BIRDIE AND THE BOYS
The derelicts of a mining camp must ever be interesting to the student
of human nature, so wide is the field for study. But it were better to
be a student, simply, when probing amongst the refuse heaps of life's
debris. A sentimentalist, a man of heart, would quickly have it broken
with the pity of it all. A city's tragedies often require search to
reveal them, but upon the frontier tragedy stalks unsepulchered in the
background of nearly every life, ready to leap out in all its naked
horror and settle itself leech-like upon the sympathetic heart,
stifling it with the burden of its misery.
No, it is not good to delve into the dark pages of such folks' lives
too closely, unless armored with impenetrable callousness. But one
cannot help wondering whence all those living tragedies come. Look at
the men. For the most part strong, able creatures, apparently capable
of fighting the lusty battle of life with undiminished ardor. Look at
the women. They are for the most part thinking women, healthy,
capable. And yet--well, nine-tenths of them are not so cut off from
their home cities, their friends and relatives, without some more than
ordinary reason.
It is a sad sight to see the women plunged headlong into the fight for
existence in such places, to witness the cruel iron thrust upon them
its searing brand, to watch all the natural softness of their sex
harden to the necessary degree for a successful issue to the battle,
to witness their frequent unsexing and ultimate degradation. Such
results are common enough when a woman enters the lists. It is so
often a mere question of time. And when the end is achieved, how
awful, how revolting, but how natural.
How Birdie Mason came to find herself the one woman on Suffering
Creek--leaving out the later advent of Scipio's wife--it is not for us
to ask. Whatever her little tragedy it is hers alone, and does not
concern us. All that we need think of is her future, and the pity that
so well-favored a woman has not found her lot cast in places where her
womanhood has its best chances. However, she is there, living the life
of all such hired "helps," drudging from morning till night in one
long round of sordid labor, in an atmosphere stinking with the fetid
breath of debased humanity.
But as yet the life has made no inroads upon her moral health. Her
sunny good nature sets her singing over the most grinding labors. Her
smiling face, and ready tongue, give her an air of happiness and joy
of life which seems well-nigh invincible. And her popularity contrives
her many thrilling moments and advantages which she is too much a
woman and a child to deny herself.
Her day's work ends with the after supper "wash up," a dreary routine
which might well crush the most ardent spirit. Yet she bends over her
tubs full of crockery dreaming her sunny dreams, building her little
castles to the clink of enameled tin cups, weaving her romances to the
clatter of cutlery, smiling upon the mentally conjured faces of her
boys amidst the steaming odors of greasy, lukewarm water. The one blot
upon her existence is perhaps the Chinese cook, with whom she has
perforce to associate. She dislikes him for no other reason than that
he is a "yaller-faced doper that ought to been set to herd with a
menagerie of measly skunks." But even this annoyance cannot seriously
damp her buoyancy, and, with wonderful feminine philosophy, she puts
him out of her mind as a "no account feller, anyway."
She was putting the finishing touches to the long dining-table, making
it ready for the next day's breakfast. It was not an elaborate
preparation. She "dumped" a box of knives and forks at each end of it,
and then proceeded to chase any odd bits of debris from the last meal
on to the floor with a duster. Then, with a hand-broom and pan, she
took these up and with them any other rubbish that might be lying
about. Finally, she set jugs of drinking water at intervals down the
center of the table, and her work was done.
She looked about her, patting her fair hair with that eminently
feminine touch which is to be seen in every woman from the millionaire's
wife down to the poorest emigrant. Then, with less delicacy, she
lifted her apron and wiped the moisture from her round young face.
"Guess that's 'most everything," she murmured, her eyes brightening at
the contemplation of her completed task. "I'll just cut out them--"
She went to a cupboard and drew out a parcel of white lawn and paper
patterns, which she carefully spread out on the table. And, in a few
moments, she was bending absorbedly over the stuff, lost in the
intricacies of hewing out an embryonic garment for her personal
adornment.
