Produced by Suzanne Shell, Beginners Projects, Sankar Viswanathan
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net.
~By B. M. Bower~
* * * * *
GOOD INDIAN
THE UPHILL CLIMB
THE GRINGOS
THE RANCH AT THE WOLVERINE
THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND
JEAN OF THE LAZY A
THE PHANTOM HERD
THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX
STARR, OF THE DESERT
THE LOOKOUT MAN
[Illustration: She was, after all, the goddess she looked, he thought
whimsically. Frontispiece. _See page_ 122.]
THE LOOKOUT MAN
By B. M. Bower
WITH FRONTISPIECE BY
H. WESTON TAYLOR
BOSTON
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY
1917
Published, August, 1917
VAIL-BALLOU COMPANY
BINGHAMTON AND NEW YORK
U. S. A.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I SOME TIME!
II "THANKS FOR THE CAR"
III TO THE FEATHER RIVER COUNTRY AND FREEDOM
IV JACK FINDS HIMSELF IN POSSESSION OF A JOB
V "IT'S A LONG WAY TO TIPPERARY," SANG JACK
VI MISS ROSE FORWARD
VII GUARDIAN OF THE FORESTS
VIII IN WHICH A GIRL PLAYS BILLIARDS ON THE MOUNTAIN TOP
IX LIKE THE BOY HE WAS
X WHEN FORESTS ARE ABLAZE
XI SYMPATHY AND ADVICE
XII KATE FINDS SOMETHING TO WORRY OVER
XIII JACK SHOULD HAVE A HIDE-OUT
XIV MURPHY HAS A HUMOROUS MOOD
XV A CAVE DWELLER JACK WOULD BE
XVI MIKE GOES SPYING ON THE SPIES
XVII PENITENCE, REAL AND UNREAL
XVIII HANK BROWN PROVES THAT HE CAN READ TRACKS
XIX TROUBLE ROCKS THE PAN, LOOKING FOR GRAINS OF GOLD
XX IGNORANCE TAKES THE TRAIL OF DANGER
XXI GOLD OF REPENTANCE, SUNLIGHT OF LOVE AND A MAN GONE MAD
XXII THE MISERERE OF MOTHERHOOD
XXIII GRIEF, AND HOPE THAT DIED HARD
XXIV TROUBLE FINDS THE GOLD THAT WAS IN THEM
CHAPTER ONE
SOME TIME!
From the obscurity of vast, unquiet distance the surf came booming in
with the heavy impetus of high tide, flinging long streamers of kelp
and bits of driftwood over the narrowing stretch of sand where
garishly costumed bathers had lately shrieked hilariously at their
gambols. Before the chill wind that had risen with the turn of the
tide the bathers retreated in dripping, shivering groups, to appear
later in fluffs and furs and woollen sweaters; still inclined to
hilarity, still undeniably both to leave off their pleasuring at
Venice, dedicated to cheap pleasures.
But when the wind blew stronger and the surf boomed louder and nearer,
and the faint moon-path stretched farther and farther toward the
smudgy sky-line, city-going street-cars began to fill with sunburned
passengers, and motors began to purr out of the narrow side streets
lined with shoddy buildings which housed the summer sojourners. One
more Sunday night's revelry was tapering off into shouted farewells,
clanging gongs, honking horns and the shuffling of tired feet hurrying
homeward.
In cafes and grills and private dining rooms groups of revelers, whose
pleasures were not halted by the nickel alarm-clocks ticking
inexorably all over the city and its suburbs, still lingered long
after the masses had gone home yawning and counting the fullness of
past joys by the present extent of smarting sunblisters.
Automobiles loaded with singing passengers scurried after their own
beams of silver light down the boulevards. At first a continuous line
of speeding cars; then thinning with long gaps between; then longer
gaps with only an occasional car; then the quiet, lasting for minutes
unbroken, so that the wind could be heard in the eucalyptus trees that
here and there lined the boulevard.
After the last street-car had clanged away from the deserted
bunting-draped joy zone that now was stark and joyless, a belated
seven-passenger car, painted a rich plum color and splendid in
upholstering and silver trim, swept a long row of darkened windows
with a brush of light as it swung out from a narrow alley and went
purring down to where the asphalt shone black in the night.
Full throated laughter and a medley of shouted jibes and
current witticisms went with it. The tonneau squirmed with uproarious
youth. The revolving extra seats swung erratically, propelled by
energetic hands, while some one barked the stereotyped invitation to
the deserted scenic swing, and some one else shouted to the revolving
occupants to keep their heads level, and all the others laughed
foolishly.
The revolving ones rebelled, and in the scuffle some one lurched
forward against the driver at a critical turn in the road, throwing
him against the wheel. The big car swerved almost into the ditch, was
brought back just in the nick of time and sped on, while Death, who
had looked into that tonneau, turned away with a shrug.
The driver, bareheaded and with the wind blowing his thick mop of wavy
hair straight back from his forehead, glanced back with swift disfavor
at the scuffling bunch.
"Hey--you want to go in the ditch?" he expostulated, chewing
vigorously upon gum that still tasted sweet and full-flavored. "You
wanta cut out that rough stuff over this way!"
"_All_ right, Jackie, old boy, anything to please!" chanted the
offender, cuffing the cap off the fellow next him. "Some time," he
added with vague relish. "S-o-m-e time! What?"
