THE MARCHES LEAVE GARLAND'S
It was on a Wednesday morning that Mr. March and Long Billy set out
for Rosita. The next week, on Thursday evening, just at sunset, Mrs.
March heard the sound of wheels, and, looking up, saw a white-topped
wagon, drawn by two mules, coming up the road. In the next instant,
she saw Rob and Nelly running, jumping, and clapping their hands,
and trying to climb up into the wagon.
"Why, that must be Mr. March," she exclaimed, and ran out of the
door.
"Why, that's queer," said the Deacon, following slowly; "he said
he'd write the day before he was a-comin'; and we were to go down
'n' meet him at the Springs."
"And if he hasn't brought that long-geared fellow back with him, I
declare!" continued the Deacon, as he walked on: "I'd like to know
what's up now."
Mrs. March had already reached the wagon, and was welcoming her
husband. Long Billy interrupted her greetings.
"Well, mum," he said, "I s'pose you're surprised to see me back
again. But me 'n' him"--nodding to Mr. March--"'s struck up a kind
o' 'liance, an' I'm to your service now: me 'n' my mules."
"I know what that means," thought Mrs. March: "we're going to move
down to that valley, post haste." But all she said was:--
"Very well, Billy; I'm glad to see you. Mr. March's friends are
always mine."
"What are you going to do with that Long Legs, Parson?" said Deacon
Plummer, as soon as he found a chance to speak to Mr. March alone;
"seems to me we haven't got work for another hand: have we?"
"Not on this farm: that's a clear case, Deacon," replied Mr. March;
"but it's too long a story to enter on now. After supper I'll tell
you my plans."
The Deacon took out his red silk handkerchief, and rubbed his
forehead.
"Oh, Lord!" said he to himself; "what's that blessed man been and
done now? He ain't noways fit to go off by himself. I'll bet he's
been took in worse 'n ever."
After supper Mr. March told his story. He had bought a farm in the
Wet Mountain Valley, and he proposed that they should all move down
there immediately. The place had more than equalled all Long Billy's
descriptions of it; and Mr. March's enthusiasm was unbounded. Deacon
Plummer listened to all his statements with a perplexed and
incredulous face.
"Did you see that medder grass's high's a man's knee?" he asked.
"Waded in it, Deacon," replied Mr. March; "but that isn't all: I've
got a wisp of it in my pocket."
Long Billy chuckled, as Mr. March drew the crumpled green wisp out
of his pocket, and handed it to the Deacon.
"'Twas I put him up to bringin' that," said Billy. "Sez I, 'there
ain't nothin' so good for folks's seein' with their own eyes.' I
kind o' misgave that the old man wouldn't be for believin' it all."
The Deacon unfolded the grass; back and forth, back and forth, he
bent it, and straightened it out across his knees. He looked at it
in silence for a minute; then he said:--
"Well, that beats me! Acres like this, you say?"
"Miles, Deacon," said Mr. March.
"Miles 'n' miles," said Billy; "'s fur's you can see it wavin' in
the wind; 't looks like wheat, only puttier. P'raps you'd better
show him the wheat now?"
Mr. March pulled out of his other pocket a similar wisp of wheat,
and handed it to the Deacon. This he straightened out, as he had the
grass, across his knees, and looked at it in silence for a moment;
then he tasted the kernel; then he rolled up both wheat and grass
together, and handed them back to Mr. March, saying:
"I've got nothin' more to say. Seein' 's believin'."
Long Billy nodded his head triumphantly, and winked at Mr. March.
"But," continued the Deacon, "for all that I don't feel it clear in
my mind about our goin'. 'Twouldn't make any difference to ye,
Parson, anyway, if Elizy 'n' I didn't go; would it?"
Mr. March was much surprised.
"Why, Deacon!" he said, "we should be very sorry to have you
separate from us. You surely can't stay on in this place!"
"Oh, no!" replied the Deacon; "we hain't the least idea o' that. The
fact is, I expect we ought to go home: Elizy's so poorly. We've been
thinkin' on't for some time. But we was so kind o' settled here, and
all so home-like, we hated to stir. But if you're goin' to break up,
and go to a new place, I expect we'd better take that time to go
home."
This was not wholly a surprise to Mr. and Mrs. March, for they had
themselves felt that old Mrs. Plummer would after all be better off
in her comfortable home in Mayfield. They saw that she was growing
slowly more feeble: the climate did not suit her.
"I reckon we're kind o' old for this country," said the Deacon. "It
don't seem to me's I feel quite so fust-rate's I did at home. Trees
gets too old to transplant after a while."
"That's so! that's so!" exclaimed Billy. "I've never yet seen the
fust time, old folks adoin' well here. The air's too bracin' for
'em. They can't get used to it,--no offence to you, sir,"--looking
at Deacon Plummer.
"Oh, no offence,--no offence at all," replied the Deacon. "I don't
make any bones about ownin' that I'm old. Me 'n' my wife's both seen
our best days; 'n' I reckon we're best off at home. I think we'd
better go, Parson. We're mighty sorry to leave you; but when you
move south, we'll start the other way towards home. Ain't that so,
Elizy?" Mrs. Plummer had been rocking violently for the last few
minutes, with her face buried in her handkerchief.
"Yes," she sobbed, "I expect so. It's just providential, the hull
on't."
"Dear Mrs. Plummer, do not cry so!" exclaimed Mrs. March. "We have
had a very pleasant time. It is only a few months; and when you get
home, it will only seem as if you had taken a six months' journey. I
really think you will be better in Mayfield than here."
"Oh, I've no doubt on't," said Mrs. Plummer, still crying in her
handkerchief; "but I thought we was a goin' to live with you all the
rest o' our lives. It's a awful disappointment to me. But it's all
providential. It's a comfort to know that."
When Zeb heard the news that the family would break up in a few
days,--the Marches to move to Wet Mountain Valley, and the Plummers
to go back to Massachusetts,--he was very sorry. He turned on his
heel without saying a word, and went into the barn.