It was at this task that Toby Jenks found her. He was worried to death
at the thought that, as a member of the newly formed Zip Trust, it was
his duty to gather information concerning the management of children.
However, in the midst of his trouble he hit on the brilliant idea of
consulting the only woman of his acquaintance.
Toby wanted to do something startling in the interests of the Trust.
He felt that his membership had been conferred in a rather grudging
spirit. And, to his mildly resentful way of thinking, it seemed it
would be a good thing if he could surprise his friends with the
excellence of his services in the general interests of the concern.
Birdie heard the door open, and raised a pair of startled eyes at the
intruder. It was not that such visits were out of order, or even
uncommon, but they generally occurred after pre-arrangement, which
gave her the opportunity of "fixing herself right."
With a wild grab she scrambled her material, and the pattern, so that
its identification would be quite impossible to male eyes, and hugged
it in her arms. Turning swiftly she thrust it into the cupboard, and
slammed the door. But she had no resentment at the interruption. Toby
was quite a new visitor, and, well--the more the merrier.
She turned to him all smiles, and Toby returned her welcome something
sheepishly. He cut a quaint figure with his broad, ungainly shoulders
supporting his rather pumpkin face. Then his arms were a little too
long and terminated in two "leg-of-mutton" hands.
"Evenin', Birdie," he said bashfully. "Guess you were sewin'?"
"Guess again," cried the girl readily, her eyes dancing at the
contemplation of a few moments' badinage with a new candidate for her
favors.
"Well, you wa'an't playin' the pianner."
But Birdie was quite equal to the best efforts of her candidates.
"My, but ain't you slick?" she cried, allowing her smiling gaze to
remain looking straight into his face in a way she knew never failed
to confuse her admirers on Suffering Creek. She watched till the
sturdy man's eyes turned away, and knew that he was groping for an
adequate retort. This effect was the result of practice with her, a
practice she thoroughly enjoyed.
The "leg-of-mutton" hands fumbled their way into the tops of Toby's
trousers, and, with a sudden self-assertion, which fitted him badly,
he lurched over to the table, beyond which Birdie was standing. It was
his intention to seat himself thereon, but his tormentor had not yet
reached the point where she could allow such intimacy.
"Say, I ain't ast you to sit around," she said, with an alluring pout.
"Men-folk don't sit around in a lady's' parlor till they're ast.
'Sides, the table's fixed fer breakfast. And anyway it ain't for
settin' on."
Toby moved away quickly, his attempt at ease deserting him with
ludicrous suddenness. At sight of his blushing face Birdie relaxed her
austerity.
"Say, ain't you soft?" she declared, with a demure lowering of her
lids. "I've allus heerd say, you only got to tell a feller don't, an'
he sure does it quick. Men-folk is that contrary. Now--"
The encouragement brought its reward. Toby promptly sat himself on the
table and set it creaking.
"Well, I do declare!" cried Birdie, in pretended indignation. "And I
never ast you, neither. I don't know, I'm sure. Some folks has
nerve."
But this time Toby was not to be intimidated. Perhaps it was the
girl's bright smile. Perhaps, with marvelous inspiration, he saw
through her flirtatious methods. Anyway, he remained where he was,
grinning sheepishly up into her face.
"Guess you best push me off. I ain't heavy," he dared her clumsily.
"I sure wouldn't demean myself that way," she retorted. "Gee, me
settin' hands on a feller like you. It would need a prize-fighter."
The acknowledgment of his size and strength was a subtle tribute which
pleased the man, as it was intended to. He preened himself and drew
his knees up into his arms, in an attitude intended to be one of
perfect ease and to show his confidence.
"I sure ain't much of a feller for strength," he said modestly, eyeing
his enormous arms and hands affectionately. "You ought to see Wild
Bill. He--he could eat me, an' never worry his digestion."
