his

speech, he added:

“One word more. It becomes my duty to inform you of a circumstance which

would certainly justify me, as an executor of the late Mr. Tretherick,

in fully resisting your demands. A few months after Mr. Tretherick's

death, through the agency of a Chinaman in his employment, it was

discovered that he had made a will, which was subsequently found among

his papers. The insignificant value of his bequest--mostly land, then

quite valueless--prevented his executors from carrying out his wishes,

or from even proving the will, or making it otherwise publicly known,

until within the last two or three years, when the property had

enormously increased in value. The provisions of that bequest are

simple, but unmistakable. The property is divided between Carry and

her stepmother, with the explicit condition that Mrs. Starbottle shall

become her legal guardian, provide for her education, and in all details

stand to her IN LOCO PARENTIS.”

“What is the value of this bequest?” asked Mr. Robinson. “I cannot

tell exactly, but not far from half a million, I should say,” returned

Prince. “Certainly, with this knowledge, as a friend of Miss Tretherick

I must say that her conduct is as judicious as it is honorable to her,”

responded Mr. Robinson. “I shall not presume to question the wishes,

or throw any obstacles in the way of carrying out the intentions, of my

dead husband,” added Mrs. Tretherick; and the interview was closed.

When its result was made known to Mrs. Starbottle, she raised Jack's

hand to her feverish lips. “It cannot add to MY happiness now, Jack; but

tell me, why did you keep it from her?” Jack smiled, but did not reply.

Within the next week the necessary legal formalities were concluded, and

Carry was restored to her stepmother. At Mrs. Starbottle's request, a

small house in the outskirts of the town was procured; and thither they

removed to wait the spring, and Mrs. Starbottle's convalescence. Both

came tardily that year.

Yet she was happy and patient. She was fond of watching the budding

of the trees beyond her window--a novel sight to her Californian

experience--and of asking Carry their names and seasons. Even at this

time she projected for that summer, which seemed to her so mysteriously

withheld, long walks with Carry through the leafy woods, whose gray,

misty ranks she could see along the hilltop. She even thought she

could write poetry about them, and recalled the fact as evidence of her

gaining strength; and there is, I believe, still treasured by one of the

members of this little household a little carol so joyous, so simple,

and so innocent that it might have been an echo of the robin that called

to her from the window, as perhaps it was.

And then, without warning, there dropped from Heaven a day so tender, so

mystically soft, so dreamily beautiful, so throbbing and alive with the

fluttering of invisible wings, so replete and bounteously overflowing

with an awakening and joyous resurrection not taught by man or limited

by creed, that they thought it fit to bring her out and lay her in that

glorious sunshine that sprinkled like the droppings of a bridal torch

the happy lintels and doors. And there she lay beatified and calm.

Wearied by watching, Carry had fallen asleep by her side; and Mrs.

Starbottle's thin fingers lay like a benediction on her head. Presently

she called Jack to her side.

“Who was that,” she whispered, “who just came in?”

“Miss Van Corlear,” said Jack, answering the look in her great hollow

eyes.

“Jack,” she said, after a moment's silence, “sit by me a moment; dear

Jack: I've something I must say. If I ever seemed hard, or cold, or

coquettish to you in the old days, it was because I loved you, Jack, too

well to mar your future by linking it with my own. I always loved you,

dear Jack, even when I seemed least worthy of you. That is gone now. But

I had a dream lately, Jack, a foolish woman's dream--that you might find

what I lacked in HER,” and she glanced lovingly at the sleeping girl at

her side; “that you might love her as you have loved me. But even that

is not to be, Jack, is it?” and she glanced wistfully in his face. Jack

pressed her hand, but did not speak. After a few moments' silence, she

again said: “Perhaps you are right in your choice. She is a goodhearted

girl, Jack--but a little bold.”

And with this last flicker of foolish, weak humanity in her struggling

spirit, she spoke no more. When they came to her a moment later, a tiny

bird that had lit upon her breast flew away; and the hand that they

lifted from Carry's head fell lifeless at her side.

BARKER'S LUCK

A bird twittered! The morning sun shining through the open window was

apparently more potent than the cool mountain air, which had only caused

the sleeper to curl a little more tightly in his blankets. Barker's eyes

opened instantly upon the light and the bird on the window ledge. Like

all healthy young animals he would have tried to sleep again, but with

his momentary consciousness came the recollection that it was his turn

to cook the breakfast that morning, and he regretfully rolled out of

his bunk to the floor. Without stopping to dress, he opened the door and

stepped outside, secure in the knowledge that he was overlooked only by

the Sierras, and plunged his head and shoulders in the bucket of cold

water that stood by the door. Then he began to clothe himself, partly in

the cabin and partly in the open air, with a lapse between the putting

on of his trousers and coat which he employed in bringing in wood.

Raking together the few embers on the adobe hearth, not without a

prudent regard to the rattlesnake which had once been detected in

haunting the warm ashes, he began to prepare breakfast. By this time the

other sleepers, his partners Stacy and Demorest, young men of about his

own age, were awake, alert, and lazily critical of his progress.

“I don't care about my quail on toast being underdone for breakfast,”

said Stacy, with a yawn; “and you needn't serve with red wine. I'm not

feeling very peckish this morning.”

“And I reckon you can knock off the fried oysters after the Spanish

mackerel for ME,” said Demorest gravely. “The fact is, that last bottle

of Veuve Clicquot we had for supper wasn't as dry as I am this morning.”

Accustomed to these regular Barmecide suggestions, Barker made no direct

reply. Presently, looking up from the fire, he said, “There's no more

saleratus, so you mustn't blame me if the biscuit is extra heavy. I told

you we had none when you went to the grocery yesterday.”

“And I told you we hadn't a red cent to buy any with,” said Stacy, who

was also treasurer. “Put these two negatives together and you make the

affirmative--saleratus. Mix freely and bake in a hot oven.”

Nevertheless, after a toilet as primitive as Barker's they sat down to

what he had prepared with the keen appetite begotten of the mountain

air and the regretful fastidiousness born of the recollection of better

things. Jerked beef, frizzled with salt pork in a frying-pan, boiled

potatoes, biscuit, and coffee composed the repast. The biscuits,

however, proving remarkably heavy after the first mouthful, were used

as missiles, thrown through the open door at an empty bottle which had

previously served as a mark for revolver practice, and a few moments

later pipes were lit to counteract the effects of the meal and take

the taste out of their mouths. Suddenly they heard the sound of horses'

hoofs, saw the quick passage of a rider in the open space before the

cabin, and felt the smart impact upon the table of some small object

thrown by him. It was the regular morning delivery of the county

newspaper!