"Some time is right!" came the exuberant chorus. "Hey, Jack! _u_ had
some time, all right--you and that brown-eyed queen that danced like
Mrs. Castle. Um-um! Floatin' round with your arms full of
sunshine--oh, you thought you was puttin' something over on the rest
of us--what?"
"Cut it out!" Jack retorted, flinging the words over his shoulder.
"Don't talk to me. Road's flopping around like a snake with its head
cut off--" He laughed apologetically, his eyes staring straight ahead
over the lowered windshield.
"Aw, step on her, Jack! Show some class, boy--show some class! Good
old boat! If you're too stewed to drive 'er, _e_ knows the way home.
Say, Jackie, if this old car could talk, wouldn't momma get an
ear-full on Monday, hey? What if she--"
"Cut it _out_--or I'll throw you out!" came back over Jack's
shirt-clad shoulder. He at least had the wit to use what little sense
he had in driving the car, and he had plenty of reason to believe that
he could carry out his threat, even if the boulevard did heave itself
up at him like the writhings of a great snake. If his head was not fit
for the job, his trained muscles would still drive with automatic
precision. Only his vision was clouded; not the mechanical skill
necessary to pilot his mother's big car safely into the garage.
Whim held the five in the rear seats absorbed in their own maudlin
comicalities. The fellow beside Jack did not seem to take any interest
in his surroundings, and the five gave the front seat no further
attention. Jack drove circumspectly, leaning a little forward, his
bare arms laid up across the wheel and grasping the top of it. Brown
as bronze, those arms, as were his face and neck and chest down to
where the open V of his sport shirt was held closed with the loose
knot of a crimson tie that whipped his shoulder as he drove. A fine
looking fellow he was, sitting there like the incarnation of strength
and youth and fullblooded optimism. It was a pity that he was
drunk--he would have been a perfect specimen of young manhood, else.
The young man on the front seat beside him turned suddenly on those
behind. The lower half of his face was covered with a black muffler.
He had a gun, and he "cut down" on the group with disconcerting
realism.
"Hands up!" he intoned fearsomely. "I am the mysterious lone bandit of
the boulevards. Your jewels are the price of your lives!" The
six-shooter wavered, looking bleakly at one and then another.
After the first stunned interval, a shout of laughter went up from
those behind. "Good! Good idea!" one approved. And another, having some
familiarity with the mechanics of screen melodrama, shouted, "Camera!"
"Lone bandit nothing! We're _all_ mysterious auto bandits out seeking
whom we may devour!" cried a young man with a naturally attractive
face and beautiful teeth, hastily folding his handkerchief cornerwise
for a mask, and tying it behind his head--to the great discomfort of
his neighbors, who complained bitterly at having their eyes jabbed out
with his elbows.
The bandit play caught the crowd. For a few tumultuous minutes elbows
were up, mufflers and handkerchiefs flapping. There emerged from the
confusion six masked bandits, and three of them flourished
six-shooters with a recklessness that would have given a Texas man
cold chills down his spine. Jack, not daring to take his eyes off the
heaving asphalt, or his hands off the wheel, retained his natural
appearance until some generous soul behind him proceeded, in spite of
his impatient "Cut it out, fellows!" to confiscate his flapping, red
tie and bind it across his nose; which transformed Jack Corey into a
speeding fiend, if looks meant anything. Thereafter they threw
themselves back upon the suffering upholstery and commented gleefully
upon their banditish qualifications.
That grew tame, of course. They thirsted for mock horrors,
and two glaring moons rising swiftly over a hill gave the
psychological fillip to their imaginations.
"Come on-let's hold 'em up!" cried the young man on the front seat.
"Naw-I'll tell you! Slow down, Jack, and everybody keep your faces
shut. When we're just past I'll shoot down at the ground by a hind
wheel. Make 'em think they've got a blowout--get the idea?"
"Some idea!" promptly came approval, and the six subsided immediately.
The coming car neared swiftly, the driver shaving as close to the
speed limit as he dared. Unsuspectingly he swerved to give plenty of
space in passing, and as he did so a loud bang startled him. The brake
squealed as he made an emergency stop. "Blowout, by thunder!" they
heard him call to his companions, as he piled out and ran to the wheel
he thought had suffered the accident.
Jack obligingly slowed down so that the six, leaning far out and
craning back at their victims, got the full benefit of their joke.
When he sped on they fell back into their seats and howled with glee.
It was funny. They laughed and slapped one another on the backs, and
the more they laughed the funnier it seemed. They rocked with mirth,
they bounced up and down on the cushions and whooped.
All but Jack. He kept his eyes on the still-heaving asphalt, and
chewed gum and grinned while he drove, with the persistent sensation
that he was driving a hydro-aeroplane across a heaving ocean. Still,
he knew what the fellows were up to, and he was perfectly willing to
let them have all the fun they wanted, so long as they didn't
interfere with his driving.
In the back of his mind was a large, looming sense of responsibility
for the car. It was his mother's car, and it was new and shiny, and
his mother liked to drive flocks of fluttery, middle-aged ladies to
benefit teas and the like. It had taken a full hour of coaxing to get
the car for the day, and Jack knew what would be the penalty if
anything happened to mar its costly beauty. A scratch would be almost
as much as his life was worth. He hoped dazedly that the fellows would
keep their feet off the cushions, and that they would refrain from
kicking the back seat.