Birdie laughed happily. She was always ready to laugh at a man's
attempt at humor. That was her way.
"You are a queer one," she said, seating herself on the opposite edge
of the table, so that she was sufficiently adjacent, and at the
requisite angle at which to carry on her flirtation satisfactorily.
"Say," she went on, with a down drooping of her eyelids, "why ain't
you in there playin' poker? Guess you're missin' heaps o' fun. I wish
I was a 'boy.' I wouldn't miss such fun by sitting around in here."
"Wouldn't you?" Toby grinned, while his brains struggled to find a
happy reply. "Well, you see," he hazarded at last, "poker an' whisky
ain't to be compared to talkin' to a dandy fine gal with yaller hair
an' elegant blue eyes."
He passed one of his great hands across his forehead as though his
attempt had made him perspire. But he had his reward. Birdie contrived
a blush of pleasure, and edged a little nearer to him.
"Gee, you can talk pretty," she declared, her lips parted in an
admiring smile. "It makes me kind o' wonder how you fellers learn it."
Then she added demurely, "But I ain't pretty, nor nothing like you
fellers try to make out. I'm jest an ord'nary sort of girl."
"No you ain't," broke in Toby, feeling that his initial success had
put him on the top of the situation, and that he had nothing now to
fear. Besides, he really felt that Birdie was an uncommonly nice girl,
and, in a vague way, wondered he had never noticed it before.
"That you ain't," he went on emphatically. Then he added as though to
clinch his statement, "not by a sight."
This brought him to a sudden and uncomfortable stop. He knew he ought
to go on piling up compliment on compliment to make good his point.
But he had emptied his brain cells by his threefold denial, and now
found himself groping in something which was little better than a
vacuum. And in his trouble he found himself wishing he was gifted with
Sunny's wit. Wild Bill's force would have carried him through, or even
Sandy Joyce's overweening confidence would have kept his head above
water. As it was he was stuck. Hopelessly, irretrievably at the end of
his resources.
He perspired in reality now, and let his knees drop out of his arms.
This movement was his salvation. With the relaxing of his physical
effort the restraining grip upon his thinking powers gave way.
Inspiration leaped, and he found himself talking again almost before
he was aware of it.
"You're a real pretty gal, Birdie," he heard himself saying. "Now,
maybe you got some kids?" he added, with an automatic grin of
ingratiation.
How the inquiry slipped out he never knew. How it had been formulated
in his brain remained a riddle that he was never able to solve. But
there it was, plain and decided. There was no shirking it. It was out
in all its naked crudeness.
There was a moment's pause which might have been hours, it seemed so
horribly long to the waiting man. He became dimly aware of a sudden
hardening in Birdie's eyes, a mounting flush to her cheeks and
forehead, a sudden, astounding physical movement, and then the
work-worn palm of her hand came into contact with his cheek with such
force as to prove the value to her physical development of the
strenuous labors which were hers.
He never thought a woman's hand could sting so much. He never thought
that he could be made to feel so mean as this girl's sudden vehemence
made him feel.
"How dare you, you bumming remittance feller?" she cried, with eyes
blazing and bosom heaving. "How dare you--you--you--" And then she
further punished him with that worst of all feminine punishments--she
burst into tears.
The next few moments were never quite clear to the distracted and
unthinking Toby. He never really knew what actually happened. He had a
confused memory of saying things by way of apology, of making several
pacific overtures, which met with physical rebuffs of no mean order,
and tearful upbraidings which were so mixed up with choking sniffs as
to be fortunately more or less unintelligible. Finally, when he came
to his ordinary senses, and the dead level of his understanding was
fully restored, he found himself grasping the girl firmly by the
waist, her golden head lying snugly on his massive shoulder, and with
a distinct recollection of warm ripe lips many times pressed upon his
own. All of which was eminently pleasing.