“He's getting to be a mighty sure shot,” said Demorest approvingly,

looking at his upset can of coffee as he picked up the paper, rolled

into a cylindrical wad as tightly as a cartridge, and began to

straighten it out. This was no easy matter, as the sheet had evidently

been rolled while yet damp from the press; but Demorest eventually

opened it and ensconced himself behind it.

“Nary news?” asked Stacy.

“No. There never is any,” said Demorest scornfully. “We ought to stop

the paper.”

“You mean the paper man ought to. WE don't pay him,” said Barker gently.

“Well, that's the same thing, smarty. No news, no pay. Hallo!” he

continued, his eyes suddenly riveted on the paper. Then, after the

fashion of ordinary humanity, he stopped short and read the interesting

item to himself. When he had finished he brought his fist and the paper,

together, violently down upon the table. “Now look at this! Talk of

luck, will you? Just think of it. Here are WE--hard-working men with

lots of sabe, too--grubbin' away on this hillside like niggers, glad

to get enough at the end of the day to pay for our soggy biscuits and

horse-bean coffee, and just look what falls into the lap of some lazy

sneakin' greenhorn who never did a stoke of work in his life! Here are

WE, with no foolishness, no airs nor graces, and yet men who would do

credit to twice that amount of luck--and seem born to it, too--and we're

set aside for some long, lank, pen-wiping scrub who just knows enough to

sit down on his office stool and hold on to a bit of paper.”

“What's up now?” asked Stacy, with the carelessness begotten of

familiarity with his partner's extravagance.

“Listen,” said Demorest, reading. “Another unprecedented rise has taken

place in the shares of the 'Yellow Hammer First Extension Mine' since

the sinking of the new shaft. It was quoted yesterday at ten thousand

dollars a foot. When it is remembered that scarcely two years ago the

original shares, issued at fifty dollars per share, had dropped to only

fifty cents a share, it will be seen that those who were able to hold on

have got a good thing.”

“What mine did you say?” asked Barker, looking up meditatively from the

dishes he was already washing.

“The Yellow Hammer First Extension,” returned Demorest shortly.

“I used to have some shares in that, and I think I have them still,”

said Barker musingly.

“Yes,” said Demorest promptly; “the paper speaks of it here. 'We

understand,'” he continued, reading aloud, “'that our eminent fellow

citizen, George Barker, otherwise known as “Get Left Barker” and

“Chucklehead,” is one of these fortunate individuals.'”

“No,” said Barker, with a slight flush of innocent pleasure, “it can't

say that. How could it know?”

Stacy laughed, but Demorest coolly continued: “You didn't hear all.

Listen! 'We say WAS one of them; but having already sold his apparently

useless certificates to our popular druggist, Jones, for corn plasters,

at a reduced rate, he is unable to realize.'”

“You may laugh, boys,” said Barker, with simple seriousness; “but I

really believe I have got 'em yet. Just wait. I'll see!” He rose and

began to drag out a well-worn valise from under his bunk. “You see,” he

continued, “they were given to me by an old chap in return--”

“For saving his life by delaying the Stockton boat that afterward blew

up,” returned Demorest briefly. “We know it all! His hair was white, and

his hand trembled slightly as he laid these shares in yours, saying, and

you never forgot the words, 'Take 'em, young man--and'--”

“For lending him two thousand dollars, then,” continued Barker with

a simple ignoring of the interruption, as he quietly brought out the

valise.

“TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS!” repeated Stacy. “When did YOU have two thousand

dollars?”

“When I first left Sacramento--three years ago,” said Barker,

unstrapping the valise.

“How long did you have it?” said Demorest incredulously.

“At least two days, I think,” returned Barker quietly. “Then I met that

man. He was hard-up, and I lent him my pile and took those shares. He

died afterward.”

“Of course he did,” said Demorest severely. “They always do. Nothing

kills a man more quickly than an action of that kind.” Nevertheless

the two partners regarded Barker rummaging among some loose clothes

and papers with a kind of paternal toleration. “If you can't find them,

bring out your government bonds,” suggested Stacy. But the next moment,

flushed and triumphant, Barker rose from his knees, and came toward them

carrying some papers in his hands. Demorest seized them from him, opened

them, spread them on the table, examined hurriedly the date, signatures,

and transfers, glanced again quickly at the newspaper paragraph, looked

wildly at Stacy and then at Barker, and gasped:

“By the living hookey! it is SO!”

“B'gosh! he HAS got 'em!” echoed Stacy.

“Twenty shares,” continued Demorest breathlessly, “at ten thousand

dollars a share--even if it's only a foot--is two hundred thousand

dollars! Jerusalem!”

“Tell me, fair sir,” said Stacy, with sparkling eyes, “hast still left

in yonder casket any rare jewels, rubies, sarcenet, or links of fine

gold? Peradventure a pearl or two may have been overlooked!”

“No--that's all,” returned Barker simply.

“You hear him! Rothschild says 'that's all.' Prince Esterhazy says he

hasn't another red cent--only two hundred thousand dollars.”

“What ought I to do, boys?” asked Barker, timidly glancing from one to

the other. Yet he remembered with delight all that day, and for many

a year afterward, that he saw in their faces only unselfish joy and

affection at that supreme moment.

“Do?” said Demorest promptly. “Stand on your head and yell! No! stop!

Come here!” He seized both Barker and Stacy by the hand, and ran out

into the open air. Here they danced violently with clasped hands around

a small buckeye, in perfect silence, and then returned to the cabin,

grave but perspiring.

“Of course,” said Barker, wiping his forehead, “we'll just get some

money on these certificates and buy up that next claim which belongs to

old Carter--where you know we thought we saw the indication.”

“We'll do nothing of the kind,” said Demorest decidedly. “WE ain't in

it. That money is yours, old chap--every cent of it--property acquired

before marriage, you know; and the only thing we'll do is to be damned

before we'll see you drop a dime of it into this Godforsaken hole. No!”

“But we're partners,” gasped Barker.

“Not in THIS! The utmost we can do for you, opulent sir--though it ill

becomes us horny-handed sons of toil to rub shoulders with Dives--is

perchance to dine with you, to take a pasty and a glass of Malvoisie, at

some restaurant in Sacramento--when you've got things fixed, in honor of

your return to affluence. But more would ill become us!”

“But what are YOU going to do?” said Barker, with a half-hysteric,

half-frightened smile.

“We have not yet looked through our luggage,” said Demorest with

invincible gravity, “and there's a secret recess--a double FOND--to my

portmanteau, known only to a trusty page, which has not been disturbed

since I left my ancestral home in Faginia. There may be a few First

Debentures of Erie or what not still there.”

“I felt some strange, disklike protuberances in my dress suit the other

day, but belike they are but poker chips,” said Stacy thoughtfully.