"Just your luck, Abe Mack!" he said, under his breath; "you don't no
sooner get used to a place 'n' to folks, 'n' feel real contented,
than somethin' happens to tip ye out. Ye're born onlucky; I reckon
there's no use fightin'. They're so took up with this long-legged
spindle of a mule-driver I expect they won't want me; 'n' I don't
want to go down into no minin' country, nuther,--'taint safe. I'll
see if the old man won't take me back to the States. I've got enough
to pay my way, if he'll give me work after I get there, and I reckon
I'd be safe from any o' them Georgetown fellers in Massachusetts."
The Deacon was very glad to take Zeb back with him. He had learned
to like the man, and he needed such a hand on his farm.
And so it was all settled, and everybody went to work as hard as
possible to get ready for the move. Nelly and Rob hardly knew
whether to be glad or sorry. They loved the hills so much, they were
afraid they would not love the valley so well. Yet their heads were
nearly turned by Long Billy's stories of the wonderful mines in
Rosita; of the machinery in the stamp-mill where they crushed the
ore and got the silver out; of the delicious wild grapes on Grape
Creek; and the trout, and the flowers on the hills.
"Yer hain't ever seen any flowers yet," said Billy, when Nelly tried
to tell him how many flowers grew in the Pass; "ye jest wait till I
take ye up on Pine's ranch, some Sunday. I'll show ye flowers then:
sixty odd kinds in one field,--yes, sure! I counted 'em; and old
Pine he counted em too. And he sent 'em off by express once, some of
each kind, to the folks at Washington. You'll see!"
Just three weeks from the day Long Billy first drove into the shadow
of the old saw-mill to camp, the March and Plummer family set out
on their journeys: Fox and Pumpkinseed drawing one big white-topped
wagon, in which were Mrs. March, Deacon and Mrs. Plummer, Nelly and
Rob. Billy's two mules drew the other big wagon, which was loaded
down very heavily with the furniture Mr. March had bought. Mr. March
drove this; and Billy, mounted on a new horse which he had bought,
was driving all the cattle before him. Zeb sat by Mr. March's side
in the mule wagon. He and Deacon and Mrs. Plummer were to take the
cars at Colorado Springs, and go to Denver. Mr. and Mrs. March had
begged them to come down with them into Wet Mountain Valley, and
make a visit. But the Deacon said "No."
"The fact is," he said, "I may's well own it: now that we're really
started for home, we're dreadful homesick. I didn't know's I had
felt it so much. Can't transplant old trees, Parson, no use! It's a
good country for young folks,--a good country; I shall tell the boys
about it. But give me old Massachusetts. I just hanker after a sight
o' the old buryin'-ground, 'n' that black elder-bush in the corner
on't."
When they parted at the little railroad station in Colorado Springs,
Mrs. Plummer broke down and cried. Nelly cried a little too, from
sympathy; and even Watch whined, seeing that something unusual and
uncomfortable was going on. Luckily, however, good-bys at railway
stations always are cut short. The engine-bell rings, and the cars
move off, and that puts an end to the last words. Mr. and Mrs. March
were sorry to part from these good old people; and yet, if the whole
truth were told, it must be owned that they felt a sense of relief
when they were gone. They had felt, all the while, a responsibility
for their comfort, and a fear lest they should be taken ill, which
had been burdensome.
"We shall miss them: shan't we?" said Mrs. March, as the train moved
off.
"Yes," said Nelly; "I'm real sorry they're gone. I like Zeb too."
"We'll miss the crullers," said Rob. "Say, mamma, didn't she show
you how to make 'em?"
"Rob," said his father, "you ought to be a Chinese."
"Why?" asked Rob.
"Because they think the seat of all life is in the stomach; and they
give great honor to people with very big stomachs," answered his
father.
Rob did not know whether his father were laughing at him or not. He
suspected he might be.
"I don't know what you mean, papa," he said: "you like crullers,
anyhow."
"Fair hit, Rob!" said Mrs. March. "Fair hit, papa!"
The journey to Rosita took six days: they had to go very slowly on
account of the cattle. The weather was perfect; and every night they
slept on the ground, in a tent which Mr. March had bought in
Colorado Springs. Rob rode on Pumpkinseed's back a good part of the
way, like a little postilion. Before the end of the journey, they
were all so burnt by the sun that they looked, Mrs. March said, "a
great deal more like Indians than like white people." They drove
into Rosita just at sunset. I wish I could tell you how beautiful
the whole place looked to them. You go down a steep hill, just as
you come into the town of Rosita. On the top of this hill, Mr. March
called out to his wife to stop. She was driving Fox and Pumpkinseed;
and he was following behind with the mules. He jumped out, and came
up to the side of her wagon.
"There, Sarah!" he said, "did you ever see any thing in your life so
beautiful as this?"
Mrs. March did not speak; both she and Nelly and even Rob were
struck dumb by the beauty of the picture. They looked right down
into the little village. It was cuddled in the ravine as if it had
gone to sleep there. The sides of the hills were dotted with
pine-trees; and most of the little houses were built of bright
yellow pine boards: they shone in the sun. Just beyond the village
they could see a bit of a most beautiful green valley; and, beyond
that, great high mountains, half covered with snow.
"That is the valley," said Mr. March; "that bit of bright green, way
down there to the west."
Nelly was the first to speak.
"Papa," said she, "it looks just like a beautiful green bottom to a
deep well: doesn't it?"
"Yes, this little bit that you see of it from here, does," said Mr.
March: "but, after you get into it, it doesn't look so. It is thirty
miles long; and so level you would think you were on the plains. And
oh, Nell! you can see your dear Pike's Peak grandly there! It looks
twice as high here as it does from any place I have seen it."
"Oh, I'm so glad!" said Nelly.
Still Mrs. March did not speak. Her husband turned to her at last,
anxiously, and said:--
"Don't you like it, Sarah?"
"Oh, Robert!" she said, "it is so beautiful it doesn't look to me
like a real place. It looks like a painted picture!"
