THE OPTION
Vivian count stood on the first hill. The brick walls of the business
center filled the levels below, and Mrs. Weatherbee's windows, like
Tisdale's, commanded the inner harbor rimmed by Duwamish Head, with a
broader sweep of the Sound beyond framed in wooded islands and the
snow-peaks of the Olympic Peninsula. Southeastward, from her alcove, lifted
the matchless, solitary crest of Rainier. It was the morning following the
cruise on the _Aquila_, and Mrs. Weatherbee was taking a light breakfast
in her room. The small table, placed near an open casement, allowed her to
enjoy both views. She inhaled the salt breeze with the gentle pleasure of
a woman whose sense has been trained, through generations, to fine and
delicate perfumes; her eyes caught the sapphire sparkle of the sea, and
her face had the freshness and warmth of a very young girl's. The elbow
length of the sleeve exposed a forearm beautifully molded, with the
velvety firmness of a child's; and the wistaria shade of her empire gown
intensified the blue tones in the dark masses of her hair. In short, she
stood for all that is refined, bright, charming in womanhood; and not for
any single type, but a blending of the best in several; the "typical
American beauty" that Miles Feversham had named her.
Her glance moved slowly among the shipping. The great steamship leaving
the Great Northern docks was the splendid liner _Minnesota_, sailing for
Japan; the outbound freighter, laden to the gunwales and carrying a
deckload of lumber, was destined for Prince William Sound. She represented
Morganstein interests. And when her eyes moved farther, in the direction
of the Yacht Club, there again was the _Aquila_, the largest speck in the
moored fleet. A shadow crossed her face. She rose and, turning from the
windows, stood taking an inventory that began with the piano, a Steinway
mellowed by age, and ended at a quaint desk placed against the opposite
wall. It was very old; it had been brought in her great-grandfather's time
from Spain, and the carving, Moorish in design, had often roused the
enthusiastic comment of her friends. Appraising it, her brows ruffled a
little; the short upper lip met the lower in a line of resolve. She went
to her telephone and found in the directory the number of a dealer in
curios. But as she reached for the receiver, she was interrupted by a
knock and, closing the book hastily, put it down to open the door.
A bell-boy stood holding a rare scarlet azalea in full flower. In its
jardiniere of Satsuma ware it was all his arms could compass, and a second
boy followed with the costly Japanese stand that accompanied it. There was
no need to read the name on the card tied conspicuously among the stiff
leaves. The gift was from Frederic Morganstein. It had arrived, doubtless,
on an Oriental steamer that had docked the previous evening while the
_Aquila_ made her landing. Mrs. Weatherbee had the plant placed where the
sunshine reached it through the window of the alcove, and it made a gay
showing against the subdued gray of the walls. Involuntarily her glance
moved from it to the harbor, seeking the _Minnesota_, now under full
headway off Magnolia Bluff. It was as though, in that moment, her
imagination out-traveled the powerful liner, and she saw before her that
alluring country set on the farther rim of the Pacific.
The steamship passed from sight; she turned from the window. The boy had
taken away the breakfast tray and had left a box on the table. It was
modest, violet-colored, with Hollywood Gardens stamped on the cover, but
she hurried with an incredulous expectancy to open it. For an instant the
perfume seemed to envelop her, then she lifted the green waxed paper, and
a soft radiance shone in her face. It was only a corsage bouquet, but the
violets, arranged with a few fronds of maidenhair, were delightfully
fresh. She took them out carefully. For a moment she held them to her
cheek. But she did not fasten them on her gown; instead she filled a
cut-glass bowl with water and set them at the open casement in the shade.
A cloud of city smoke, driving low, obscured the _Aquila_; the freighter
bound for Prince William Sound rounded Magnolia Bluff, but clearly she had
forgotten these interests; she stood looking the other way, through the
southeast window, where Rainier rose in solitary splendor. A subdued
exhilaration possessed her. Did she not in imagination travel back over
the Cascades to that road to Wenatchee, where, rising to the divide, they
had come unexpectedly on that far view of the one mountain? Then her
glance fell again to the violets, and she lifted the bowl, leaning her
cheek, her forehead, to feel the touch of the cool petals and inhale their
fragrance.
She had not looked for Tisdale's card, but presently, in disposing of the
florist's box, she found it tucked in the folds of waxed paper. He had
written across it, not very legibly, with his left hand,
"I want to beg your pardon for that mistake I made. I know you never will
put any man in David Weatherbee's place. You are going to think too much
of him. When you are ready to make his project your life work, let me
know."
She was a long time reading the note, going back to the beginning more
than once to reconsider his meaning. And her exhilaration died; the
weariness that made her suddenly older settled over her face. At last she
tore the card slowly in pieces and dropped it in the box.
Her telephone rang, and she went over and took down the receiver. "Mrs.
Weatherbee," she said, and after a moment. "Yes. Please send him up."