When once these comfortable relations were thoroughly established, he
had no difficulty in clearing the clouds from her horizon, and
relegating her tears into the background. Her nature was of a much too
smiling order to need a great deal of coaxing. But explanation was
needed, and explanation never came easily to this stalwart dullard.
"Y'see, what I meant was," he said, with a troubled frown of intense
concentration, "maybe you know about kids. I didn't mean offense, I
sure didn't. Everybody knows our Birdie to be jest a straight,
up-standin', proper gal, who wouldn't hurt nobody, nor nuthin', 'cep'
it was a buzzin' fly around the supper hash. No feller don't take no
account o' her bein' a pot-wallopin', hash-slingin' mutton rustler. It
sure ain't no worse than ladlin' swill to prize hogs. It's jest in the
way o' business. 'Sides, she don't need to care what no fellers
thinks. She ain't stuck on men-folk wuth a cent."
"That I sure ain't," asserted a smothered voice from the bosom of his
dirty shirt.
"That you ain't," he reassured her. "You're jest a dandy gal as 'ud
make any feller with a good patch o' pay dirt a real elegant sort o'
wife."
The golden head snuggled closer into his shirt.
"You ain't got no patch o' pay dirt, Toby?" she inquired.
Toby shook his head all unsuspiciously.
"No sech luck," he asserted. Then with a sudden burst of gallantry,
"If I had I don't guess there'd be no Birdie Mason chasin' around
these parts unbespoke."
The girl's eyes developed an almost childish simplicity as they looked
up into his foolish face.
"What d'you mean?"
"Mean? Why, jest nothin', only--"
Toby laughed uneasily. And a shadow crossed Birdie's face.
"I don't guess the patch o' pay dirt matters a heap," she said, with
subtle encouragement.
"That's so," agreed Toby.
"Y'see, a gal don't marry a feller fer his patch o' pay dirt," she
went on, doing her best.
"Sure she don't."
But Toby's enthusiasm was rapidly cooling. The girl breathed a sigh of
perfect content. And her heavy breathing was fast making a moist patch
amidst the gravel stains on his shirt front.
"She jest loves a feller--"
Toby's arm slipped from her waist, and a hunted look crept into his
foolish eyes.
"An' she don't care nothin'--"
The man was suddenly seized with a racking fit of coughing, which
somehow jolted the girl into an upright position.
"Course she don't," he agreed, when his paroxysm had passed. "Say, you
don't think I got newmony?" he inquired, feeling the need for an
abrupt change of subject. "I was allus weak-chested as a kid. An'
talkin' o' kids," he hurried on, in his terror recalling the object
of his visit, "guess you ken put me wise."
"Kids? I wasn't talkin' of kids," protested the girl a little
angrily.
She was hurt. Cruelly hurt. All her best efforts had gone for nothing.
A moment before Toby had seemed so nearly hers, and now--
"No. I didn't guess you were. But--that is--you see--"
The man floundered heavily and broke off. His look was one of comical
confusion and trouble. So much so that it was too much for the girl's
good nature.
"Whose kids?" she demanded, the familiar smile creeping back into her
eyes, and her lips pursing dryly. "Yours?"
"Oh, no," denied the man quickly. "Not mine. It's Zip's. Y'see, since
his wife's lit out he's kind o' left with 'em. An' he's that
fool-headed he don't know how to raise 'em proper. So I guessed I'd
help him. Now, if you put me wise--"
"You help raise Zip's kids? Gee!" The girl slid off the table and
stood eyeing him, her woman's humor tickled to the limit.
But Toby did not realize it. He was in deadly earnest now.
"Yes," he said simply. Then, with a gleam of intelligence, "How'd you
raise 'em?"
The girl was suddenly stirred to a feeling of good-humored malice.
"How'd I raise 'em? Why, it ain't jest easy."
"It sure ain't," agreed Toby heartily. "Now, how'd you feed 'em?"
Birdie became judicially wise.
"Well," she began, "you can't jest feed 'em same as ord'nary folks.
