you, way I look at it. I don't suppose there ever was a man who really
loved his daughter but what he figured that, taking one thing with
another, she was too good for any man on earth. No matter who the lucky
candidate is he says to himself: 'Well, if I have to have a son-in-law
I suppose maybe you'll do, but alongside of her you're a total loss.'
That's what any father who's worth his salt is bound to think. And
that's what I'd still think no matter who you picked out. I'm not
saying now what sort of a husband I'd try to pick out for you if the
choice had been left to me. I'd probably want to keep you an old maid
so's I could have you around and then I'd secretly despise myself for
doing it, too. What I'm saying is this: If you're certain you know your
own mind and if you've decided that this boy is the boy you want, why
what more is there for me to do except maybe to ask you just one or two
small questions?"
"Shoot!" she bade, without looking up, but her arms hugged him a
little tighter. "Probably one of the nicest old meal-tickets in the
world," she added, confidentially addressing the top buttonhole of his
sweater.
"Has it by any chance entered into your calculations at this early
stage of the game, how you are going to live--you two? Or where? Or, if
I may be so bold, what on?"
"That's easy," she said, and now she was peering up at him through a
tousled short forelock. "You're going to set us up on a place out here
somewhere--a ranch. We're going to raise beef. He knows about beef. And
I'm going to learn. I aim to be the leading lady beefer of the Imperial
Northwest before I'm done."
"Whose notion was that?" His voice had sharpened the least bit.
"Mine, of course. He doesn't know anything about it. His idea is that
we start in on what he can earn. But my idea is that we start in on a
few of the simoleons that have already been earned--by you. And that's
the idea that's going to prevail."
"Lucky I brought a fountain pen and a check-book along," he said.
"Nothing like being prepared for these sudden emergencies. Still, I
take it there's no great rush. Now, I tell you what: You run along
and locate your mother and get _that_ over with. She knows how I
stand--we've been discussing this little affair our own selves."
"Oh," she said. "Oh, you have?" She seemed disappointed
somehow--disappointed and slightly puzzled.
"Oh yes, several times. And on your way kindly whisper to the young
man that I'm lurking right here behind these rocks ready to have a few
words with him--if he can spare the time."
"Righto!" She reached up and kissed him and went swinging away,
suspecting nothing, and for just a moment Mr. Gatling's conscience
smote him, that she did not suspect.
"I've got to do it," he said to himself, excusing himself. "I've just
got to find out--for her sake and ours--yes, and for his, too. It looks
like an impossible bet and I've got to make sure."
With young Tripler he had more than the few words he had specified.
They had quite an interview and as they had it the youth's
embarrassment, which at the outset of the dialogue had made him wriggle
and mumble and kick with his toes at inoffensive pebbles, gradually
wore off until it vanished altogether and his native assurance
reasserted itself. A proposition was advanced. It needed little
pressing; promptly he fell in with it. It appealed to him.
"So we're agreed there," concluded his prospective father-in-law,
clinching the final rivets. "We'll all go right ahead and finish out
this tour--it's only a couple of days more anyhow and there's still a
few cutthroats I want to catch. Then I'll take Shirley and her mother
and run on out to Spokane. We'll hustle one of the other boys back
tomorrow to the entrance to tell my chauffeur to load some bags in the
car and run around to this side and meet us where we come out. We'll
leave you there and you can dust back to the starting point through
that short cut over the Garden Wall you were just speaking of. The
business that I've got in Spokane will keep me maybe two or three days.
That'll give you time to get those new clothes of yours and then we'll
all meet over at Many Glacier--I'll wire you in advance--and in a day
or two we'll all go on East together so's you can get acquainted with
Shirley's friends and so forth. But of course, as I said before, that's
our secret--all that part of it is. You've never been East, I believe?"
"Well, I've been as far as Minot, North Dakota."
"You'll probably notice a good deal of territory the other side of
there. You'll enjoy it. Sure you can pick up all the wardrobe you need
out in this country?" His manner was solicitous.
"Oh yes, sir, there's those two swell fellows named Steinfelt and
Immergluck I was telling you about that they've got the leading gents'
furnishing goods store down in Cree City."
"Good enough! I'd suggest that when picking out a suit you get
something good and brisk as to pattern. Shirley likes live colors." Mr.