The bell-boy had left the door ajar, and she heard the elevator when it
stopped at her floor; a quick, nervous step sounded along the corridor,
the door swung wider to some draught, and a short, wiry man, with a
weather-beaten face, paused on the threshold. "I am Lucky Banks," he said
simply, taking off his hat. "Mr. Tisdale asked me to see you got this
bundle."
Involuntarily her glance rested on the hand that held the package in the
curve of his arm, and she suppressed a shiver; the dread that the young
and physically perfect always betray at the sight of deformity sprang to
her eyes. "Thank you for troubling," she said, then, having taken the
bundle, she waited to close the door.
But Banks was in no hurry. "It wasn't any trouble, my, no," he replied. "I
was glad of the chance. It's a little bunch of stuff that was Dave's. And
likely I'd have come up, anyhow," he added, "to inquire about a tract of
land you own east of the mountains. I heard you talked of selling."
Instantly her face brightened. "Yes. But come in, will you not?" She
turned and placed the package on the table, and took one of two chairs
near the alcove. The azalea was so near that its vivid flowers seemed to
cast a reflection on her cheeks. "I presume you mean my tract in the
Wenatchee Mountains?" she went on engagingly. "A few miles above
Hesperides Vale."
"Well, yes." Banks seated himself on the edge of the other chair and held
his hat so as to conceal the maimed hand. "I didn't know you had but one
piece. It's up among the benches and takes in a kind of pocket. It's off
the line of irrigation, but if the springs turn out what I expect, it
ought to be worth sixty dollars an acre. And I want an option on the whole
tract for ten thousand."
"Ten thousand dollars?" Her voice fluted incredulously. "But I am afraid I
don't understand exactly what an option is. Please explain, Mr. Banks."
"Why, it's this way. I pay something down, say about three thousand, and
you agree to let the sale rest for well, say six months, while I prospect
the ground and see how it is likely to pan out. Afterwards, if I fail to
buy, I naturally forfeit the bonus and all improvements."
"I see," she said slowly. "I see. But--you know it is wild land; you have
been over the ground?"
"Not exactly, but I know the country, and I've talked with a man I can
bank on, my, yes."
"How soon"--she began, then, covering her eagerness, said: "I agree to
your option, Mr. Banks."
He laid his hat on the floor and took out his billbook, in which he found
two printed blanks, filled according to his terms and ready for her
signature. "I thought likely we could close the deal right up, ma'am, so's
I could catch the Wenatchee train this afternoon. Your name goes here
above mine."
She took the paper and started buoyantly to the secretary, but the little
man stopped her. "Read it over, read it over," he cautioned. "All square,
isn't it? And sign this duplicate, too. That's right. You're quite a
business woman."
He laughed his high, mirthless laugh, and, taking a check from the
bill-book, added some bright gold pieces which he stacked on the table
carefully beside the package he had brought. "There's your three
thousand," he said.
"It's out of a little bunch of dust I just turned in at the assay office."
"Thank you." She stood waiting while he folded his duplicate and put it
away, but he did not rise to go, and after a moment, she went back to her
chair by the scarlet azalea.
"They are doing really wonderful things in the Wenatchee Valley," she said
graciously, willing to make conversation in consideration of that little
pile of clean, new coin that had come so opportunely, "the apples are
marvelous. But"--and here her conscience spoke--"you understand this tract
is unreclaimed desert land; you must do everything."
"Yes, ma'am, I understand that; but what interests me most in that pocket
is that it belonged to David Weatherbee. He mapped out a project of his
own long before anybody dreamed of Hesperides Vale. He told me all about
it; showed me the plans. That piece of ground got to be the garden spot of
the whole earth to him; and I can't stand back and see it parcelled out to
strangers."
He paused. The color deepened a little in her face; she looked away
through the west window. "I thought an awful lot of Dave," he went on.
"I'd ought to. Likely you don't know it--he wasn't the kind to talk much
about himself--but I owe my life to him. _It_ had commenced"--he held up
the crippled hand and smiled grimly--"when Dave found me curled up under
the snow, but he stayed, in the teeth of a blizzard, to see me through.
And afterwards he lost time, weeks when hours counted, taking care of me,--
operated when it came to it, like a regular doctor, my, yes. And when I
got to crawling around again, I found he'd made me his partner."
"He had made a discovery," she asked, "while you were ill?"
"Yes, and you could bank on Dave it was a good one. He knew the gravel
every time. But we had to sell; it was the men who bought us out that
struck it rich. You see, Dave had heavy bills pressing him down here in
the States; he never said just what he owed, but he had to have the money.
And, my, when he was doing the bulk of the work, I couldn't say much. It
was so the next time and the next. We never could keep a claim long enough
for the real clean-up. So, when I learned to use my hand, I cut loose to
try it alone."