Mrs. Singleton Corey was a large, firm woman who wore her white hair
in a marcelled pompadour, and frequently managed to have a flattering
picture of herself in the Sunday papers--on the
Society-and-Club-Doings page, of course. She figured prominently in
civic betterment movements, and was loud in her denunciation of Sunday
dances and cabarets and the frivolities of Venice and lesser beach
resorts. She did a lot of worrying over immodest bathing suits, and
never went near the beach except as a member of a purity committee, to
see how awfully young girls behaved in those public places.
She let Jack have the car only because she believed that he was going
to take a party of young Christian Endeavorers up Mount Wilson to view
the city after dark. She could readily apprehend that such a sight
might be inspiring, and that it would act as a spur upon the worthy
ambitions of the young men, urging them to great achievements. Mrs.
Singleton Corey had plenty of enthusiasm for the betterment of young
lives, but she had a humanly selfish regard for the immaculateness of
her new automobile, and she feared that the roads on the mountain
might be very dusty and rough, and that overhanging branches might
snag the top. Jack had to promise that he would be very careful of
overhanging branches.
Poor lady, she never dreamed that her son was out at Venice gamboling
on the beach with bold hussies in striped bathing trunks and no
skirts; fox-trotting with a brown-eyed imp from the telephone office,
and drinking various bottled refreshments--carousing shamelessly, as
she would have said of a neighbor's son--or that, at one-thirty in the
morning, he was chewing a strong-flavored gum to kill the odor of
alcohol.
She was not sitting up waiting for him and wondering why he did not
come. Jack had been careful to impress upon her that the party might
want to view the stars until very late, and that he, of course, could
not hurry them down from the mountain top.
You will see then why Jack was burdened with a sense of deep
responsibility for the car, and why he drove almost as circumspectly
as if he were sober, and why he would not join in the hilarity of the
party.
"Hist! Here comes a flivver!" warned the young man on the front seat,
waving his revolver backward to impress silence on the others. "Let's
_all_ shoot! Make 'em think they've run into a mess of tacks!"
"Aw, take a wheel off their tin wagon!" a laughter-hoarse voice
bettered the plan.
"Hold 'em up and take a nickel off 'em--if they carry that much on
their persons after dark," another suggested.
"You're on, bo! This is a hold-up. Hist!"
A hold-up they proceeded to make it. They halted the little car with a
series of explosions as it passed. The driver was alone, and as he
climbed out to inspect his tires, he confronted what looked to his
startled eyes like a dozen masked men. Solemnly they went through his
pockets while he stood with his hands high above him. They took his
half-plug of chewing tobacco and a ten-cent stick-pin from his tie,
and afterwards made him crank his car and climb back into the seat and
go on. He went--with the throttle wide open and the little car loping
down the boulevard like a scared pup.
"Watch him went!" shrieked one they called Hen, doubling himself
together in a spasm of laughter.
"'He was--here--when we _started_, b-but he was--gone--when we got
th'ough!'" chanted another, crudely imitating a favorite black-faced
comedian.
Jack, one arm thrown across the wheel, leaned out and looked back,
grinning under the red band stretched across the middle of his face.
"Ah, pile in!" he cried, squeezing his gum between his teeth and
starting the engine. "He might come back with a cop."
That tickled them more than ever. They could hardly get back into the
car for laughing. "S-o-m-e little bandits!--what?" they asked one
another over and over again.
"S-o-m-e little bandits is--right!" the approving answer came
promptly.
"S-o-m-e _time_, bo, s-o-m-e _time!_" a drink-solemn voice croaked in
a corner of the big seat.
Thus did the party of Christian Endeavorers return sedately from their
trip to Mount Wilson.
CHAPTER TWO
"THANKS FOR THE CAR"
They held up another car with two men in it, and robbed them of
insignificant trifles in what they believed to be a most ludicrous
manner. Afterward they enjoyed prolonged spasms of mirth, their
cachinnations carrying far out over the flat lands disturbing
inoffensive truck gardeners in their sleep. They cried "S-o-m-e time!"
so often that the phrase struck even their fuddled brains as being
silly.
They met another car--a large car with three women in the tonneau.
These, evidently, were home-going theatre patrons who had indulged
themselves in a supper afterwards. They were talking quietly as they
came unsuspectingly up to the big, shiny machine that was traveling
slowly townward, and they gave it no more than a glance as they
passed.
Then came the explosion, that sounded surprisingly like a blowout. The
driver stopped and got out to look for trouble, his companion at his
heels. They confronted six masked men, three of them displaying
six-shooters.
"Throw up your hands!" commanded a carefully disguised voice.
The driver obeyed--but his right hand came up with an automatic pistol
in it. He fired straight into the bunch--foolishly, perhaps; at any
rate harmlessly, though they heard the bullet sing as it went by.
Startled, one of the six fired back impulsively, and the other two
followed his example. Had they tried to kill, in the night and drunk
as they were, they probably would have failed; but firing at random,
one bullet struck flesh. The man with the automatic flinched backward,
reeled forward drunkenly and went down slowly, his companion grasping
futilely at his slipping body.
"Hey, you darn mutts, whatcha shootin' for? Hell of a josh, that is!"
Jack shouted angrily and unguardedly. "Cut that out and pile in here!"