"That'll do! that'll do!" laughed Mr. March; "I'm satisfied. Now
we'll go down the hill."
Rob nudged Nelly. They were on the back seat of the wagon.
"Nell," he whispered, "did you ever see any thing like it? I see
lots of silver mines all round on the hills. Billy told me how they
looked. Those piles of stones are all on top of mines; that's where
they throw out the stones. I'll bet we'll find a mine."
"Oh," said Nelly, "wouldn't that be splendid! Let's go out the first
thing to-morrow morning."
Mr. March had planned to stay in Rosita a couple of days, before
going down to his farm in the valley. He wished to become acquainted
with some of the Rosita tradesmen, and to find out all about the
best ways of doing things in this new life. Long Billy proved a good
helper now. Everybody in Rosita knew Long Billy and liked him; and,
when he said to his friends, confidentially:
"This is a first-rate feller I've hired with: he does the square
thing by everybody, I tell you. There's nothin' narrer about him;
he's the least like a parson of any parson ye ever see,"--they
accepted Billy's word for it all, and met Mr. March with a
friendliness which would not usually have been shown to a newcomer.
The next morning after they reached Rosita, Long Billy proposed to
take Mr. March out and introduce him to some of the people he knew.
When Mr. March came downstairs, he was dressed in a good suit of
black, and wore a white collar; on the journey, he had worn his
rough working-clothes, and a flannel shirt. Long Billy looked him up
and down, from head to foot, with an expression of great
dissatisfaction; but did not say anything. Then he walked out on the
piazza of the hotel, and stood still for some minutes, in deep
thought. Then he said to himself:--
"Hang it all! I'll have to speak to him. What'd he want to go 'n'
spruce hisself all up like that for? 'T'll jest ruin him in this
town, oncet for all! I'll have to speak to him. I'd rather be
scotch-wolloped."
What scotch-wolloped means I do not know: but it was a favorite
expression of Long Billy's. So he walked back into the hotel, and
beckoned Mr. March out on the piazza.
"Look here, Parson," he said, speaking very fast, and looking very
much embarrassed,--which was an odd thing for Billy,--"look here,
Parson, you ain't goin' to preach to-day, be yer?"
"Why, no, Billy," said Mr. March; "why did you ask?"
"Ain't these yer preachin' clo'es?" replied Billy, pointing to the
black coat.
Mr. March laughed.
"Why, yes, I have preached in them, Billy; but I do not expect ever
to again. I must wear them out, though."
"Not in these parts, Parson," said Billy, solemnly, shaking his
head. "Yer don't know minin' towns so well's I do. Ef I was to take
you down town in that rig, there wouldn't one o' the fellers open
his head to yer. They'd shet up jest like snappin' turtles. Ye jest
go upstairs 'n' put on the clo'es ye allers wears won't ye?" said
Billy, almost pleadingly.
"Why, certainly, Billy, if you really think it would make any
difference about my making friends with the people. I don't want to
offend anybody. These are pretty old clothes, though, Billy, if they
only knew it. It was to save my others that I put them on. But I'll
change them, if you say so." And Mr. March ran upstairs much amused.
When he came down in his rough suit and his blue flannel shirt,
Billy smiled with pleasure.
"There," he said, "you look like a man in them clo'es, Parson.
Excuse my bein' so free; but I allers did think that the parsons'
clo'es had a good deal to do with fellers despisin' 'em's they do.
They allers call 'em 'Tender-feet.'"
"Tender-feet!" exclaimed Mr. March; "what does that mean, Billy?"
Billy did not answer immediately. He was puzzled to think of any
definition of "Tender-feet."
"Well," he said at last, "don'no' as I can say exactly what it does
mean; but 'tain't because I don't know. Any feller that's
over-particular about his clo'es, 'n' his way o' livin', 'n' can't
rough it like the generality o' folks in Colorado, gets called a
'Tender-foot'! Lord, I'd rather be called a thief, any day!"
Mr. March laughed heartily.
"I see! I see!" he said. "Well now, Billy, you don't think there'd
be any danger of my ever being called a 'Tender-foot' do you?"
"Not a bit of it, Parson," said Billy, emphatically, "when a feller
came to live with yer; but to see yer jest a walkin' round in them
black clo'es o' yourn, you'd get took for one. Yer would: that's a
fact. I should take yer for one myself. Yer may's well give that
suit up, oncet for all, Parson, for this country, I tell ye," added
Billy, thinking he would make sure that the danger did not occur
again. "Thet is," he continued, "except Sundays. I don't suppose
'twould do ye any harm to be seen in it Sundays, or to a dance."
"I don't go to dances, Billy," said Mr. March; "perhaps I'll give
the suit away: that'll save all trouble."
As they left the hotel, they saw Rob and Nelly walking hand in hand
up the steep road down which they had come the night before,
entering the village.
"Where can the children be going?" said Mr. March. "Rob! Nelly!" he
called. They both turned and said:
"What, papa?" but did not come towards him.
"Where are you going?" he said.
"Oh, only a little way up this road," replied Rob.
"Don't you want to come with me?" said Mr. March. The children
hesitated.
"Do you want us, papa?" said Nelly.
"Why, no, certainly not," replied Mr. March, "unless you want to
come. I thought you would like to see the town: that's all."
"We'd rather go up on the hill, papa," said Rob. "Mamma said we
might, if we wouldn't go out of sight of the hotel. Good-by!"
"Good-by, papa!" called Nelly. And they both trudged off with a most
business-like air.
Long Billy laughed.
"Them youngsters got silver on the brain," he said. "Thet's what's
the matter with them. I've seen plenty o' grown folks jest the same
way in this country: a walkin', walkin' by the month to a time, a
pokin' into every hole, 'n' a hammerin' every stone,--jest wild
after gold 'n' silver. There's plenty on 'em's jest wasted time
enough on't to ha' made a considerable money, if they'd stuck to
some kind o' regular work. That little chap o' yourn, he's a driver;
he hain't never let go the idee of findin' a silver mine, sence the
day they hauled all them mica stuns down, back there'n the Pass.