He halted again, but she waited in silence with her face turned to the
harbor. "I drifted into the Iditarod country," he went on, "and was among
the first to make a strike. It was the luckiest move I ever made, but I
wish now I had stayed by Dave. I was only a few hundred miles away, but I
never thought of his needing me. That was the trouble. He was always
putting some other man on his feet, cheering the rest along, but not one
of us ever thought of offering help to Dave Weatherbee. A fine,
independent fellow like him.
"But I sure missed him," he said. "Many a time there in the Iditarod I
used to get to wishing we had that voice of his to take the edge off of
things. Why, back on the Tanana I've seen it keep a whole camp heartened;
and after he picked me up in that blizzard, when I was most done for and
couldn't sleep, it seemed like his singing about kept me alive. Sometimes
still nights I can hear those tunes yet. He knew a lot of 'em, but there
was _Carry Me Back to Old Virginny_, and _Heart Bowed Down_, and _You'll
Remember Me_. I always thought that song reminded him of some girl down
here in the States. He never told me so, always put me off if I said a
word, and none of us knew he was married then; but when he got to singing
that tune, somehow he seemed to forget us boys and the camp and
everything, and went trailing off after his voice, looking for somebody
clear out of sight. I know now, since I've seen you, I was likely right."
Still she was silent. But she moved a little and lifted her hand to the
edge of the Satsuma jardinière; her fingers closed on it in a tightening
grip; she held her head high, but the lashes drooped over her eyes.
Watching her, the miner's seamed face worked. After a moment he said: "The
other night I paid seven dollars for a seat at the Metropolitan just to
hear one of those first-class singers try that song. The scenery was all
right. There were the boys and two or three women sitting around a
camp-fire. And the fiddles got the tune fine, but my, my! I couldn't
understand a word. Seemed like that fellow was talking darn Dago."
At this she lifted her eyes. The shadow of a smile touched her mouth,
though her lashes were wet. "And he was, Mr. Banks," she said brightly.
"He was. I know, because I was there."
Banks picked up his hat and rose to his feet. "We were all mighty proud of
Dave," he said. "There wasn't one of us wouldn't have done his level best
to reach him that last stampede; but I'm glad the chance came to Hollis
Tisdale. There wasn't another man in Alaska could have done what he did.
Yes, I'm mighty glad it was Tisdale who--found him." He paused, holding
his hat over the crippled hand, then added: "I suppose you never knew what
it means to be cold."
She rose. The smile had left her lips, and she stood looking into his
withered face with wide eyes. "I mean so cold you don't care what happens.
So cold you can lie down in your tracks, in a sixty-mile-an-hour blizzard
and go to sleep."
"No." She shivered, and her voice was almost a whisper. "I am afraid not."
"Then you can't begin to imagine what Tisdale did. You can't see him
fighting his way through mountains, mushing ahead on the winter trail,
breaking road for his worn-out huskies, alone day after day, with just
poor Dave strapped to the sled."
She put her hands to her ears. "Please, please don't say any more," she
begged. "I know--all--about it."
"Even about the wolves?"
She dropped her hands, bracing herself a little on the table, and turned
her face, looking, with that manner of one helplessly trapped, around the
room.
"Even about the wolves?" he persisted.
"No. No," she admitted at last.
He nodded. "I thought likely not. Hollis never told that. It goes against
his grain to be made much of. He and Dave was cut out of the same block.
But last night in the lobby to the hotel, I happened on a fellow that met
him in the pass above Seward. There were four of 'em mushing through to
some mines beyond the Susitna. It was snowing like blazes when they heard
those wolves, and pretty soon Tisdale's dogs came streaking by through the
smother. Then a gun fired. It kept up, with just time enough between shots
to load, until they came up to him. He had stopped where a kind of small
cave was scooped in the mountainside and put the sled in and turned the
huskies loose. He had had the time, too, to make a fire in front of the
hole, but when the boys got there, his wood was about burned out, and the
wolves had got Dave's old husky, Jack. He had done his best to help hold
off the pack. There's no telling how many Hollis killed; you see the rest
fell on 'em soon's they dropped. It was hell. Nothing but hair and blood
and bones churned into the snow far as you could see. Excuse me, ma'am; I
guess it sounds a little rough. I'm more used to talking to men, my, yes.
But the fellow who told me said Hollis knew well enough what was coming at
the start, when he heard the first cry of the pack. He had a chance to
make a roadhouse below the pass. Not one man in a thousand would have
stayed by that sled."
His withered face worked again. He moved to the door. "But Dave would have
done it." His voice took a higher pitch. "Yes, ma'am, Dave would have done
the same for Hollis Tisdale. They was a team; my, yes." He laughed his
hard, mirthless laugh. "Well, so long," he said.
She did not answer. Half-way down the corridor Banks looked back through
the open door. She had not moved from the place where he had left her,
though her face was turned to the window. A little farther on, while he
waited for the elevator, he saw she had taken the package he had brought
from Tisdale. She stood weighing it, undecided, in her hands, then drew
out the table drawer and laid it in. She paused another instant in
uncertainty and, closing the drawer, began to gather up the pieces of
gold.