While the last man was clawing in through the door, Jack let in the
clutch, slamming the gear-lever from low to high and skipping
altogether the intermediate. The big car leaped forward and Hen bit
his tongue so that it bled. Behind them was confused shouting.
"Better go back and help--what? You hit one," Jack suggested over his
shoulder, slowing down as reason cooled his first hot impulse for
flight.
"Go back _nothing!_ And let 'em get our number? Nothing doing!"
"Aw, that mark that was with him took it. I saw him give it the
once-over when he came back."
"He did not!" some one contradicted hotly. "He was too scared."
"Well, do we go back?" Jack was already edging the car to the right so
that he would have room for a turn.
"No! Step on 'er! Let 'er out, why don't yuh? Damn it, what yuh
killin' time for? Yuh trying to throw us down? Want that guy to call a
cop and pinch the outfit? Fine pal you are! We've got to beat it while
the beatin's good. Go on, Jack--that's a good boy. Step on 'er!"
With all that tumult of urging, Jack went on, panic again growing
within him as the car picked up speed. The faster he went the faster
he wanted to go. His foot pressed harder and harder on the
accelerator. He glanced at the speedometer, saw it flirting with the
figures forty-five, and sent that number off the dial and forced fifty
and then sixty into sight. He rode the wheel, holding the great car
true as a bullet down the black streak of boulevard that came sliding
to meet him like a wide belt between whirring wheels.
The solemn voice that had croaked "S-o-m-e time!" so frequently,
took to monotonous, recriminating speech. "No-body home!
No-body home! Had to spill the beans, you simps! Nobody home a-tall!
Had to shoot a man--got us all in wrong, you simps! Nobody home!" He
waggled his head and flapped his hands in drunken self-righteousness,
because he had not possessed a gun and therefore could not have
committed the blunder of shooting the man.
"Aw, can that stuff! You're as much to blame as anybody," snapped the
man nearest him, and gave the croaker a vicious jab with his elbow.
"Don't believe that guy got hep to our number! Didn't have time," an
optimist found courage to declare.
"What darn fool was it that shot first? Oughta be crowned for that!"
"Aw, the boob started it himself! He fired on us--and we were only
joshing!"
"He got his, all right!"
"Don't believe we killed him--sure, he was more scared than hurt," put
in the optimist dubiously.
"No-body home," croaked the solemn one again, having recovered his
breath.
They wrangled dismally and unconvincingly together, but no one put
into speech the fear that rode them hard. Fast as Jack drove, they
kept urging him to "Step on 'er!" A bottle that had been circulating
intermittently among the crowd was drained and thrown out on the
boulevard, there to menace the tires of other travelers. The keen wind
whipped their hot faces and cleared a little their fuddled senses, now
that the bottle was empty. A glimmer of caution prompted Jack to drive
around through Beverly Hills and into Sunset Boulevard, when he might
have taken a shorter course home. It would be better, he thought, to
come into town from another direction, even if it took them longer to
reach home. He was careful to keep on a quiet residence street when he
passed through. Hollywood, and he turned at Vermont Avenue and drove
out into Griffith Park, swung into a crossroad and came out on a road
from Glendale. He made another turn or two, and finally slid into Los
Angeles on the main road from Pasadena, well within the speed limit
and with his heart beating a little nearer to normal.
"We've been to Mount Wilson, fellows. Don't forget that," he warned
his passengers. "Stick to it. If they got our number back there we can
bluff them into thinking they got it wrong. I'll let yuh out here and
you can walk home. Mum's the word--get that?"
He had taken only a passive part in the egregious folly of their play,
but they climbed out now without protest, subdued and willing to own
his leadership. Perhaps they realized suddenly that he was the
soberest man of the lot. Only once had he drunk on the way home, and
that sparingly, when the bottle had made the rounds. Like whipped
schoolboys the six slunk off to their homes, and as they disappeared,
Jack felt as though the full burden of the senseless crime had been
dropped crushingly upon his shoulders.
He drove the big car quietly up the palm-shaded street to where his
mother's wide-porched bungalow sprawled across two lots. He was sober
now, for the tragedy had shocked him into clear thinking. He shivered
when he turned in across the cement walk and slid slowly down the
driveway to the garage. He climbed stiffly out, rolled the big doors
shut, turned on the electric lights and then methodically switched off
the lights of the car. He looked at the clock imbedded in the
instrument board and saw that it lacked twenty minutes of three. It
would soon be daylight. It seemed to him that there was a good deal to
be done before daylight.
Preoccupiedly he took a big handful of waste and began to polish the
hood and fenders of the car. His mother would want to drive, and she
always made a fuss if he left any dust to dim its glossy splendor. He
walked around behind and contemplated the number plate, wondering if
the man who was said to be "hep" would remember that there were three
ciphers together. He might see only two--being in a hurry and excited.
He rubbed the plate thoughtfully, trying to guess just how that
number, 170007, would look to a stranger who was excited by being shot
at.
No use doctoring the number now. If the man had it, he had it--and it
was easy enough to find the car that carried it. Easy enough, too, to
prove who was in the car. Jack had named every one of the fellows who
were to make up the party. He had to, before his mother would let him
take the car. The names were just names to her--since she believed
that they were Christian young men!--but she had insisted upon knowing
who was going, and she would remember them. She had a memory like
glue. She would also give the names to any officer that asked. Jack
knew that well enough. For, besides having a memory that would never
let go, Mrs. Singleton Corey had a conscience that was inexorable
toward the faults of others. She would consider it her duty as a
Christian woman and the president of the Purity League to hand those
six young men over to the law. That she had been deceived as to their
morals would add fire to her fervor.