They need speshul food. You'll need to give 'em boiled milk plain or
with pap, you kin git fancy crackers an' soak 'em. Then ther's
beef-tea. Not jest ord'nary beef-tea. You want to take a boilin' o'
bones, an' boil for three hours, an' then skim well. After that you
might let it cool some, an' then you add flavorin'. Not too much, an'
not too little, jest so's to make it elegant tastin'. Then you cook
toasties to go with it, or give 'em crackers. Serve it to 'em hot, an'
jest set around blowin' it so it don't scald their little stummicks.
Got that? You can give 'em eggs, but not too much meat. Meat well done
an' cut up wi' vegetables an' gravy, an' make 'em eat it with a spoon.
Knives is apt to cut 'em. Eggs light boiled, an' don't let 'em rub the
yolk in their hair, nor slop gravy over their bow-ties. Candy, some,
but it ain't good for their teeth, which needs seein' to by a dentist,
anyway. Say, if they're cuttin' teeth you ken let 'em chew the beef
bones, it helps 'em thro'. Fancy canned truck ain't good 'less it's
baked beans, though I 'lows beans cooked reg'lar is best. You soak 'em
twenty-four hours, an' boil 'em soft, an' see the water don't boil
away. Fruit is good if they ain't subjec' to colic, which needs
poultices o' linseed, an' truck like that. Don't let 'em eat till
they're blown up like frogs, an'--you got all that?"
"Ye-es," replied the bewildered man a little helplessly.
"Well," continued the smiling girl, "then there's their manners an'
things."
Toby nodded vaguely.
"You'll need to give 'em bed at sundown," Birdie hurried on. "An' up
at sunrise. Clothes needs washin' at least once a month--with soap.
See they says their prayers, an' bath 'em once a week reg'lar--with
soap. But do it Sundays. An' after that give 'em a Bible talk for an
hour. Then I dessay they'll need physic once a week--best give it
Saturday nights. Don't fix 'em that way same as a horse, their
stummicks ain't made of leather. You got all that?"
Toby gave a bewildered nod.
"How 'bout when they're sick?" he asked.
"Sick? Why, see they don't muss their clothes," Birdie answered
cheerfully. "Guess that's put you wise to most everything."
"Sure." Toby slid from the table, feeling dazed. Nor had he the
courage to ask any more questions. He was trying hard to fix the
salient points of the information in his whirling brain, but all he
could remember was that all washing must be done with soap, and the
children must have bones to keep their teeth right. He clung to these
things desperately, and felt that he must get away quickly before
they, too, should slip through the sieve of his memory.
"Guess I'll git along an'--an' see to things," he murmured vaguely,
without glancing in Birdie's direction. "You said beef bones?" he
added, passing a hand perplexedly across his forehead.
"Sure," smiled the girl.
"Good. Thanks." Then he moved heavily off. "Beef bones and soap--bath
an' Bible talk; beef bones an' soap--"
The girl watched him vanish behind the closing door, muttering as he
went to "see to things."
She stood for some moments where he had left her. The smile was still
in her eyes, but its humor had died out. She was unfeignedly sorry he
had gone. He was such a good-natured simpleton, she thought. A real
good-hearted sort. Just the sort to make a husband worth having. Ah,
well, he had gone! Better luck next time.
She turned away with a deep, sentimental sigh, and crossed over to the
cupboard. She drew out her work once more and again spread out the
crumpled paper pattern upon the gossamer lawn.
Yes, Toby would have suited her well. She heaved another sigh. He had
remittances from home, too. And he wouldn't be difficult to manage.
His head was rather a funny shape, and his face didn't suggest
brightness, but then--
She began to snip at the material with her rusty scissors. But just as
her mind had fully concentrated upon her task a sudden sound startled
her. She looked up, listening, and the next moment the door was flung
wide, and Sandy Joyce stood framed in the opening.