Gatling next stressed a point which already had been dwelt upon: "You
understand of course that she's not to know a single thing about all
this--it's strictly between us two?"
"Yes, sir."
"You see, that'll make the surprise all the greater when she sees you
all fixed up in a snappy up-to-date rigging like young college fellows
your age wear back where she comes from. Seems like to me I was reading
in an advertisement only here the other day where they're going in for
coats with belts on 'em this season. Oh yes, and full-bottomed pants; I
read that, too.
"One thing more occurs to me: Your hair is a little bit long and
shaggy, don't you think? That's fine for out here but back East a
young fellow that wants to be in style keeps himself trimmed up sort
of close. Now I saw a barber working on somebody about as old as you
are just the other day. Let me see--where was it? Oh yes, it was the
barber at that town of Cree City--I dropped in there for a shave when
we motored down last week. He seemed to have pretty good ideas about
trimming up a fellow's bean, that barber."
"I know the one you mean--Silk Sullivan, next door to the bank. I've
patronized him before."
"That's the one. Well, patronize him again before you rejoin us. He
knows his business all right, your friend Sullivan does.... Now, mind
you, mum's the word. All this part of it is absolutely between us."
"Oh yes, sir."
"O. K. Shake on it.... Well, suppose we see how they're coming along
with supper."
Mr. Gatling's strategy ticked like a clock. After they got to Spokane
he delayed the return by pretending a vexatious prolongation of a
purely fictitious deal in ore properties, his privy intent being
to give opportunity for Cree City's ready-made clothing princes to
work their will. Since a hellish deed must be done he craved that
they do it properly. Then on the homeward journey when they had
reached the Western Gate and were preparing to ship the car through
the non-negotiable sixty-mile stretch across the summit, he suddenly
remembered he had failed to complete his purchases of an assortment of
game heads at Lewis's on Lake McDonald. He professed that he couldn't
round out the order by telephone; unless he personally selected his
collection some grievous error might be made.
"You go on across on this train, Shirley," he said. "I telegraphed your
young man that we'd be there this morning and he'll be on the lookout.
Your mother and I'll dust up to the head of the lake on the bus and
I'll finish up what I've got to do there and we'll be along on the
Limited this evening. After being separated for a whole week you two'll
probably enjoy a day together without any old folks snooping around.
Meet us at the hotel tonight for a reunion."
So Shirley went on ahead. It perhaps was true that Shirley's nerves had
suffered after six days spent in the companionship of a devoted mother
who trailed along with yearning, grief-stricken eyes fixed on her only
child--a mother who at frequent intervals sniffed mournfully and once
in a while broke into low moaning and sighing sounds. Mrs. Gatling was
bearing up under the blow as well as could be expected, but, even
so, there had been hours when depression enveloped her as with sable
trappings and at no period had she been what the kindliest of critics
would call good company. Quite willingly Shirley went.
"I--I feel as though I were giving her up forever," faltered Mrs.
Gatling, following with brimming eyes her daughter's departing form.
"Romola," commanded Mr. Gatling, "don't be foolish in the head. You're
going to be separated from her exactly nine hours--unless the evening
train's late, in which event it may be as long as nine hours and a
half."
"You know what I mean, Hector."
"Don't I? Mmph!"
"But she tripped away so gaily--so gladly. It was exactly as though she
wanted to leave us. And yet, Heaven knows I've tried and tried ever
since that--that terrible night to show her what she means to me....
Have you got a handkerchief to spare? Mine's sopping."
"You've done more than try, Romola--you've succeeded, if that's any
consolation to you. You've succeeded darned well." He stared almost
regretfully down the line at the rear of an observation-car swiftly
diminishing into a small square dot where the rails came together.
"Since you mention it, she did look powerfully chipper and cheerful a
minute ago, hustling to climb aboard that Pullman--cheerfuller than
she's looked since we quit the trail last Wednesday. Lord, how I
wish I could guarantee that kid was never going to have a minute's
unhappiness the rest of her life!" Something remotely akin to remorse
was beginning to gnaw at Mr. Gatling's heart-cockles.
Indeed, something strongly resembling remorse beset him toward the
close of this day. At the station when they detrained, no Shirley was
on hand to greet them; nor was there sign of Shirley's affianced. Up
the slope from the tracks at the hotel a clerk wrenched himself from an
importuning cluster of newly arrived tourists for long enough to tell
them the numbers of their rooms and to say Miss Gatling had left word
she would be awaiting them there.