Whether she would hand Jack over with them was a detail which did not
greatly concern her son. He believed she would do it, if thereby she
might win the plaudits of her world as a mother martyred to her fine
sense of duty. Jack had lived with his mother for twenty-two years,
and although he was very much afraid of her, he felt that he had no
illusions concerning Mrs. Singleton Corey. He felt that she would
sacrifice nearly everything to her greed for public approbation.
Whether she would sacrifice her pride of family--twist it into a lofty
pride of duty--he did not know. There are queer psychological quirks
which may not be foreseen by youth.
Looking back on the whole sickening affair while he sat on the running
board and smoked a cigarette, Jack could not see how his mother could
consistently avoid laying him on the altar of justice. He had driven
the party, and he had stopped the car for them to play their damnable
joke. The law would call him an accomplice, he supposed. His mother
could not save him, unless she pleaded well the excuse that he had
been led astray by evil companions. In lesser crises, Jack remembered
that she had played successfully that card. She might try it now....
On the other hand, she might make a virtue of necessity and volunteer
the information that he had in the first place lied about their
destination. That, he supposed, would imply a premeditated plan of
holding up automobiles. She might wash her hands of him altogether.
He could see her doing that, too. He could, in fact, see Mrs.
Singleton Corey doing several things that would work him ill and
redound to her glory. What he could not see was a mother who would
cling to him and cry over him and for him, and stick by him, just
because she loved him.
"Aw, what's the use? It'll come out--it can't help it. The cops are
out there smelling around now, I bet!"
He arose and worked over the car until it shone immaculately. A
lifetime of continual nagging over little things, while the big things
had been left to adjust themselves, had fixed upon Jack the habit of
attending first to his mother's whims. Mrs. Singleton Corey made it a
point to drive her own car. She liked the feeling of power that it
gave her, and she loved the flattery of her friends. Therefore, even a
murder problem must wait until her automobile was beautifully ready to
back out of the garage into a critical world.
Jack gave a sigh of relief when he wiped his hands on the bunch of
waste and tossed it into a tin can kept for that purpose. Time was
precious to him just now. Any minute might bring the police. Jack did
not feel that he was to blame for what had happened, but he realized
keenly that he was "in wrong" just the same, and he had no intention
of languishing heroically in jail if he could possibly keep out of it.
He hesitated, and finally he went to the house and let himself in
through a window whose lock he had "doctored" months ago. His mother
would not let him have a key. She believed that being compelled to
ring the bell and awaken her put the needful check upon Jack's habits;
that, in trailing downstairs in a silk kimono to receive him and his
explanation of his lateness, she was fulfilling her duty as a mother.
Jack nearly always humored her in this delusion, and his explanations
were always convincing. But he was not prepared to make any just now.
He crawled into the sun parlor, took off his shoes and slipped down
the hall and up the stairs to his room. There he rummaged through his
closet and got out a khaki outing suit and hurried his person into it.
In ten minutes he looked more like an overgrown boy scout than
anything else. He took a cased trout rod and fly book, stuffed an
extra shirt and all the socks he could find into his canvas creel,
slung a pair of wading boots over his shoulder and tiptoed to the
door.
There it occurred to him that it wouldn't be a bad idea to have some
money. He went back to his discarded trousers, that lay in a heap on
the floor, and by diligent search he collected two silver dollars and
a few nickels and dimes and quarters--enough to total two dollars and
eighty-five cents. He looked at the meagre fund ruefully, rubbed his
free hand over his hair and was reminded of something else. His hair,
wavy and trained to lie back from his forehead, made him easily
remembered by strangers. He took his comb and dragged the whole heavy
mop down over his eyebrows, and parted it in the middle and plastered
it down upon his temples, trying to keep the wave out of it.
He looked different when he was through; and when he had pulled a
prim, stiff-brimmed, leather-banded sombrero well down toward his
nose, he could find the heart to grin at his reflection.
The money problem returned to torment him. Of what use was this
preparation, unless he had some real money to use with it? He took off
his shoes again, and his hat; pulled on his bathrobe over the khaki
and went out and across to his mother's room.
Mrs. Singleton Corey had another illusion among her collection of
illusions about herself. She believed that she was a very light
sleeper; that the slightest noise woke her, and that she would then
lie for hours wide-eyed. Indeed she frequently declared that she did
her best mental work during "the sleepless hours of the night."
However that might be, she certainly was asleep when Jack pushed open
her door. She lay on her back with her mouth half open, and she was
snoring rhythmically, emphatically--as one would hardly believe it
possible for a Mrs. Singleton Corey to snore. Jack looked at her
oddly, but his eyes went immediately to her dresser and the purse
lying where she had carelessly laid it down on coming home from one of
her quests for impurity which she might purify.
She had a little more than forty-two dollars in her purse, and Jack
took all of it and went back to his room. There, he issued a check to
her for that amount--unwittingly overdrawing his balance at the bank
to do so--and wrote this note to his mother:
"Dear Mother:
"I borrowed some money from you, and I am leaving this check to cover
the amount. I am going on a fishing trip. Maybe to Mexico where dad
made his stake. Thanks for the car today.