An uneasy feeling crept over Barker. The color which had left his fresh

cheek returned to it quickly, and he turned his eyes away. Yet he had

seen nothing in his companions' eyes but affection--with even a certain

kind of tender commiseration that deepened his uneasiness. “I suppose,”

he said desperately, after a pause, “I ought to go over to Boomville and

make some inquiries.”

“At the bank, old chap; at the bank!” said Demorest emphatically. “Take

my advice and don't go ANYWHERE ELSE. Don't breathe a word of your luck

to anybody. And don't, whatever you do, be tempted to sell just now; you

don't know how high that stock's going to jump yet.”

“I thought,” stammered Barker, “that you boys might like to go over with

me.”

“We can't afford to take another holiday on grub wages, and we're only

two to work today,” said Demorest, with a slight increase of color and

the faintest tremor in his voice. “And it won't do, old chap, for us to

be seen bumming round with you on the heels of your good fortune. For

everybody knows we're poor, and sooner or later everybody'll know you

WERE rich even when you first came to us.”

“Nonsense!” said Barker indignantly.

“Gospel, my boy!” said Demorest shortly.

“The frozen truth, old man!” said Stacy.

Barker took up his hat with some stiffness and moved toward the door.

Here he stopped irresolutely, an irresolution that seemed to communicate

itself to his partners. There was a moment's awkward silence. Then

Demorest suddenly seized him by the shoulders with a grip that was

half a caress, and walked him rapidly to the door. “And now don't stand

foolin' with us, Barker boy; but just trot off like a little man, and

get your grip on that fortune; and when you've got your hooks in it hang

on like grim death. You'll”--he hesitated for an instant only, possibly

to find the laugh that should have accompanied his speech--“you're sure

to find US here when you get back.”

Hurt to the quick, but restraining his feelings, Barker clapped his hat

on his head and walked quickly away. The two partners stood watching him

in silence until his figure was lost in the underbrush. Then they spoke.

“Like him--wasn't it?” said Demorest.

“Just him all over,” said Stacy.

“Think of him having that stock stowed away all these years and never

even bothering his dear old head about it!”

“And think of his wanting to put the whole thing into this rotten

hillside with us!”

“And he'd have done it, by gosh! and never thought of it again. That's

Barker.”

“Dear old man!”

“Good old chap!”

“I've been wondering if one of us oughtn't to have gone with him? He's

just as likely to pour his money into the first lap that opens for it,”

said Stacy.

“The more reason why we shouldn't prevent him, or seem to prevent him,”

said Demorest almost fiercely. “There will be knaves and fools enough

who will try and put the idea of our using him into his simple heart

without that. No! Let him do as he likes with it--but let him be

himself. I'd rather have him come back to us even after he's lost the

money--his old self and empty-handed--than try to change the stuff God

put into him and make him more like others.”

The tone and manner were so different from Demorest's usual levity that

Stacy was silent. After a pause he said: “Well! we shall miss him on the

hillside--won't we?”

Demorest did not reply. Reaching out his hand abstractedly, he wrenched

off a small slip from a sapling near him, and began slowly to pull the

leaves off, one by one, until they were all gone. Then he switched it in

the air, struck his bootleg smartly with it, said roughly: “Come, let's

get to work!” and strode away.

Meantime Barker on his way to Boomville was no less singular in his

manner. He kept up his slightly affected attitude until he had lost

sight of the cabin. But, being of a simple nature, his emotions were

less complex. If he had not seen the undoubted look of affection in the

eyes of his partners he would have imagined that they were jealous of

his good fortune. Yet why had they refused his offer to share it with

him? Why had they so strangely assumed that their partnership with him

had closed? Why had they declined to go with him? Why had this

money--of which he had thought so little, and for which he had cared

so little--changed them toward him? It had not changed HIM--HE was

the same! He remembered how they had often talked and laughed over

a prospective “strike” in mining and speculated what THEY would do

together with the money! And now that “luck” had occurred to one of

them, individually, the effect was only to alienate them! He could not

make it out. He was hurt, wounded--yet oddly enough he was conscious now

of a certain power within him to hurt and wound in retribution. He was

rich: he would let them see HE could do without them. He was quite free

now to think only of himself and Kitty.

For it must be recorded that with all this young gentleman's simplicity

and unselfishness, with all his loyal attitude to his partners, his

FIRST thought at the moment he grasped the fact of his wealth was of

a young lady. It was Kitty Carter, the daughter of the hotelkeeper at

Boomville, who owned the claim that the partners had mutually coveted.

That a pretty girl's face should flash upon him with his conviction that

he was now a rich man meant perhaps no disloyalty to his partners,

whom he would still have helped. But it occurred to him now, in his

half-hurt, half-vengeful state, that they had often joked him about

Kitty, and perhaps further confidence with them was debarred. And it was

only due to his dignity that he should now see Kitty at once.

This was easy enough, for in the naive simplicity of Boomville and the

economic arrangements of her father, she occasionally waited upon the

hotel table. Half the town was always actively in love with her; the

other half HAD BEEN, and was silent, cynical, but hopeless in defeat.

For Kitty was one of those singularly pretty girls occasionally met

with in Southwestern frontier civilization whose distinct and original

refinement of face and figure were so remarkable and original as to cast

a doubt on the sagacity and prescience of one parent and the morality of

the other, yet no doubt with equal injustice. But the fact remained

that she was slight, graceful, and self-contained, and moved beside her

stumpy, commonplace father, and her faded, commonplace mother in the

dining-room of the Boomville Hotel like some distinguished alien. The

three partners, by virtue, perhaps, of their college education and

refined manners, had been exceptionally noticed by Kitty. And for some

occult reason--the more serious, perhaps, because it had no obvious

or logical presumption to the world generally--Barker was particularly

favored.

He quickened his pace, and as the flagstaff of the Boomville Hotel rose

before him in the little hollow, he seriously debated whether he had not

better go to the bank first, deposit his shares, and get a small advance

on them to buy a new necktie or a “boiled shirt” in which to present

himself to Miss Kitty; but, remembering that he had partly given his

word to Demorest that he would keep his shares intact for the present,

he abandoned this project, probably from the fact that his projected

confidence with Kitty was already a violation of Demorest's injunctions

of secrecy, and his conscience was sufficiently burdened with that

breach of faith.

But when he reached the hotel, a strange trepidation overcame him. The

dining-room was at its slack water, between the ebb of breakfast and

before the flow of the preparation for the midday meal. He could not

have his interview with Kitty in that dreary waste of reversed chairs

and bare trestlelike tables, and she was possibly engaged in her

household duties. But Miss Kitty had already seen him cross the road,

and had lounged into the dining-room with an artfully simulated air of

casually examining it. At the unexpected vision of his hopes, arrayed in

the sweetest and freshest of rosebud-sprigged print, his heart faltered.