So they went up under escort of two college students serving as
bell-hops. Collegians as a class make indifferent bell-hops. These two
deposited the hand-baggage in the living-room of the suite, accepted
the customary rewards and departed. As they vanished, a bedroom door
opened and out came Shirley--a crumpled, wobegone Shirley with a
streaky swollen face and on her cheek the wrinkle marks where she had
ground it into a wadded pillow.
"It's all right, mater," she said with a flickering trace of her usual
jauntiness. "The alliance between the house of Gatling and the house of
Tripler is off. So you can liven up. I'll be your substitute for such
crying as is done in this family during the next day or two. I've--I've
been practicing all afternoon."
She eluded the lady's outstretched arms and clung temporarily at her
father's breast.
"Dad," she confessed brokenly, "I think I must have been a little bit
loony these last two weeks. But, dad, I've taken the cure. It's not
nice medicine and it makes you feel miserable at first but I guess it's
good for what ails me.... Dad, have you seen--him?"
"Not yet." Compassion for her was mixed in with his own secret
exultation, as though he tasted a sweet cake that was iced with a most
bitter icing.
"Well, when you do, you'll understand. Even if he doesn't!"
"Have you told him?"
"Of course I have. Did you think I'd try to wish that little job off on
you? I didn't tell him the real reason--I couldn't wound him that much.
I told him I'd changed. But he--he's really the one that's changed.
That's what makes it harder for me now. That's what makes it hurt so."
"Here, Romola," he said, kissing the girl and relinquishing her into
her mother's grasp. "You swap tears awhile--you'll enjoy that anyhow,
Romola. I've got business down-stairs--got to make some sleeper
reservations for getting out of here in the morning. And as soon as we
hit Pittsburgh I figure you two had better be booking up for a little
swing around Europe."
The lobby below was seething--seething is the word commonly used in
this connection so we might as well do so, too--was seething with
Easterners who mainly had dressed as they imagined Westerners would
dress, and with Westerners who mainly had dressed as they imagined
Easterners would dress, the resultant effect being that nobody was
fooled but everybody was pleased. Working his way through the jam on
the search for a certain one, Mr. Gatling's eye almost immediately was
caught by a startling color combination or rather a series of startling
color combinations appertaining to an individual who stood half hidden
in the protection of a column, leaning against it head down with his
back to Mr. Gatling.
To begin at the top, there was, surmounting all, a smug undersized
object of head-gear--at least, it would pass for head-gear--of a
poisonous mustard shade. It perched high and, as it were, aloof
upon the crest of its wearer's skull. Below it, where the neck had
been shaved, and a good portion of the close-clipped scalp as well,
a sort of crescent of pink skin blazed forth in strong contrast to
an abnormally long expanse of sun-burnt surface rising above the
cross-line of an exceedingly low, exceedingly shiny blue linen collar.
Straying on downward, Mr. Gatling's wondering eye was aware of a
high-waisted Norfolk jacket belted well up beneath the armpits, a
jacket of a tone which might not be called mauve nor yet lavender nor
yet magenta but which partook subtly of all three shades--with a plaid
overlay in chocolate superimposed thereon. Yet nearer the floor was
revealed a pair of trousers extensively bell-bottomed and apparently
designed with the intent to bring out and impress upon the casual
observer the fact that their present owner had two of the most widely
bowed legs on the North American continent; and finally, a brace of
cloth-top shoes. Tan shoes, these were, with buttoned uppers of a pale
fawn cloth, and bulldog toes. They were very new shoes, that was plain,
and of an exceedingly bright and pristine glossiness.
This striking person now moved out of his shelter, his shoulders being
set at a despondent hunch, and as he turned about, bringing his profile
into view, Mr. Gatling recognized that the stranger was no stranger and
he gave a gasp which became a choked gurgle.
"Perfect!" he muttered to himself; "absolutely perfect! Couldn't be
better if I'd done it myself. And, oh Lordy, that necktie--that's the
finishing stroke! Still, at that, it's a rotten shame--the poor kid!"
He hurried across, overtaking the slumping figure, and as his hand fell
in a friendly slap upon one drooped shoulder the transformed cowboy
flinched and turned and looked on him with two sad eyes.