"Your son,
"Jack."
He took check and note to her room and placed them on her purse to the
tune of her snoring, looked at her with a certain wistfulness for the
mothering he had never received from her, and went away.
He climbed out of the house as he had climbed in, and cut across lots
until he had reached a street some distance from his own neighborhood.
Then keeping carefully in the shadows, he took the shortest route to
the S.P. depot. An early car clanged toward him, but he waited in a
dark spot until it had passed and then hurried on. He passed an
all-night taxi stand in front of a hotel, but he did not disturb the
sleepy drivers. So by walking every step of the way, he believed that
he had reached the depot unnoticed, just when daylight was upon him
with gray wreaths of fog.
By the depot clock it was five minutes to five. A train was being
called, and the sing-song chant informed him that it was bound for
"Sa-anta Bar-bra--Sa-an Louis Oh bispo--Sa-linas--Sa-an 'Osay--Sa-an
Fransisco, and a-a-ll points north!"
Jack, with his rubber boots flapping on his back, took a run and a
slide to the ticket window and bought a ticket for San Francisco,
thinking rather feverishly of the various points north.
CHAPTER THREE
TO THE FEATHER RIVER COUNTRY AND FREEDOM
In the chair car, where he plumped himself into a seat just as the
train began to creep forward, Jack pulled his hat down over his
eyebrows and wondered if any one had recognized him while he was
getting on the train. He could not tell, because he had not dared to
seem anxious about it, and so had not looked around him. At any rate
he had not been stopped, though the police could wire ahead and have
him dragged off the train at any station they pleased. Panic once more
caught him and he did not dare look up when the conductor came for his
ticket, but held his breath until the gloomy, haggard-faced man had
tagged him and passed on. Until the train had passed Newhall and was
rattling across the flat country to the coast, he shivered when any
one passed down the aisle.
Beyond San Francisco lay the fog bank of the unknown. With his fishing
outfit he could pass unquestioned to any part of that mysterious,
vague region known as Northern California. The Russian River country,
Tahoe, Shasta Springs, Feather River--the names revolved teasingly
through Jack's mind. He did not know anything about them, beyond the
fact that they were places where fellows went for sport, and that he
hoped people would think he went for sport also. His wading boots and
his rod and creel would, he hoped, account for any haste he might
betray in losing himself somewhere.
Lose himself he must. If he did not, if his mother got the chance to
put him through the tearful third-degree system that women employ with
such deadly certainty of success, Jack knew that he would tell all
that he knew--perhaps more. The very least he could hope to reveal was
the damning fact that he had not been to Mount Wilson that day. After
that the rest would not need to be told. They could patch up the
evidence easily enough.
He tried to forget that man slipping down in the embrace of his
friend. It was too horrible to be true. It must have been a trick just
to scare the boys. The world was full of joshers--Jack knew half a
dozen men capable of playing that trick, just to turn the joke. For a
few minutes he was optimistic, almost making himself believe that the
man had not been shot, after all. The fading effect of the wines he
had drunk sent his mood swinging from the depths of panicky anguish
over the horrible affair, to a senseless optimism that refused to see
disaster when it stood by his side.
He tried again to decide where he should go from San Francisco. He
tried to remember all that he had ever heard about the various
paradises for sportsmen, and he discovered that he could not remember
anything except that they were all in the mountains, and that Tahoe
was a big lake, and lots of people went there in the summer. He
crossed Tahoe off the list, because he did not want to land in some
fashionable resort and bump into some one he knew. Besides, thirty-one
dollars would not last long at a summer resort--and he remembered he
would not have thirty-one dollars when he landed; he would have what
was left after he had paid his fare from San Francisco, and had eaten
once or twice.
Straightway he became hungry, perhaps because a porter came down the
aisle announcing the interesting fact that breakfast was now being
served in the diner--fourth car rear. Jack felt as though he could
eat about five dollars' worth of breakfast. He was only a month or so
past twenty-two, remember, and he himself had not committed any crime
save the crime of foolishness.
He slid farther down upon his spine, pulled his nice new sombrero
lower on the bridge of his tanned nose, and tried to forget that back
there in the diner they would give him grapefruit on ice, and after
that rolled oats with thick yellow cream, and after that ham and eggs
or a tenderloin steak or broiled squab on toast; and tried to remember
only that the check would make five dollars look sick. He wished he
knew how much the fare would be to some of those places where he meant
to lose himself. With all that classy-looking paraphernalia he would
not dare attempt to beat his way on a freight. He had a keen sense of
relative values; dressed as he was he must keep "in the part." He must
be able to show that he had money. He sighed heavily and turned his
back definitely upon a dining-car breakfast. After that he went to
sleep.
At noon he was awake and too ravenous to worry so much over the
possibility of being arrested for complicity in a murder. He collided
violently with the porter who came down the aisle announcing luncheon.
He raced back through two chair cars and a tourist sleeper, and he
entered the dining car with an emphasis that kept the screen door
swinging for a full half minute. He tipped the waiter who came to fill
his water glass, and told him to wake up and show some speed. Any
waiter will wake up for half a dollar, these hard times. This one
stood looking down over Jack's shoulder while he wrote, so that he was
back with the boullion before Jack had reached the bottom of the
order blank--which is the reason why you have not read anything about
a certain young man dying of starvation while seated at table number
five in a diner, somewhere in the neighborhood of Paso Robles.