They're a rare couple, he 'n' Nelly: they are."
"Yes, they are good children," said Mr. March: "good children; but I
don't want them to get possessed with this desire for money." And he
looked anxiously up the hill, where he could see Rob and Nelly
striking off from the road, and picking their way across the rough
ground towards a great pile of gray ore, which had been thrown out
of one of the mines.
Long Billy also looked up at them.
"The little sarpents!" he said. "They're a makin' for the Pocahontas
mine, straight. Rob, he was askin' me all about the piles o' ore 'n'
the engines in the mines, yesterday."
"Is there any danger of their being hurt?" said Mr. March.
"Oh, no! I reckon not. That Nelly, she's jest the same's a grown
woman. I allers notice her a holdin' the little feller back. She
won't go into any resky places no more'n her ma would. She's got a
heap o' sense, that little gal has."
While Mr. March and the children were away, Mrs. March sat at the
west window of her room, looking off into the beautiful valley. I
wish I could make you see just how it looked from her window;
however, no picture can show it, and I suppose no words can tell it;
but if you really want to try to imagine how it looked just ask
somebody who is with you while you are reading this page, to explain
to you how high a thousand feet would seem to you. If you can see
the spire of the church, and can know just how high that is, that
will help you get an idea of a thousand feet. Then you can imagine
that you are looking off between two high hills, right down into a
bit of green valley one thousand feet lower down than you are. Then
try to imagine that this bit of green valley looked very small; and
that, beyond it, there were grand high mountains, half covered with
snow. The lower half of the mountains looked blue: on a sunny day,
mountains always look blue in the distance; and the upper half was
dazzling white. This is the best I can do towards making you see the
picture which Mrs. March saw as she sat at her western window. After
all, I think Nelly's sentence was worth more than all mine, when she
said, "Oh, papa, it looks like a beautiful green bottom to a deep
well." The picture was so beautiful that Mrs. March did not want to
do anything but sit and look at it, and when her husband returned
from his walk in the village, she was really astonished to find that
she had sat at the window two whole hours without moving. The
children did not come home until noon. Their faces were red and
their eyes shone with excitement: they had had a fine time; they had
rambled on from one mine to another on the hill; wherever they saw a
pile of the gray ore, and a yellow pine building near it, they had
gone into the building and looked into the shaft down which the
miners went into the ground. They had found kind men everywhere who
had answered all their questions; and Rob had both his pockets full
of pieces of stone with beautiful colors, like a peacock's neck. Rob
had forgotten the name of the stone: so had Nelly.
"It sounded something like prophets," said Nelly, "but it couldn't
have been that"; she handed a bit of the stone to Long Billy.
"Oh," said he, glancing at it carelessly, "that's nothing but
pyrites; that's no account; they'll give you all you want of that."
"I don't care:" said Rob, "it's splendid. I'm going to make a
museum, and I shall have the shelves full of it. But, mamma," he
said sadly, "there isn't any use in our looking for a mine. When I
told one of the men that we were going to see if we couldn't find a
mine, he just laughed, and he said that every inch of the ground all
round here belonged to people that thought they'd got mines. All
those little bits of piles of stones, with just a stick stuck up by
them, every one of those means that a man's been digging there to
find silver; and they're just as thick! why, you can't go ten steps
without coming on one! They call them 'claims.'"
"That's so," said Long Billy; "and I'll tell ye what I call 'em. I
call 'em gravestones, them little sticks stuck up on stone heaps:
that's what most on 'em are, graves where some poor feller's buried
a lot o' hope and some money."
Nelly turned her great dark eyes full on Long Billy when he said
this. Her face grew very sad: she understood exactly what he meant.
Rob did not understand. He looked only puzzled.
"Graves!" exclaimed he. "Why, what do you call them graves for,
Billy? There isn't any thing buried in them."
Billy looked a little ashamed of his speech; he did not often
indulge in anything so much like a flight of fancy as this.
"Oh, nothin'!" he said. "That's only a silly way o' puttin' it."
"I don't think so, Billy," said Nelly. "I think it's real true.
Don't you know, Rob, how awfully you and I felt when we thought we'd
found that mine up in the Pass, and it turned out nothing but mica?
We felt just as if we'd lost something."
"I didn't," said Rob; "I just felt mad; and it makes me feel mad now
to think of it: how we lugged those heavy old stones all that way. I
wish I'd saved some for my museum though. All the boys here have
museums, a man told me, and perhaps I won't find any of that kind of
stone here."
After dinner, they all drove down into the valley to look at their
new home. The road wound down in a zigzag way among a great many low
hills. Sometimes for quite a distance among these hills, you cannot
see the valley at all; and then all of a sudden you look right out
into it. As they went lower, they saw more and more of it, until at
last they reached it and came out on the level ground, where they
could look up and down the whole length of the valley. Long Billy
was driving them: when they reached the spot where the whole valley
lay in full view, he stopped the horses and, turning round to Mrs.
March, said:--
"Well, mum, did I tell the truth or not?"
"No, Billy, you did not," replied Mrs. March, very gravely.
Billy looked surprised, and was just about to speak when Mrs. March
continued:--
"You did not tell half how beautiful it is."
"Ah!" said Billy. "Well, that kind o' lie I don't mind bein' charged
with."
"Oh, papa! let me get out!" cried Nelly. "I want to walk in this
grass. Is this our grass?"
The road was winding along between two fields of high grass, which
waved in the wind. As it waved, Nelly saw bright red and blue
flowers among it; some tall, and some low down close to the ground
as if they were hiding.
"Yes, this is where our land begins," said her father; "this is our
own grass: but I don't want you to run in it; we must mow it next
week."
"Oh, let us, papa; just a little bit--close to the fence. You can
spare a little bit of hay," pleaded Nelly; "we'll step light."
"Do let them, Robert," said Mrs. March. "I should like to do it
myself."
"Very well: keep close to the fence, then," said Mr. March, and
reined up the horses. Rob and Nelly jumped out, and had clambered
over the fence in a second, and waded into the grass. It was nearly
up to their shoulders, and they looked very pretty moving about in
it, picking the flowers. As Mrs. March was watching them, she
suddenly saw a brown bird with yellow breast fly out of the grass,
and perch on one of the fence-posts.
"Oh, don't stir, children! don't stir!" she cried: "see that bird!"
Rob and Nelly stood perfectly still. And what do you think that bird
did?--opened his mouth and sang the most exquisite song you ever
heard. The canary bird's song is not half so sweet. The bird was
not ten steps away from the carriage or from the children: there he
sat, looking first at one and then at the other, like a tame bird.
In a few seconds he sang again: then he spread his wings and flew a
little way into the field, and alighted on a tall, slender grass
stalk, and there he sat, swinging to and fro on the grass, and sang
again; then he flew away. Nobody drew a long breath till he had
gone.
"That's a lark," said Billy; "this country's full on 'em; they're
the tamest birds for a wild bird I ever see. They'll sing to ye
right under your feet."
"Well, he's a glorious chorister," said Mr. March.
"If he's a chorister, I'd like to go where he keeps his choir," said
Rob. "I mean to catch one, and have him to sing in my museum."
"Oh, no, Rob," said Nelly; "don't!"
"They won't never sing in cages," said Billy. "I've seen it tried
many a time. They jest walk, walk, walk up and down, up and down in
the cage the hull time, and beat their wings. They can't stand bein'
shut up, for all they're so tame actin' while they're free."
The children climbed back into the wagon now, with their hands full
of flowers; and Billy whipped up the horses.
"Git up, Pumpkinseed! git up, Fox!" he said: "there's a crib o' corn
ahead for you."
Very soon the new home came in sight. It looked, when they first saw
it, as if it were half buried in green grass; but, as they came
nearer, they saw that the enclosure in which the house and barns
stood was entirely bare of grass. This gave it a naked and barren
look which was not pleasing, and disappointed Mrs. March very much.
However, she said nothing; only thought to herself "I'll have green
grass up to that very doorstep, before another year's out."
The house was very much like the one they had lived in, in the Ute
Pass, except that it was larger; there were three log-cabin barns,
two of which were very large; and a queer-shaped log-house, bigger
at the top than at the bottom, standing up quite a distance from the
ground, on posts. This was for wheat. Then there were two
dog-houses, and a great place built round with palings, to keep hens
in; and one or two large open sheds where wagons and carts stood.
Billy looked round on all these buildings with great pride.
"I declare," said he, "there ain't such a ranch's this in all the
valley. What a dumb fool that Wilson was to go 'n' leave it. He's
put all he's worth, except this farm, into a mine up in Central; 'n'
now he'll go 'n' put the money for this in too, and's like's not
he'll never see a dollar on't again's long's he lives'. This minin'
jest crazes folks."
"Did ye ever see a puttier farm'n this, mum?" he asked, turning to
Mrs. March.
Mrs. March could not say that she had not. To her eye, accustomed to
Massachusetts green yards, shaded by elms and maples, this little
group of rough houses and sheds, standing up quite a distance from
the ground, on posts, few tufts of coarse grass, and weeds growing
around it, was very unsightly. But she did not want to say this; so
she said:--
"It is much the nicest place I have seen in Colorado, Billy; and
this valley is perfectly beautiful. But where is the creek?"
"Right there, mum, just a few rods beyond that fence to the
west,--where you see that line of bushes."
"I don't see any water," said Nelly.
"No, you can't till yer come right on it," said Billy; "'tain't very
wide here, 'n' it jest slips along in the bushes 's if it was trying
to hide itself."
"Papa," whispered Nelly, "doesn't Billy say queer things about
things, just as if every thing was alive, and had feelings as we do?
I like it."
Mr. March smiled, and took Nelly's hand in his.
"Girlie," he said, "Billy's a little of a poet, in his rough way."
"He doesn't make verses: does he?" asked Nelly, reverentially. To
make verses had always been the height of Nelly's ambition, as many
a little roll of scribbled paper in her desk would show. But there
was one great trouble with Nelly's verses thus far: she never could
find any words that rhymed; and now to hear Billy called a poet
seemed very strange to her.
"I never should have thought he could make verses," she continued.
"Oh! making verses is the smallest part of being a poet, Nellie,"
said Mr. March. "You can't understand that yet; but you will some
day."
Then they all went into the house, and looked at room after room,
thinking what they would do with each. The rooms were sunny and
bright, but were so dirty that Mrs. March groaned.
"Oh, how shall we ever get this place clean?"
"I'll tell you," said Billy. "If ye don't mind the expense o'
stayin' at the hotel a week, an' if ye'll buy me a little paint,
I'll have this hull place so ye won't know it, in a week's time.
There's nothin' I can't turn my hand to; an' I'd like to fix things
up here for you, first rate. I saw up 't the other place about how
you like things."
Billy had a quick eye for everything that was pretty. He had never
seen any house in Colorado which was so cosey and pretty as the
Marches' house in the Ute Pass; and he was thinking now in his heart
how he would like to make this new one as pretty as that.
"Mebbe you couldn't trust me," he said, seeing that Mrs. March
hesitated.
"Oh, yes, I could, Billy," she replied; "I have no doubt you could
put it all in beautiful order. I was thinking whether we ought to
stay"--she was going to say, "stay a whole week at the hotel"--but,
just at that minute, there came piercing shrieks in Rob's voice:
"Papa! papa! Billy; come! come!"
The shrieks came from the direction of the creek.
"Oh, my God! he's fallen into the creek!" cried Mrs. March, as she
tried to run towards the spot. Long Billy dashed past her, with his
great strides, and said, as he passed:--
"Don't be skeered, mum; in the mud, most likely."
The cries came feebler and feebler, and stopped altogether,--then a
loud burst of laughter from Billy, which brought the life back to
Mrs. March. She was clinging to the fence, nearly senseless with
terror; Nelly stood close by, her face white, and tears rolling down
her cheeks: when they heard Billy's laugh, they looked at each other
in amazement and relief.
"He can't be in the creek, mamma," said Nelly: "Billy wouldn't
laugh."
Then they heard Mr. March laugh, and say:--
"Hold on, Rob: don't be frightened; we'll get a rail."
Then Billy came striding back out of the bushes, still laughing.
When he saw Mrs. March's and Nelly's agonized faces, his own sobered
instantly.
"'Twas too bad, mum," he exclaimed, "to give ye such a skeer. He's
in the slough, thet's all; he's putty well in, too; he'll be a sight
to see when we get him fished out. He's in putty well nigh up to his
arms."
Mrs. March could not help laughing; but Nelly only cried the more.
"Poor dear Rob!" she said: "how he will feel!" And she began to
climb the fence.
"Oh, Lor'! don't any more on ye come over here," cried Billy: "it's
all we can do to get round. The creek's overflowed: 'n' it's all
quakin' tussocks here; that's the way he went in, a jumpin' from one
to another."
While Billy was speaking he was tearing off two of the top rails
from the fence. He seemed to be as strong as a giant. In a very few
minutes, he had two rails over his shoulder, and had plunged back
among the bushes. In a few minutes more, out they all came; Rob
being led between Mr. March and Billy. He was indeed, as Billy had
said he would be, "a sight to behold." Up to his very arms he was
plastered with black, slimy mud.
"Oh, mamma, it smells horrid," was his first remark. "I wouldn't
mind if it didn't smell so."
Nelly ran up as close to him as she dared.
"Oh, Rob," she said, "how could you go in such a place! Why didn't
you stay with us?"
"I wanted to see if there were any grapes yet," said Rob; "and you
couldn't have told yourself, Nell, that it wouldn't bear. Ugh!
What'll I do, mamma?"
"I'm sure I don't know, Rob," said Mrs. March: she was at her wits'
end. She looked helplessly at Billy: Billy was rubbing his left
cheek with his right forefinger,--his invariable gesture when he was
perplexed. Mr. March also stood looking at Rob with a despairing
face.
"I wish you wouldn't all look so at me," cried Rob, half crying:
"it's horrid to be stared at. What'll I do, mamma?"
It was indeed a dilemma. Rob's trousers and jacket were dripping
wet, and coated thick with the muddy slime; his shoes were full of
it; as he walked about it made a gurgling noise, and spurted up;
his face was spattered with it; his hands were black; even his hair
had not escaped.
"There's lots o' hay in the barn," said Billy; "we might rub a good
deal off on him with that. Me 'n' you'd better take him," said
Billy, nodding to Mr. March. "No, mum, ye stay where ye be; we'll
manage better without ye, this time," continued Billy, waving Mrs.
March back, as she set out to follow them.
Poor Rob looked back, as Billy led him off towards the barn; the
tears ran down in the mud on his cheeks, and made little white
tracks all the way.
"I think you're real mean to laugh, mamma," he said.
Mrs. March was sorry to hurt his feelings, but she could not help
laughing. Nelly did not laugh, however: she looked almost as
wretched as Rob did. It seemed an age before any one came back from
the barn. Then Mr. March and Billy came out alone: Mr. March carried
Rob's trousers on a stick, and Billy carried the jacket and
stockings and shoes.
"Why, what have you done with the child!" exclaimed Mrs. March: "he
will take cold, without any clothes on."
Mr. March's eyes twinkled.
"Well, he has some clothes on, such as they are," he said. "Billy
raised a contribution for him: my under-drawers and vest, and
Billy's coat; he's all rolled up in the hay, and you'd better go and
sit by him now."
Mrs. March and Nelly hurried in. There lay Rob, all buried up in
hay: only his face to be seen. He looked very jolly now, and said he
felt perfectly comfortable.
"Now tell me a story, mamma! tell me a story. You've got to tell me
stories as long as I stay here."
So Mrs. March sat down on one side, and Nelly on the other, and Mrs.
March told them the story of the Master Thief, out of the Brothers
Grimm's "Fairy Stories of All Lands"; and, just as she got to where
the Master Thief was planning to steal the bottom sheet from off the
king's bed, she looked up and saw that Rob was fast asleep.
"Oh, that's good," she said; "that's the best thing that could have
happened to him. Now we'll go out and look at the house again."
"But, mamma," said Nelly, "I think I'll stay here. If he should wake
up, he would feel so lonely here; and he can't get out of the hay."
"Thank you, dear: that is very kind of you," replied Mrs. March.
And, as she went out of the barn, she said to herself, "What a kind,
thoughtful child Nelly is. She really is like a little woman."
Mrs. March could not find her husband and Billy anywhere; so she sat
down on the door-step of the house to wait for them. She looked up
and down the beautiful valley: it seemed a great deal more than
thirty miles long. The mountains at the south end of it looked blue
and hazy; the great Sangre di Christo Mountains, which made the
western wall, looked very near; the snow on them shone so brightly
it dazzled Mrs. March's eyes to look at it. After a time, she got up
from the door-step and walked round to the north side of the house.
"Oh, there is Nelly's mountain!" she said. There stood Pike's Peak,
in full sight, to the northeast. It looked so grand and so high at
first, Mrs. March did not know it. This, too, had a great deal of
snow on it, and there were white clouds floating round the top; it
was the grandest sight in the whole view. There were no other houses
near; she could see only a few in the valley; and she could not see
Rosita at all. The road down which they had come seemed to end very
soon among the hills.
"We shall not have much more to do with neighbors here than in the
Pass," thought Mrs. March. "But I do not care for that. One could
never be lonely with these mountains to look at."
"Well, mum, here's the little feller's clo'es," said Billy, coming
up at this moment, with Rob's clothes hanging in a limp wet bundle
over his arm. "Now I'll jest make a rousin' fire back here, 'n'
you'll be astonished to see how quick they'll dry. I've washed 'em
in about five hundred waters,--that medder mud's the meanest stuff
to stick ye ever see,--but they'll be dry in no time now."
"Mamma!" called Nelly, from the barn; "Rob's awake. He wants to get
up: he says he won't lie here another minute."
"I'll show him his clo'es," said Billy. "I guess that'll convince
him," and Billy carried the wet bundle into the barn. Shouts of
laughter followed, and in a minute more Billy came out again,
shaking all over with laughter. "I jest offered 'em to him," said
he, "'n' told him he could get up 'n' put 'em on ef he wanted to;
but I rayther thought he'd better let 'em dry some fust."
"What did he say?" asked Mrs. March.
"He wanted to know how long it would take 'em to dry 'n' I told him
the best part of an hour; 'twill be some longer'n that, but I
couldn't pretend to be exact to a minnit, 'n' he laid back on the
hay 'n' sez he: 'You tell my mamma to come right here 'n' finish
that story she was a tellin'.'"
When Mrs. March went back into the barn, she shouted aloud as soon
as she saw Rob. He had crawled out of his hay bed. It was too warm:
there he sat bolt upright, with his legs straight out in front of
him. Nelly had drawn the white drawer legs out to their full length,
and set Rob's shoes, toes up, in the hay at the end of them, so it
looked as if his legs were all that length; then Mr. March's gray
waistcoat came down nearly to his knees, and Billy's old brown coat
hung on his shoulders as loosely as a blanket. He looked up at his
mother with a perfectly grave face, and did not speak. Nelly was
laughing hard. "Isn't he too funny, mamma?" said she.
"You can laugh now if you want to, mamma," said Rob politely. "I
don't mind your laughing at papa's drawers and waistcoat and Billy's
old coat. That's quite different from laughing at me."
"Thank you, dear," said Mrs. March: "you're very kind; but I can get
along very comfortably without laughing at you now. You're not half
so funny as you were when you were covered with the mud."
It took so long to dry Rob's clothes, that it was nearly dark when
they got back to Rosita.
"Well, I reckoned you liked your house so well you weren't coming
back to us at all," said the landlord, as they drove up.
"Oh, no, sir," cried Rob, "that wasn't it. I fell into the mud by
the creek: I always fall into the water each new place we go to. I
did it the first thing up in the Pass."
The landlord looked closely at him. "What! you been into the creek
in them clothes?"
"Billy washed them," said Nelly; "they were all black as mud."
"Oh!" said the landlord. "Well, there ain't any thing under Heaven
that Long Billy can't do: that's certain."
Mr. and Mrs. March thought so too, when one week later they drove
down to take possession of their home. Billy had pleaded so
earnestly to be allowed to do all the work himself that Mr. March
had consented; and had even promised him that they would not come
near the house until he invited them. Then Billy set to work in good
earnest, and Miss Lucinda Harkiss set to work with him. This was the
young woman to whom Billy was engaged. She was coming to be Mrs.
March's servant. A very good time Lucinda and Billy had all that
week. It was almost like going to housekeeping together for
themselves. The first day Lucinda swept and scrubbed the floors, and
washed the windows till they shone; then Billy stained all the
floors dark brown, and painted the window-sashes and the door-frames
brown; and this brown color was so pretty with the yellow of the
pine, that it made the rough boarded rooms look almost handsome.
While the paint was drying, Lucinda and Billy drove over to Pine's
ranch at the foot of one of the Sangre di Christo mountains. They
knew old Mr. Pine very well; and he was very glad to have them make
him a visit. All one day Billy worked hard digging up young
pine-trees, and Lucinda gathered a great quantity of kinnikinnick
vines. Billy had told her how Mrs. March had had them nailed up on
the walls in the other house. The next day they drove home early in
the morning, and in the afternoon Billy set out a row of the little
pine-trees all round the house. "Even if they don't grow, they'll
look green for a spell," he said to Lucinda; "an' ye never see a
woman hanker arter green stuff's Miss March does. There wan't a
livin' thing growin' in the Ute Pass, but what she had it in a
pitcher or a tumbler or a tin can, a settin' round in her house. And
as for that Nelly, she'd bring in her arms full o' flowers every day
o' her life. You'll like 'em all, Lucinda, see if you don't. They
ain't like most o' the folks out here."
Lucinda had a good many fears about coming to live with Mrs. March.
She had never been a servant; but she wanted to be married to Billy
as much as he wanted to be married to her, and she thought if she
could earn good wages and lay all the money up, they could be
married sooner.
"I shall like them well enough, I dare say," said Lucinda; "but I
don't know how I'll stand being ordered round."
"Ordered round!" said Billy, in a scornful tone. "I tell you they
ain't the orderin' round kind; they're the reel genuwine fust-class
folks; an' genuwine fust-class folks don't never order nobody to do
nothing: I tell you I shouldn't stand no orderin' any more'n you
would. Mr. March he always sez to me, 'We'd better do so and so,' if
there's anything he wants done; 'n' he works 's hard as I do, any
day, 'n' Miss March she's jest like him. You'll see how 'twill be. I
ain't a mite afeared."
After the paint was dry, they nailed up the vines; and Billy added
to them some pine boughs with great clusters of green cones on them
which were beautiful. Then they unpacked the boxes of furniture; and
Billy showed Lucinda how to put up the chintz curtains in the
sitting-room, and the white ones in the bedrooms, and, when it was
all done, it looked so pretty that Billy could not help saying:--
"Don't you wish it was our house, Luce?" He always called her Luce
for short. "Can't take time for no three-storied names 'n this
country," said Billy; "two's too many."
Lucinda blushed a little, and said:--
"We can make ours just as pretty some day, Billy."
"That's so, Luce," said Billy: "you'll get lots o' idees out o' Miss
March. She's what I call a reel home-y woman. I hain't never seen
nobody I've took to so since I left hum."