"Howdy-do, sir," he said wanly. Then he braced himself and squared
his back, and Mr. Gatling perceived--and was glad to note--that the
youngster strove to take his heartache in a manly fashion.
"Son," said Mr. Gatling, "from what I'm able to gather I'm not going
to have you for a son-in-law after all. But that's no reason why we
shouldn't hook up along another line. I've been watching you off and
on ever since we got acquainted and more closely since--well, since
about a week ago, and it strikes me you've got some pretty good stuff
in you. I've been thinking of trying a little flier in the cattle game
out here--had the notion in the back of my mind for quite a while but
didn't spring it until I found the party that I figure could maybe
run it right. Well, I think I've found him. You're him. If you think
you'd like a chance to start in as foreman or boss or superintendent or
whatever you call it and maybe work up into a partnership if you showed
me you had the goods, why, we'll talk it over together at dinner. The
womenfolks won't be down and we can sit and powwow and I'll give you my
ideas and you can give me yours."
"I'd like that fine, sir," said young Tripler.
"Good boy! I'll keep you so busy you won't have time to brood on any
little disappointment that you may be suffering from now.... Say, son,
don't mind my suggesting something, do you? If I was you I'd skin out
of these duds you've got on and climb back into your regular working
clothes--somehow, you don't seem to match the picture the way you are
now."
"Why, you advised me to get 'em your own self, sir!" exclaimed the
youth.
"That's right, I did, didn't I? Well, maybe you had better keep on
wearing 'em." A shrewd and crafty gleam flickered under his eyelids.
"You see--yes--on second thoughts, I think I want a chance to get used
to you in your stylish new outfit. Promise me you'll wear 'em until
noon tomorrow anyhow?"
"Yes, sir," said his victim obediently.
Mr. Gatling winked a concealed deadly wink.
A CLOSE SHAVE
[Decoration]
On a certain day the young governor--Gov. G. W. Blankenship--left the
Executive Mansion and motored up to the State Penitentiary.
As the car spun him north over good roads through the crisp morning
air, he took stock of himself and of his past life and of his future
prospects, nor had cause for disappointment or doubt regarding any one
of these three. This was a fine large world--large yet cozy--and he
gave it his unqualified indorsement while he rode along.
He took the penitentiary unawares. The warden was not expecting him.
Nobody was--not even the warden's pretty, amorous little wife. Of this,
his first visit to the institution since his inauguration six months
before, the governor meant to make a surprise visit. An announcement
sent on ahead would have meant preparations for his arrival--an
official reception and a speeding-up of the machinery. His design was
to see how the place looked in, as you might say, its week-day clothes.
It looked pretty good. After a painstaking inspection he was bound
to conclude that, for a prison, this prison came very near to being a
model prison. The management was efficient, that was plain to be seen.
The discipline, so far as he might judge, was strict without being
cruel.
The climax to a very satisfactory forenoon came, when the warden at the
end of the tour invited him to stay for luncheon.
"It'll just be a simple meal, Governor," said Warden Riddle, "with
nobody else there except Mrs. Riddle. But I'd mightily like to have you
take pot-luck with us."
"Well, I believe I will do just that very thing," said Governor
Blankenship, heartily. Privately he was much pleased. "That is, if I'm
not putting your household out on my account?"
"Of course not," stated Riddle. "I'll just chase a trusty across the
road to tell the missis to put a third plate on the table--that's all
that's necessary." He spoke with the pride of a contented husband in a
well-ordered home.
"Then I'll get in my car and go find a barber shop," said the governor,
sliding the palm of his hand across his chin. "I started up country so
soon after breakfast this morning that I forgot to shave."
"No need for you to do that," Riddle told him. "Don't you remember
seeing the little shop over back of the main building--not the big shop
where the inmates are trimmed up, the little one where the staff have
their barbering done? We've got a lifer over there who's a wiz' at his
trade. I'll guarantee you'll get as good a shave from him as you ever
had in your life, Governor."
So, escorted by the warden, Governor Blankenship recrossed the
enclosure to a wing behind the infirmary. From the doorway of a small,
neat shop, properly equipped and spotlessly clean, the warden addressed
the lone occupant, a young man in convict gray.
"Shave this gentleman right away," he ordered. "A good quick job."