When he returned to his place in the chair car he knew he must try to
find out what isolated fishing country was closest. So he fraternized
with the "peanut butcher," if you know who he is: the fellow who is
put on trains to pester passengers to death with all sorts of readable
and eatable indigestibles.
He bought two packages of gum and thereby won favor. Then,
nonchalantly picking up his wading boots and placing them in a
different position, he casually asked the boy how the fishing was, up
this way. The peanut butcher balanced his tray of chewing gum and
candy on the arm of a vacant chair beside Jack, and observed
tentatively that it was fine, and that Jack must be going fishing.
Jack confessed that such was his intention, and the vender of
things-you-never-want made a shrewd guess at his destination.
"Going up into the Feather River country, I bet. Fellow I know just
come back. Caught the limit, he claims. They say Lake Almanor has got
the best fishing in the State, right now. Fellow I know seen a
ten-pounder pulled outa there. He brought back one himself that tipped
the scales at seven-and-a-half. He says a pound is about as small as
they run up there. I'm going to try to get on the W.P. that runs up
the canyon. Then some day I'll drop off and try my luck--"
"Don't run to Lake Almanor, does it? First I ever heard--"
"No, sure it don't! The lake's away off the railroad--thirty or forty
miles. I don't look for a chance to go _there_ fishing. I mean Feather
River--anywhere along up the canyon. They say it's great. You can sure
catch fish! Lots of little creeks coming down outa the canyon, and all
of them full of trout. You'll have all kinds of sport."
"Aw, Russian River's the place to go," Jack dissented craftily, and
got the reply that he was waiting for.
"Aw, what's the use of going away up there? And not get half the fish?
Why, you can take the train at the ferry and in the morning you are
right in the middle of the best fishing in the State. Buh-lieve _me_,
it'll be Feather River for mine, if I can make the change I want to!
Them that have got the money to travel on, can take the far-off
places--me for the fish, bo, every day in the week." He took up his
tray and went down the car, offering his wares to the bored, frowsy
passengers who wanted only to reach journey's end.
The next round he made, he stopped again beside Jack. They talked of
fishing--Jack saw to that!--and Jack learned that Lake Almanor was
nothing more nor less than an immense reservoir behind a great dam put
in by a certain power company at a cost that seemed impossible. The
reservoir had been made by the simple process of backing up the water
over a large mountain valley. You could look across the lake and see
Mount Lassen as plain as the nose on your face, the peanut butcher
declared relishfully. And the trout in that artificial lake passed all
belief.
Every time the boy passed, he stopped for a few remarks. Pound by
pound the trout in Lake Almanor grew larger. Sentence by sentence Jack
learned much that was useful, a little that was needful. There were
several routes to Lake Almanor, for instance. One could get in by way
of Chico, but the winter snow had not left the high summits, so that
route was unfeasible for the time being. The best way just now was by
the way of Quincy, a little town up near the head of Feather River
Canyon. The fare was only seven or eight dollars, and since the season
had opened one could get reduced rates for the round trip. That was
the way the friend of the peanut butcher had gone in--only he had
stopped off at Keddie and had gone up to the dam with a fellow he knew
that worked there. And he had brought back a trout that weighed
practically eight pounds, dressed. The peanut butcher knew; he had
seen it with his own eyes. They had it hanging in the window of the
California Market, and there was a crowd around the window all the
time. He knew; he had seen the crowd, and he had seen the fish; and he
knew the fellow who had caught it.
Unless he could go with a crowd, Jack did not care much about fishing.
He liked the fun the gang could have together in the wilds, but that
was all; like last summer when Hen had run into the hornet's nest
hanging on a bush and thought it was an oriole's basket! Alone and
weighed down with horror as he was, Jack could not stir up any
enthusiasm for the sport. But he found out that it would not cost much
to reach the little town called Quincy, of which he had never before
heard.
No one, surely, would ever think of looking there for him. He could
take the evening train out of San Francisco, and in the morning he
would be there. And if he were not sufficiently lost in Quincy, he
could take to the mountains all around. There were mountains, he
guessed from what the boy had told him; and canyons and heavy timber.
The thought of having some definite, attainable goal cheered him so
much that he went to sleep again, sitting hunched down in the seat
with his hat over his eyes, so that no one could see his face; and
since no one but the man who sold it had ever seen him in that sport
suit, he felt almost safe.
He left the train reluctantly at the big, new station in San
Francisco, and took a street car to the ferry depot. There he kept out
of sight behind a newspaper in the entrance to the waiting room until
he was permitted to pass through the iron gate to the big, resounding
room where passengers for the train ferry were herded together like
corralled sheep. It seemed very quiet there, to be the terminal
station in a large city.
Jack judged nervously that people did not flock to the best fishing in
the State, in spite of all the peanut butcher had told him. He was
glad of that, so long as he was not so alone as to be conspicuous.
Aside from the thin sprinkling of passengers, everything was just as
the boy had told him. He was ferried in a big, empty boat across the
darkling bay to the train that stood backed down on the mole waiting
for him and the half dozen other passengers. He chose the rear seat in
another chair car very much like the one he had left, gave up his
ticket and was tagged, pulled his hat down over his nose and slept
again, stirring now and then because of his cramped legs.