When everything was ready, the house and the barns and sheds all in
order, and the whole enclosure raked over and made as tidy as
possible, Billy said:--
"Now, we'll jest keep 'em waitn' one more day. You make up a lot o'
your best bread, and churn some butter; 'n' I'll go over to Pine's
and pick two or three gallons o' raspberries. They're just ripe to
pick now, 'n' this is the last chance I'll get. Then you 'n' Miss
March can preserve 'em. I know she wants some. I heard her say so
when we was a comin' up Hardscrabble Canyon."
Something besides raspberries Billy brought back from Pine's ranch
that night,--something that he never dreamed of getting, something
which pleased him so greatly he fairly snapped his fingers with
delight,--it was a little pet fawn. "Old-man Pine" had had it for
several months; it had strayed down out of the woods, when it was
too young to find its way back; he had found it early one morning
lapping milk out of the milk-pan he kept outside his cabin-door for
his dog Spotty. He had caught it without difficulty, and tamed it,
so that it followed him about like a puppy. Sometimes it would
disappear for a few days, but always came back again. It was a
lovely little creature, almost white under its belly, and on the
under side of its legs; but all the rest of a beautiful bright red.
When Billy told old Mr. Pine about the March family, and about the
twin brother and sister, who were such nice children, the old man
said:--
"Don't you think they'd like to have the fawn? It's a pesky little
thing, for all it's so pretty, an' I'm tired on't. There was a man
offered me seven dollars for it, a while ago, but I thought I didn't
want to let it go; but ye may have it for them children if ye want
it. Ye can tell 'em I sent it to 'em; an' I'm the oldest settler in
this valley, tell 'em. Yer must bring 'em over to see me some time."
Billy promised to do so.
"They'll go clean out o' their heads when they see the critter," he
added. "They've been a talkin' about deer ever since they come: deer
an' silver are the two things they're full of. They've pretty near
walked their little feet off by this time, I expect, lookin' fur a
mine. They took the idee's soon's they see the wagon-load o' ore I
was haulin' through the Ute Pass: that's when I fust knew 'em; an' I
declare to you, the youngsters hain't never let go on't, 'n' I
dunno's they ever will."
"Mebbe, then, they'll find a mine yet," said old Pine. "There's one
o' the best mines in all Californy was found by a little feller not
more'n ten years old. He jest hauled up a bush with solid gold a
stickin' in the roots.
"You don't say so!" said Billy. "Well, there ain't no such free
gold's that in this country; but I wouldn't like any thing much
better, next to findin' a mine myself, than to have Mr. March's
folks find one. They're the sort o' folks ought to have money."
Billy worked very late that night fencing a little bit of the green
meadow nearest the house, to keep the fawn in. The little creature
seemed shy and frightened; and, when Billy drove away in the morning
to bring the family down, he charged Lucinda to go out often and
speak to it and feed it with sugar.
"I'd like to have it get over its scare before Nelly sees it," he
said; "for, if it don't seem to be happy, she's just the gal to go
on the sly and let the critter out, so it could go where it wants
to."
Billy was much disappointed, when he reached the hotel, to learn
that Mr. and Mrs. March and the children were out. They had gone to
one of the mines, and would not be back till dinner-time; for they
were going down into the mine.
"I never see any thing in all my life like that little chap," said
the landlord. "He don't rest a minute. I believe he 'n' his sister
have walked over every foot o' ground within five miles o' this
house; 'n' there ain't a workin' mine in all these gulches that he
don't know by name; 'n' he'll tell you who's the foreman 'n' how
many workmen are on; 'n' he's got about a wheelbarrow full o'
specimens o' one sort 'n' another, for his museum, 's he calls it.
The little girl she seems a kind o' nurse to him, she's so steady;
but they say they're twins: you wouldn't ever think it."
"No, that you wouldn't," replied Billy; "but they are. I like the
gal best myself. She don't say much; but there ain't nothin' escapes
her, 'n' she's just the sweetest-tempered little thing that was ever
born. She's too good: that's the worst on't. I don't like to see
youngsters always doin' right; 't don't look healthy."
Poor Lucinda's nice dinner was almost spoiled,--it had to wait so
long before the family came. Billy had not once thought of the
possibility of his not finding them at home, and had called out to
Lucinda, as he drove off:--
"Now, mind, Luce, you have all ready at one, sharp. We'll be here
before that time."
So, when Billy drove into the yard, at half-past two o'clock, he
felt quite crestfallen, and half afraid to see Lucinda's face in the
doorway. But she smiled pleasantly, and only said:--
"How punctual you are, to be sure! Dinner won't be very good."
"Never mind, Lucinda," said Mrs. March. "We were not at home. It
wasn't Billy's fault. He has been worrying about you for an hour. It
will taste very good to us all, for we are hungry."
Mrs. March praised every thing in the house, till Billy's face and
Lucinda's grew red with pleasure; and Mr. March also praised
everything out of doors.
"Didn't I tell you, Luce," said Billy, at the first chance he found
to whisper in her ear, "didn't I tell you they was nice folks to
work for? They don't let you slave yourself to death for 'em like
some folks, 'n' never say so much 's a thank you."
The delight of Rob and Nelly in the fawn was greater than could be
told in words. They ran round and round the enclosure, to see it
upon all sides; they fed it, till it would not eat another mouthful;
they stood still, gazing at it with almost unbelief in their faces.
"Oh, is it really our own? Will it always stay?" they cried. "It is
too good to be true."
I don't believe there was in all Colorado a happier family than went
to sleep under Mr. March's roof that night. Everybody was entirely
satisfied with the home and with everybody in it. Even Watch and
Trotter sat in the low-arched doors of their new houses, and held
their heads up, and looked around them with an air of contentment
and pride. They had never had houses of their own before. They had
slept on the great pile of sawdust by the old mill; but they walked
straight into these little houses and took possession of them as
naturally as possible. They almost made you think of people who,
when they come into possession of things much finer than they have
been accustomed to, try very hard to act as if they had had them all
their lives.