Then, partly with the desperation of a timid man, and partly through

the working of a half-formed resolution, he met her bright smile with

a simple inquiry for her father. Miss Kitty bit her pretty lip, smiled

slightly, and preceded him with great formality to the office. Opening

the door, without raising her lashes to either her father or the

visitor, she said, with a mischievous accenting of the professional

manner, “Mr. Barker to see you on business,” and tripped sweetly away.

And this slight incident precipitated the crisis. For Barker instantly

made up his mind that he must purchase the next claim for his partners

of this man Carter, and that he would be obliged to confide to him the

details of his good fortune, and as a proof of his sincerity and his

ability to pay for it, he did so bluntly. Carter was a shrewd business

man, and the well-known simplicity of Barker was a proof of his

truthfulness, to say nothing of the shares that were shown to him. His

selling price for his claim had been two hundred dollars, but here was

a rich customer who, from a mere foolish sentiment, would be no doubt

willing to pay more. He hesitated with a bland but superior smile. “Ah,

that was my price at my last offer, Mr. Barker,” he said suavely; “but,

you see, things are going up since then.”

The keenest duplicity is apt to fail before absolute simplicity. Barker,

thoroughly believing him, and already a little frightened at his own

presumption--not for the amount of the money involved, but from the

possibility of his partners refusing his gift utterly--quickly took

advantage of this LOCUS PENITENTIAE. “No matter, then,” he said

hurriedly; “perhaps I had better consult my partners first; in fact,”

he added, with a gratuitous truthfulness all his own, “I hardly know

whether they will take it of me, so I think I'll wait.”

Carter was staggered; this would clearly not do! He recovered himself

with an insinuating smile. “You pulled me up too short, Mr. Barker;

I'm a business man, but hang it all! what's that among friends? If you

reckoned I GAVE MY WORD at two hundred--why, I'm there! Say no more

about it--the claim's yours. I'll make you out a bill of sale at once.”

“But,” hesitated Barker, “you see I haven't got the money yet, and--”

“Money!” echoed Carter bluntly, “what's that among friends? Gimme your

note at thirty days--that's good enough for ME. An' we'll settle the

whole thing now--nothing like finishing a job while you're about it.”

And before the bewildered and doubtful visitor could protest, he had

filled up a promissory note for Barker's signature and himself signed a

bill of sale for the property. “And I reckon, Mr. Barker, you'd like

to take your partners by surprise about this little gift of yours,” he

added smilingly. “Well, my messenger is starting for the Gulch in five

minutes; he's going by your cabin, and he can just drop this bill o'

sale, as a kind o' settled fact, on 'em afore they can say anything,

see! There's nothing like actin' on the spot in these sort of things.

And don't you hurry 'bout them either! You see, you sorter owe us

a friendly call--havin' always dropped inter the hotel only as a

customer--so ye'll stop here over luncheon, and I reckon, as the old

woman is busy, why Kitty will try to make the time pass till then by

playin' for you on her new pianner.”

Delighted, yet bewildered by the unexpected invitation and opportunity,

Barker mechanically signed the promissory note, and as mechanically

addressed the envelope of the bill of sale to Demorest, which Carter

gave to the messenger. Then he followed his host across the hall to the

apartment known as “Miss Kitty's parlor.” He had often heard of it as a

sanctum impervious to the ordinary guest. Whatever functions the young

girl assumed at the hotel and among her father's boarders, it was

vaguely understood that she dropped them on crossing that sacred

threshold, and became “MISS Carter.” The county judge had been

entertained there, and the wife of the bank manager. Barker's admission

there was consequently an unprecedented honor.

He cast his eyes timidly round the room, redolent and suggestive in

various charming little ways of the young girl's presence. There was

the cottage piano which had been brought up in sections on the backs of

mules from the foot of the mountain; there was a crayon head of Minerva

done by the fair occupant at the age of twelve; there was a profile

of herself done by a traveling artist; there were pretty little china

ornaments and many flowers, notably a faded but still scented woodland

shrub which Barker had presented to her two weeks ago, and over which

Miss Kitty had discreetly thrown her white handkerchief as he entered. A

wave of hope passed over him at the act, but it was quickly spent as Mr.

Carter's roughly playful voice introduced him:

“Ye kin give Mr. Barker a tune or two to pass time afore lunch, Kitty.

You kin let him see what you're doing in that line. But you'll have to

sit up now, for this young man's come inter some property, and will

be sasheying round in 'Frisco afore long with a biled shirt and a

stovepipe, and be givin' the go-by to Boomville. Well! you young folks

will excuse me for a while, as I reckon I'll just toddle over and get

the recorder to put that bill o' sale on record. Nothin' like squaring

things to onct, Mr. Barker.”

As he slipped away, Barker felt his heart sink. Carter had not only

bluntly forestalled him with the news and taken away his excuse for a

confidential interview, but had put an ostentatious construction on his

visit. What could she think of him now? He stood ashamed and embarrassed

before her.

But Miss Kitty, far from noticing his embarrassment in a sudden concern

regarding the “horrid” untidiness of the room, which made her cheeks

quite pink in one spot and obliged her to take up and set down in

exactly the same place several articles, was exceedingly delighted. In

fact, she did not remember ever having been so pleased before in her

life! These things were always so unexpected! Just like the weather, for

instance. It was quite cool last night--and now it was just stifling.

And so dusty! Had Mr. Barker noticed the heat coming from the Gulch? Or

perhaps, being a rich man, he--with a dazzling smile--was above walking

now. It was so kind of him to come here first and tell her father.

“I really wanted to tell only--YOU, Miss Carter,” stammered Barker. “You

see--” he hesitated. But Miss Kitty saw perfectly. He wanted to tell

HER, and, seeing her, he asked for HER FATHER! Not that it made the

slightest difference to her, for her father would have been sure to

have told her. It was also kind of her father to invite him to luncheon.

Otherwise she might not have seen him before he left Boomville.

But this was more than Barker could stand. With the same desperate

directness and simplicity with which he had approached her father, he

now blurted out his whole heart to her. He told her how he had loved

her hopelessly from the first time that they had spoken together at the

church picnic. Did she remember it? How he had sat and worshiped her,

and nothing else, at church! How her voice in the church choir had

sounded like an angel's; how his poverty and his uncertain future had

kept him from seeing her often, lest he should be tempted to betray his

hopeless passion. How as soon as he realized that he had a position,

that his love for her need not make her ridiculous to the world's eyes,

he came to tell her ALL. He did not even dare to hope! But she would

HEAR him at least, would she not?

Indeed, there was no getting away from his boyish, simple, outspoken

declaration. In vain Kitty smiled, frowned, glanced at her pink cheeks

in the glass, and stopped to look out of the window. The room was filled

with his love--it was encompassing her--and, despite his shy attitude,

seemed to be almost embracing her. But she managed at last to turn upon

him a face that was now as white and grave as his own was eager and

glowing.

“Sit down,” she said gently.

He did so obediently, but wonderingly. She then opened the piano and

took a seat upon the music stool before it, placed some loose sheets

of music in the rack, and ran her fingers lightly over the keys. Thus

intrenched, she let her hands fall idly in her lap, and for the first

time raised her eyes to his.

“Now listen to me--be good and don't interrupt! There!--not so near; you

can hear what I have to say well enough where you are. That will do.”

Barker had halted with the chair he was dragging toward her and sat

down.

“Now,” said Miss Kitty, withdrawing her eyes and looking straight before

her, “I believe everything you say; perhaps I oughtn't to--or at least

SAY it--but I do. There! But because I do believe you--it seems to me

all wrong! For the very reasons that you give for not having spoken to

me BEFORE, if you really felt as you say you did, are the same reasons

why you should not speak to me now. You see, all this time you have let

nobody but yourself know how you felt toward me. In everybody's eyes

YOU and your partners have been only the three stuck-up, exclusive,

college-bred men who mined a poor claim in the Gulch, and occasionally

came here to this hotel as customers. In everybody's eyes I have been

only the rich hotel-keeper's popular daughter who sometimes waited upon

you--but nothing more. But at least we were then pretty much alike,

and as good as each other. And now, as soon as you have become suddenly

rich, and, of course, the SUPERIOR, you rush down here to ask me to

acknowledge it by accepting you!”

“You know I never meant that, Miss Kitty,” burst out Barker vehemently,

but his protest was drowned in a rapid roulade from the young lady's

fingers on the keys. He sank back in his chair.

“Of course you never MEANT it,” she said with an odd laugh; “but

everybody will take it in that way, and you cannot go round to everybody

in Boomville and make the pretty declaration you have just made to me.

Everybody will say I accepted you for your money; everybody will say

it was a put-up job of my father's. Everybody will say that you threw

yourself away on me. And I don't know but that they would be right. Sit

down, please! or I shall play again.

“You see,” she went on, without looking at him, “just now you like to

remember that you fell in love with me first as a pretty waiter girl,

but if I became your wife it's just what you would like to FORGET. And

I shouldn't, for I should always like to think of the time when you came

here, whenever you could afford it and sometimes when you couldn't, just

to see me; and how we used to make excuses to speak with each other over

the dishes. You don't know what these things mean to a woman who”--she

hesitated a moment, and then added abruptly, “but what does that matter?

You would not care to be reminded of it. So,” she said, rising up with a

grave smile and grasping her hands tightly behind her, “it's a good deal

better that you should begin to forget it now. Be a good boy and take my

advice. Go to San Francisco. You will meet some girl there in a way

you will not afterward regret. You are young, and your riches, to say

nothing,” she added in a faltering voice that was somewhat inconsistent

with the mischievous smile that played upon her lips, “of your kind

and simple heart, will secure that which the world would call unselfish

affection from one more equal to you, but would always believe was only

BOUGHT if it came from me.”

“I suppose you are right,” he said simply.

She glanced quickly at him, and her eyebrows straightened. He had risen,

his face white and his gray eyes widely opened. “I suppose you are

right,” he went on, “because you are saying to me what my partners said

to me this morning, when I offered to share my wealth with them, God

knows as honestly as I offered to share my heart with you. I suppose

that you are both right; that there must be some curse of pride or

selfishness upon the money that I have got; but I have not felt it yet,

and the fault does not lie with me.”

She gave her shoulders a slight shrug, and turned impatiently toward the

window. When she turned back again he was gone. The room around her was

empty; this room, which a moment before had seemed to be pulsating with

his boyish passion, was now empty, and empty of HIM. She bit her lips,

rose, and ran eagerly to the window. She saw his straw hat and brown

curls as he crossed the road. She drew her handkerchief sharply away

from the withered shrub over which she had thrown it, and cast the once

treasured remains in the hearth. Then, possibly because she had it

ready in her hand, she clapped the handkerchief to her eyes, and sinking

sideways upon the chair he had risen from, put her elbows on its back,

and buried her face in her hands.

It is the characteristic and perhaps cruelty of a simple nature to make

no allowance for complex motives, or to even understand them! So it

seemed to Barker that his simplicity had been met with equal directness.

It was the possession of this wealth that had in some way hopelessly

changed his relations with the world. He did not love Kitty any the

less; he did not even think she had wronged him; they, his partners and

his sweetheart, were cleverer than he; there must be some occult quality

in this wealth that he would understand when he possessed it, and

perhaps it might even make him ashamed of his generosity; not in the way

they had said, but in his tempting them so audaciously to assume a wrong

position. It behoved him to take possession of it at once, and to take

also upon himself alone the knowledge, the trials, and responsibilities

it would incur. His cheeks flushed again as he thought he had tried to

tempt an innocent girl with it, and he was keenly hurt that he had not

seen in Kitty's eyes the tenderness that had softened his partners'

refusal. He resolved to wait no longer, but sell his dreadful stock at

once. He walked directly to the bank.

The manager, a shrewd but kindly man, to whom Barker was known already,

received him graciously in recognition of his well-known simple honesty,

and respectfully as a representative of the equally well-known poor but

“superior” partnership of the Gulch. He listened with marked attention

to Barker's hesitating but brief story, only remarking at its close:

“You mean, of course, the 'SECOND Extension' when you say 'First'?”

“No,” said Barker; “I mean the 'First'--and it said First in the

Boomville paper.”

“Yes, yes!--I saw it--it was a printer's error. The stock of the 'First'

was called in two years ago. No! You mean the 'Second,' for, of course,

you've followed the quotations, and are likely to know what stock you're

holding shares of. When you go back, take a look at them, and you'll see

I am right.”

“But I brought them with me,” said Barker, with a slight flushing as

he felt in his pocket, “and I am quite sure they are the 'First'.” He

brought them out and laid them on the desk before the manager.

The words “First Extension” were plainly visible. The manager glanced

curiously at Barker, and his brow darkened.

“Did anybody put this up on you?” he said sternly. “Did your partners

send you here with this stuff?”

“No! no!” said Barker eagerly. “No one! It's all MY mistake. I see it

now. I trusted to the newspaper.”

“And you mean to say you never examined the stock or the quotations, nor

followed it in any way, since you had it?”

“Never!” said Barker. “Never thought about IT AT ALL till I saw the

newspaper. So it's not worth anything?” And, to the infinite surprise of

the manager, there was a slight smile on his boyish face.

“I am afraid it is not worth the paper it's written on,” said the

manager gently.

The smile on Barker's face increased to a little laugh, in which his

wondering companion could not help joining. “Thank you,” said Barker

suddenly, and rushed away.

“He beats everything!” said the manager, gazing after him. “Damned if he

didn't seem even PLEASED.”

He WAS pleased. The burden of wealth had fallen from his shoulders; the

dreadful incubus that had weighed him down and parted his friends from

him was gone! And he had not got rid of it by spending it foolishly. It

had not ruined anybody yet; it had not altered anybody in HIS eyes.

It was gone; and he was a free and happy man once more. He would go

directly back to his partners; they would laugh at him, of course, but

they could not look at him now with the same sad, commiserating eyes.

Perhaps even Kitty--but here a sudden chill struck him. He had forgotten

the bill of sale! He had forgotten the dreadful promissory note given to

her father in the rash presumption of his wealth! How could it ever be

paid? And more than that, it had been given in a fraud. He had no money

when he gave it, and no prospect of any but what he was to get from

those worthless shares. Would anybody believe him that it was only a

stupid blunder of his own? Yes, his partners might believe him; but,

horrible thought, he had already implicated THEM in his fraud! Even now,

while he was standing there hesitatingly in the road, they were entering

upon the new claim he had NOT PAID FOR--COULD NOT PAY FOR--and in the

guise of a benefactor he was dishonoring them. Yet it was Carter he

must meet first; he must confess all to him. He must go back to the

hotel--that hotel where he had indignantly left her, and tell the father

he was a fraud. It was terrible to think of; perhaps it was part of that

money curse that he could not get rid of, and was now realizing; but

it MUST be done. He was simple, but his very simplicity had that

unhesitating directness of conclusion which is the main factor of what

men call “pluck.”

He turned back to the hotel and entered the office. But Mr. Carter had

not yet returned. What was to be done? He could not wait there; there

was no time to be lost; there was only one other person who knew his

expectations, and to whom he could confide his failure--it was Kitty. It

was to taste the dregs of his humiliation, but it must be done. He ran

up the staircase and knocked timidly at the sitting-room door. There was

a momentary pause, and a weak voice said “Come in.” Barker opened the

door; saw the vision of a handkerchief thrown away, of a pair of tearful

eyes that suddenly changed to stony indifference, and a graceful but

stiffening figure. But he was past all insult now.

“I would not intrude,” he said simply, “but I came only to see your

father. I have made an awful blunder--more than a blunder, I think--a

FRAUD. Believing that I was rich, I purchased your father's claim for my

partners, and gave him my promissory note. I came here to give him back

his claim--for that note can NEVER be paid! I have just been to the

bank; I find I have made a stupid mistake in the name of the shares upon

which I based my belief in my wealth. The ones I own are worthless--am

as poor as ever--I am even poorer, for I owe your father money I can

never pay!”

To his amazement he saw a look of pain and scorn come into her troubled

eyes which he had never seen before. “This is a feeble trick,” she said

bitterly; “it is unlike you--it is unworthy of you!”

“Good God! You must believe me. Listen! it was all a mistake--a

printer's error. I read in the paper that the stock for the First

Extension mine had gone up, when it should have been the Second. I

had some old stock of the First, which I had kept for years, and only

thought of when I read the announcement in the paper this morning. I

swear to you--”

But it was unnecessary. There was no doubting the truth of that

voice--that manner. The scorn fled from Miss Kitty's eyes to give place

to a stare, and then suddenly changed to two bubbling blue wells of

laughter. She went to the window and laughed. She sat down to the piano

and laughed. She caught up the handkerchief, and hiding half her rosy

face in it, laughed. She finally collapsed into an easy chair, and,

burying her brown head in its cushions, laughed long and confidentially

until she brought up suddenly against a sob. And then was still.

Barker was dreadfully alarmed. He had heard of hysterics before. He felt

he ought to do something. He moved toward her timidly, and gently drew

away her handkerchief. Alas! the blue wells were running over now.

He took her cold hands in his; he knelt beside her and passed his arm

around her waist. He drew her head upon his shoulder. He was not sure

that any of these things were effective until she suddenly lifted

her eyes to his with the last ray of mirth in them vanishing in a big

teardrop, put her arms round his neck, and sobbed:

“Oh, George! You blessed innocent!”

An eloquent silence was broken by a remorseful start from Barker.

“But I must go and warn my poor partners, dearest; there yet may be

time; perhaps they have not yet taken possession of your father's

claim.”

“Yes, George dear,” said the young girl, with sparkling eyes; “and tell

them to do so AT ONCE!”

“What?” gasped Barker.

“At once--do you hear?--or it may be too late! Go quick.”

“But your father--Oh, I see, dearest, you will tell him all yourself,

and spare me.”

“I shall do nothing so foolish, Georgey. Nor shall you! Don't you see

the note isn't due for a month? Stop! Have you told anybody but Paw and

me?”

“Only the bank manager.”

She ran out of the room and returned in a minute tying the most

enchanting of hats by a ribbon under her oval chin. “I'll run over and

fix him,” she said.

“Fix him?” returned Barker, aghast.

“Yes, I'll say your wicked partners have been playing a practical joke

on you, and he mustn't give you away. He'll do anything for me.”

“But my partners didn't! On the contrary--”

“Don't tell me, George,” said Miss Kitty severely. “THEY ought never to

have let you come here with that stuff. But come! You must go at once.

You must not meet Paw; you'll blurt out everything to him; I know you!

I'll tell him you could not stay to luncheon. Quick, now; go. What?

Well--there!”

Whatever it represented, the exclamation was apparently so protracted

that Miss Kitty was obliged to push her lover to the front landing

before she could disappear by the back stairs. But once in the street,

Barker no longer lingered. It was a good three miles back to the Gulch;

he might still reach it by the time his partners were taking their

noonday rest, and he resolved that although the messenger had preceded

him, they would not enter upon the new claim until the afternoon. For

Barker, in spite of his mistress's injunction, had no idea of taking

what he couldn't pay for; he would keep the claim intact until something

could be settled. For the rest, he walked on air! Kitty loved him!

The accursed wealth no longer stood between them. They were both poor

now--everything was possible.

The sun was beginning to send dwarf shadows toward the east when he

reached the Gulch. Here a new trepidation seized him. How would his

partners receive the news of his utter failure? HE was happy, for he had

gained Kitty through it. But they? For a moment it seemed to him that he

had purchased his happiness through their loss. He stopped, took off his

hat, and ran his fingers remorsefully through his damp curls.

Another thing troubled him. He had reached the crest of the Gulch, where

their old working ground was spread before him like a map. They were not

there; neither were they lying under the four pines on the ridge where

they were wont to rest at midday. He turned with some alarm to the new

claim adjoining theirs, but there was no sign of them there either. A

sudden fear that they had, after parting from him, given up the claim

in a fit of disgust and depression, and departed, now overcame him. He

clapped his hand on his head and ran in the direction of the cabin.

He had nearly reached it when the rough challenge of “Who's there?” from

the bushes halted him, and Demorest suddenly swung into the trail.

But the singular look of sternness and impatience which he was wearing

vanished as he saw Barker, and with a loud shout of “All right, it's

only Barker! Hooray!” he ran toward him. In an instant he was joined by

Stacy from the cabin, and the two men, catching hold of their returning

partner, waltzed him joyfully and breathlessly into the cabin. But the

quick-eyed Demorest suddenly let go his hold and stared at Barker's

face. “Why, Barker, old boy, what's up?”

“Everything's up,” gasped the breathless Barker. “It's all up about

these stocks. It's all a mistake; all an infernal lie of that newspaper.

I never had the right kind of shares. The ones I have are worthless

rags”; and the next instant he had blurted out his whole interview with

the bank manager.

The two partners looked at each other, and then, to Barker's infinite

perplexity, the same extraordinary convulsion that had seized Miss Kitty

fell upon them. They laughed, holding on each other's shoulders; they

laughed, clinging to Barker's struggling figure; they went out and

laughed with their backs against a tree. They laughed separately and in

different corners. And then they came up to Barker with tears in their

eyes, dropped their heads on his shoulder, and murmured exhaustedly:

“You blessed ass!”

“But,” said Stacy suddenly, “how did you manage to buy the claim?”

“Ah! that's the most awful thing, boys. I've NEVER PAID FOR IT,” groaned

Barker.

“But Carter sent us the bill of sale,” persisted Demorest, “or we

shouldn't have taken it.”

“I gave my promissory note at thirty days,” said Barker desperately,

“and where's the money to come from now? But,” he added wildly, as the

men glanced at each other--“you said 'taken it.' Good heavens! you don't

mean to say that I'm TOO late--that you've--you've touched it?”

“I reckon that's pretty much what we HAVE been doing,” drawled Demorest.

“It looks uncommonly like it,” drawled Stacy.

Barker glanced blankly from the one to the other. “Shall we pass our

young friend in to see the show?” said Demorest to Stacy.

“Yes, if he'll be perfectly quiet and not breathe on the glasses,”

returned Stacy.

They each gravely took one of Barker's hands and led him to the

corner of the cabin. There, on an old flour barrel, stood a large tin

prospecting pan, in which the partners also occasionally used to knead

their bread. A dirty towel covered it. Demorest whisked it dexterously

aside, and disclosed three large fragments of decomposed gold and

quartz. Barker started back.

“Heft it!” said Demorest grimly.

Barker could scarcely lift the pan!

“Four thousand dollars' weight if a penny!” said Stacy, in short

staccato sentences. “In a pocket! Brought it out the second stroke of

the pick! We'd been awfully blue after you left. Awfully blue, too, when

that bill of sale came, for we thought you'd been wasting your money on

US. Reckoned we oughtn't to take it, but send it straight back to you.

Messenger gone! Then Demorest reckoned as it was done it couldn't be

undone, and we ought to make just one 'prospect' on the claim, and

strike a single stroke for you. And there it is. And there's more on the

hillside.”

“But it isn't MINE! It isn't YOURS! It's Carter's. I never had the money

to pay for it--and I haven't got it now.”

“But you gave the note--and it is not due for thirty days.”

A recollection flashed upon Barker. “Yes,” he said with thoughtful

simplicity, “that's what Kitty said.”

“Oh, Kitty said so,” said both partners, gravely.

“Yes,” stammered Barker, turning away with a heightened color, “and, as I

didn't stay there to luncheon, I think I'd better be getting it ready.”

He picked up the coffeepot and turned to the hearth as his two partners

stepped beyond the door.

“Wasn't it exactly like him?” said Demorest.

“Him all over,” said Stacy.

“And his worry over that note?” said Demorest.

“And 'what Kitty said,'” said Stacy.

“Look here! I reckon that wasn't ALL that Kitty said.”

“Of course not.”

“What luck!”

A YELLOW DOG

I never knew why in the Western States of America a yellow dog should be

proverbially considered the acme of canine degradation and incompetency,

nor why the possession of one should seriously affect the social

standing of its possessor. But the fact being established, I think we

accepted it at Rattlers Ridge without question. The matter of ownership

was more difficult to settle; and although the dog I have in my mind at

the present writing attached himself impartially and equally to everyone

in camp, no one ventured to exclusively claim him; while, after the

perpetration of any canine atrocity, everybody repudiated him with

indecent haste.

“Well, I can swear he hasn't been near our shanty for weeks,” or the

retort, “He was last seen comin' out of YOUR cabin,” expressed

the eagerness with which Rattlers Ridge washed its hands of any

responsibility. Yet he was by no means a common dog, nor even an

unhandsome dog; and it was a singular fact that his severest critics

vied with each other in narrating instances of his sagacity, insight,

and agility which they themselves had witnessed.

He had been seen crossing the “flume” that spanned Grizzly Canyon at a

height of nine hundred feet, on a plank six inches wide. He had tumbled

down the “shoot” to the South Fork, a thousand feet below, and was found

sitting on the riverbank “without a scratch, 'cept that he was lazily

givin' himself with his off hind paw.” He had been forgotten in a

snowdrift on a Sierran shelf, and had come home in the early spring with

the conceited complacency of an Alpine traveler and a plumpness alleged

to have been the result of an exclusive diet of buried mail bags and

their contents. He was generally believed to read the advance election

posters, and disappear a day or two before the candidates and the brass

band--which he hated--came to the Ridge. He was suspected of having

overlooked Colonel Johnson's hand at poker, and of having conveyed to

the Colonel's adversary, by a succession of barks, the danger of betting

against four kings.

While these statements were supplied by wholly unsupported witnesses, it

was a very human weakness of Rattlers Ridge that the responsibility of

corroboration was passed to the dog himself, and HE was looked upon as a

consummate liar.

“Snoopin' round yere, and CALLIN' yourself a poker sharp, are ye! Scoot,

you yaller pizin!” was a common adjuration whenever the unfortunate

animal intruded upon a card party. “Ef thar was a spark, an ATOM of

truth in THAT DOG, I'd believe my own eyes that I saw him sittin' up and

trying to magnetize a jay bird off a tree. But wot are ye goin' to do

with a yaller equivocator like that?”

I have said that he was yellow--or, to use the ordinary expression,

“yaller.” Indeed, I am inclined to believe that much of the ignominy

attached to the epithet lay in this favorite pronunciation. Men who

habitually spoke of a “YELLOW bird,” a “YELLOW-hammer,” a “YELLOW leaf,”

always alluded to him as a “YALLER dog.”

He certainly WAS yellow. After a bath--usually compulsory--he presented

a decided gamboge streak down his back, from the top of his forehead to

the stump of his tail, fading in his sides and flank to a delicate straw

color. His breast, legs, and feet--when not reddened by “slumgullion,”

in which he was fond of wading--were white. A few attempts at ornamental

decoration from the India-ink pot of the storekeeper failed, partly

through the yellow dog's excessive agility, which would never give the

paint time to dry on him, and partly through his success in transferring

his markings to the trousers and blankets of the camp.

The size and shape of his tail--which had been cut off before his

introduction to Rattlers Ridge--were favorite sources of speculation to

the miners, as determining both his breed and his moral responsibility

in coming into camp in that defective condition. There was a general

opinion that he couldn't have looked worse with a tail, and its removal

was therefore a gratuitous effrontery.

His best feature was his eyes, which were a lustrous Vandyke brown, and

sparkling with intelligence; but here again he suffered from evolution

through environment, and their original trustful openness was marred by

the experience of watching for flying stones, sods, and passing kicks

from the rear, so that the pupils were continually reverting to the

outer angle of the eyelid.

Nevertheless, none of these characteristics decided the vexed question

of his BREED. His speed and scent pointed to a “hound,” and it is

related that on one occasion he was laid on the trail of a wildcat with

such success that he followed it apparently out of the State, returning

at the end of two weeks footsore, but blandly contented.

Attaching himself to a prospecting party, he was sent under the same

belief, “into the brush” to drive off a bear, who was supposed to be

haunting the campfire. He returned in a few minutes WITH the bear,

DRIVING IT INTO the unarmed circle and scattering the whole party. After

this the theory of his being a hunting dog was abandoned. Yet it was

said--on the usual uncorroborated evidence--that he had “put up” a

quail; and his qualities as a retriever were for a long time accepted,

until, during a shooting expedition for wild ducks, it was discovered

that the one he had brought back had never been shot, and the party were

obliged to compound damages with an adjacent settler.

His fondness for paddling in the ditches and “slumgullion” at one time

suggested a water spaniel. He could swim, and would occasionally bring

out of the river sticks and pieces of bark that had been thrown in; but

as HE always had to be thrown in with them, and was a good-sized dog,

his aquatic reputation faded also. He remained simply “a yaller dog.”

What more could be said? His actual name was “Bones”--given to him, no

doubt, through the provincial custom of confounding the occupation of

the individual with his quality, for which it was pointed out precedent

could be found in some old English family names.

But if Bones generally exhibited no preference for any particular

individual in camp, he always made an exception in favor of drunkards.

Even an ordinary roistering bacchanalian party brought him out from

under a tree or a shed in the keenest satisfaction. He would accompany

them through the long straggling street of the settlement, barking his

delight at every step or misstep of the revelers, and exhibiting none of

that mistrust of eye which marked his attendance upon the sane and the

respectable. He accepted even their uncouth play without a snarl or a

yelp, hypocritically pretending even to like it; and I conscientiously

believe would have allowed a tin can to be attached to his tail if the

hand that tied it on were only unsteady, and the voice that bade him

“lie still” were husky with liquor. He would “see” the party cheerfully

into a saloon, wait outside the door--his tongue fairly lolling from his

mouth in enjoyment--until they reappeared, permit them even to tumble

over him with pleasure, and then gambol away before them, heedless of

awkwardly projected stones and epithets. He would afterward accompany

them separately home, or lie with them at crossroads until they were

assisted to their cabins. Then he would trot rakishly to his own haunt

by the saloon stove, with the slightly conscious air of having been a

bad dog, yet of having had a good time.

We never could satisfy ourselves whether his enjoyment arose from some

merely selfish conviction that he was more SECURE with the physically

and mentally incompetent, from some active sympathy with active

wickedness, or from a grim sense of his own mental superiority at such

moments. But the general belief leant toward his kindred sympathy as a

“yaller dog” with all that was disreputable. And this was supported by

another very singular canine manifestation--the “sincere flattery” of

simulation or imitation.

“Uncle Billy” Riley for a short time enjoyed the position of being

the camp drunkard, and at once became an object of Bones' greatest

solicitude. He not only accompanied him everywhere, curled at his feet

or head according to Uncle Billy's attitude at the moment, but, it was

noticed, began presently to undergo a singular alteration in his own

habits and appearance. From being an active, tireless scout and forager,

a bold and unovertakable marauder, he became lazy and apathetic;

allowed gophers to burrow under him without endeavoring to undermine the

settlement in his frantic endeavors to dig them out, permitted squirrels

to flash their tails at him a hundred yards away, forgot his usual

caches, and left his favorite bones unburied and bleaching in the sun.

His eyes grew dull, his coat lusterless, in proportion as his companion

became blear-eyed and ragged; in running, his usual arrowlike directness

began to deviate, and it was not unusual to meet the pair together,

zigzagging up the hill. Indeed, Uncle Billy's condition could be

predetermined by Bones' appearance at times when his temporary master

was invisible. “The old man must have an awful jag on today,” was

casually remarked when an extra fluffiness and imbecility was noticeable

in the passing Bones. At first it was believed that he drank also, but

when careful investigation proved this hypothesis untenable, he was

freely called a “derned time-servin', yaller hypocrite.” Not a few

advanced the opinion that if Bones did not actually lead Uncle Billy

astray, he at least “slavered him over and coddled him until the old man

got conceited in his wickedness.” This undoubtedly led to a compulsory

divorce between them, and Uncle Billy was happily dispatched to a

neighboring town and a doctor.

Bones seemed to miss him greatly, ran away for two days, and was

supposed to have visited him, to have been shocked at his convalescence,

and to have been “cut” by Uncle Billy in his reformed character; and

he returned to his old active life again, and buried his past with his

forgotten bones. It was said that he was afterward detected in trying

to lead an intoxicated tramp into camp after the methods employed by

a blind man's dog, but was discovered in time by the--of

course--uncorroborated narrator.

I should be tempted to leave him thus in his original and picturesque

sin, but the same veracity which compelled me to transcribe his

faults and iniquities obliges me to describe his ultimate and somewhat

monotonous reformation, which came from no fault of his own.

It was a joyous day at Rattlers Ridge that was equally the advent of

his change of heart and the first stagecoach that had been induced to

diverge from the highroad and stop regularly at our settlement. Flags

were flying from the post office and Polka saloon, and Bones was flying

before the brass band that he detested, when the sweetest girl in the

county--Pinkey Preston--daughter of the county judge and hopelessly

beloved by all Rattlers Ridge, stepped from the coach which she had

glorified by occupying as an invited guest.