When he awoke finally it was daylight, and the train was puffing into
a tunnel. He could see the engine dive into the black hole, dragging
the coaches after it like the tail of a snake. When they emerged,
Jack looked down upon a green-and-white-scurrying river; away down--so
far that it startled him a little. And he looked up steep pine-clad
slopes to the rugged peaks of the mountains. He heaved a sigh of
relief. Surely no one could possibly find him in a place like this.
After a while he was told to change for Quincy, and descended into a
fresh, green-and-blue world edged with white clouds. There was no
town--nothing but green hills and a deep-set, unbelievable valley
floor marked off with fences, and a little yellow station with a red
roof, and a toy engine panting importantly in front of its one tiny
baggage-and-passenger coach, with a freight car for ballast.
Jack threw back his shoulders and took a long, deep, satisfying
breath. He looked around him gloatingly and climbed into the little
make-believe train, and smiled as he settled back in a seat. There was
not another soul going to Quincy that morning, save the conductor and
engineer. The conductor looked at his passenger as boredly as the wife
of a professional humorist looks at her husband, took his ticket and
left him.
Jack lighted a cigarette and blew the smoke out of the open window
while the little train bore him down through the green forest into the
valley. He was in a new world. He was safe here--he was lost.
CHAPTER FOUR
JACK FINDS HIMSELF IN POSSESSION OF A JOB
Writing his name on the hotel register was an embarrassing ceremony
that had not occurred to Jack until he walked up the steps and into
the bare little office. Some instinct of pride made him shrink from
taking a name that did not belong to him, and he was afraid to write
his own in so public a place. So he ducked into the dining room whence
came the muffled clatter of dishes and an odor of fried beefsteak, as
a perfectly plausible means of dodging the issue for a while.
He ate as slowly as he dared and as long as he could swallow, and when
he left was lucky enough to find the office occupied only by a big
yellow cat curled up on the desk with the pen between its paws. It
seemed a shame to disturb the cat. He went by it on his toes and
passed on down the steps and into the full face of the town lying
there cupped in green hills and with a sunshiny quiet that made the
world seem farther away than ever.
A couple of men were walking down the street and stopping now and then
to talk to those they met. Jack followed aimlessly, his hands in his
pockets, his new Stetson--that did not look so unusual here in
Quincy--pulled well down over his eyebrows and giving his face an
unaccustomed look of purposefulness. Those he met carried letters and
papers in their hands; those he followed went empty handed, so Jack
guessed that he was observing the regular morning pilgrimage to the
postoffice--which, had he only known it, really begins the day in
Quincy.
He did not expect any mail, of course; but there seemed nothing else
for him to do, no other place for him to go; and he was afraid that if
he stayed around the hotel some one might ask him to register. He
went, therefore, to the postoffice and stood just outside the door
with his hands still in his pockets and the purposeful look on his
face; whereas no man was ever more completely adrift and purposeless
than was Jack Corey. Now that he had lost himself from the
world--buried himself up here in these wonderfully green mountains
where no one would ever think of looking for him--there seemed nothing
at all to do. He did not even want to go fishing. And as for
journeying on to that lake which the peanut butcher had talked so much
about, Jack had never for one minute intended going there.
A tall man with shrewd blue eyes twinkling behind goldrimmed glasses
came out and stood in the pleasant warmth of the sun. He had a lot of
mail under his arm and a San Francisco paper spread before him. Jack
slanted a glance or two toward the paper, and at the second glance he
gulped.
"Los Angeles Auto Bandits Trailed" stared out at him accusingly like a
pointed finger. Underneath, in smaller type, that was black as the
meaning that it bore for him, were the words: "Sensational
Developments Expected."
Jack did not dare look again, lest he betray to the shrewd eyes behind
the glasses a guilty interest in the article. He took his cigarette
from his mouth and moistened his lips, and tried to hide the trembling
of his fingers by flicking off the ash. As soon as he dared he walked
on down the street, and straightway found that he was walking himself
out of town altogether. He turned his head and looked back, saw the
tall man glancing after him, and went on briskly, with some effort
holding himself back from running like a fool. He felt that he had
blundered in coming down this way, where there was nothing but a
blacksmith shop and a few small cottages set in trim lawns. The tall
man would know that he had no business down here, and he would wonder
who he was and what he was after. And once that tall man began to
wonder....
"Auto Bandits Trailed!" seemed to Jack to be painted on his back.
That headline must mean him, because he did not believe that any of
the others would think to get out of town before daylight as he had
done. Probably that article had Jack's description in it.
He no longer felt that he had lost himself; instead, he felt trapped
by the very mountains that five minutes ago had seemed so like a
sheltering wall between him and his world. He wanted to get into the
deepest forest that clothed their sides; he wanted to hide in some
remote canyon.
He turned his head again and looked back. A man was coming behind him
down the pathway which served as a pavement. He thought it was the
tall man who had been reading about him in the paper, and again panic
seized him--only now he had but his two feet to carry him away into
safety, instead of his mother's big new car. He glanced at the houses
like a harried animal seeking desperately for some hole to crawl into,
and he saw that the little, square cottage that he had judged to be a
dwelling, was in reality a United States Forest Service headquarters.
He had only the haziest idea of what that meant, but at least it was a
public office, and it had a door which he could close between himself
and the man that followed.