"Yes, sir," replied the prisoner.
"You needn't wait, Warden," said the governor. "I'll rejoin you in your
office in a few minutes."
The warden accordingly departed, the barber closing the door behind
him. The governor climbed into the chair and was tilted back. A crisp
cloth was tucked about his collar, warm, soft suds were applied to his
face and deft fingers kneaded the soap and rubbed it in among the hair
roots, then the razor began mowing with smooth, even strokes over the
governor's jowls--first one jowl, then the other. This much was done in
a silence broken only by the gentle scraping sound of the steel against
the bristles.
It was the convict who spoke first, thereby violating a prison rule.
He had finished with his subject's jaws; the razor hovered above the
Adam's apple.
"I know you," he said coldly; "you're the governor."
"Yes," said his Excellency, "I am."
"Then you ought to recognize me, too," continued the barber. "Take a
look!"
Slightly startled, Governor Blankenship blinked and peered upward into
a face that was bent just above his own face.
"No," he said, "I don't believe I remember you. Where did we ever meet
before?"
"In a courtroom," said the prisoner, "in a courtroom at ----," he named
the principal city of the state, which also was the city where the
governor held his citizenship. "You prosecuted me--you sent me here."
All at once his voice grew shaky with passion; his features, which
until now he had held in a composed blank, became distorted--a twisted
mask of hatred.
Sudden apprehension stirred inside the young governor. He made as
though to straighten up. A strong hand pressing on his breast kept him
down, though.
"Stay still!" commanded the convict. "You haven't got a chance. I
locked the door there when the head-screw left. And don't try to yell
for help, either--I can take that head of yours off your shoulders at
one swipe. Stay still and listen to me."
As white under the patchings of lather as the lather was--yes,
whiter--Governor Blankenship lay there, rigid with a great fear, and
hearkened as his tormentor went on:
"Probably you wouldn't remember me. Why should you? I was just one
of the poor stiffs you persecuted when you were district attorney,
building up the record that landed you in the governor's chair. 'Blood
Hound' Blankenship--that's what they called you. And how you worked to
put me away! Well, you had your wish. Here I am, in for keeps. And here
you are, helpless as a baby, and a sharp razor right against your neck.
Feel it, don't you? I'll make you feel it!"
The stricken man felt it, pressing at his throat, fraying the skin,
ready to slice downward into his crawling flesh. The mere touch of it
seemed to paralyze his vocal cords. He strove to speak, but for the
life of him--and his life was the stake, he realized that--he couldn't
get the words out.
In a terrible relentless monotone the torturer went on:
"I don't so much blame the judge--he seemed almost sorry for me
when he was hanging the sentence on me. And I don't blame the jury,
either. But you--what you said about me, the way you went at me on
cross-examination, the names you called me when you were summing up! I
swore then that if ever I got a chance at you I'd fix you. And now I've
got my chance--and I've got you right where I want you!"
"Wait--for God's sake, wait!" In a strangled frenzied gurgle the
helpless man pumped forth the entreaty.
"Why should I wait? They don't have capital punishment any more in this
state. All they can do is pile another life term on the one I'm already
doing."
"But wait--oh, please wait! I do seem to remember you now. Maybe--maybe
I was too severe. If I took your case under advisement--if I pardoned
you--if-if--" He was begging so hard that he babbled.
The pressure of that deadly thing at his throat was relaxed the least
bit.
"Now you're getting reasonable," said the lifer. "I thought the thing
I wanted most in the world was to kill you. But after four years here,
liberty would be pretty sweet too. There's one thing they've always
said about you--that you keep your word. Swear you'll keep your trap
shut about what's happened in this shop today, and on top of that swear
to me you'll turn me out of here, and you can go!"
On these terms then the bargain was struck. The governor, having given
his promise, had a good shave, twice over, with witch-hazel for a
lotion, and having somewhat mastered his jumping nerves and regained
his customary dignity, went home with the warden for luncheon.
From the foot of the table, little Mrs. Riddle shot covert smiles at
him--and soft languishing glances. There was meaningness in her manner,
in her caressing voice. Her husband talked along, suspecting nothing.
He thought--if he gave it a thought--that she was flattered at having
the governor at her board. As for the governor, even in his shaken
state he had a secret glowing within.
As he was leaving, he remarked in a casual tone to his host: