THE WAY TO MAKE A DOLL
For a moment after the quaint little pilgrim had spoken, the miner
stared at him almost in awe. Had a gold nugget dropped at his feet
from the sky his amazement could scarcely have been greater.
"What's that?" he said. "Nobody wants you, little boy? What's the
matter with me and the pup?" And taking the tiny chap up in his arms
he sat in the doorway and held him snugly to his rough, old heart and
rocked back and forth, in a tumult of feeling that nothing could
express.
"Little pard," he said, "you bet me and Tintoretto want you, right
here."
For his part, Tintoretto thumped the house and the step and the miner's
shins with the clumsy tail that was wagging his whole puppy body. Then
he clambered up and pushed his awkward paws in the little youngster's
face, and licked his ear and otherwise overwhelmed him with attentions,
till his master pushed him off. At this he growled and began to chew
the big, rough hand that suppressed his demonstrations.
In lieu of the ears of the rabbit to which he had clung throughout the
night, the silent little man on the miner's knee was holding now to
Jim's enormous fist, which he found conveniently supplied. He said
nothing more, and for quite a time old Jim was content to watch his
baby face.
"A white little kid--that nobody wants--but me and Tintoretto," he
mused, aloud, but to himself. "Where did you come from, pardner,
anyhow?"
The tiny foundling made no reply. He simply looked at the thin, kindly
face of his big protector in his quaint, baby way, but kept his solemn
little mouth peculiarly closed.
The miner tried a score of questions, tenderly, coaxingly, but never a
thing save that confident clinging to his hand and a nod or a shake of
the head resulted.
By some means, quite his own, the man appeared to realize that the
grave little fellow had never prattled as children usually do, and that
what he had said had been spoken with difficulties, only overcome by
stress of emotion. The mystery of whence a bit of a boy so tiny could
have come, and who he was, especially after his baby statement that
nobody wanted him, anywhere, remained unbroken, after all the miner's
queries. Jim was at length obliged to give it up.
"Do you like that little dog?" he said, as Tintoretto renewed his
overtures of companionship. "Do you like old brother Jim and the pup?"
Solemnly the little pilgrim nodded.
"Want some breakfast, all pretty, in our own little house?"
Once more the quaint and grave little nod was forthcoming.
"All right. We'll have it bustin' hot in the shake of a crockery
animal's tail," announced the miner.
He carried the mite of a man inside and placed him again in the bunk,
where the little fellow found his rabbit and drew it into his arms.
The banquet proved to be a repetition of the supper of the night
before, except that two great flapjacks were added to the menu, greased
with fat from the bacon and sprinkled a half-inch thick with soft brown
sugar.
When the cook fetched his hungry little guest to the board the rabbit
came as well.
"You ought to have a dolly," decided Jim, with a knowing nod. "If only
I had the ingenuity I could make one, sure," and throughout the meal he
was planning the manufacture of something that should beat the whole
wide world for cleverness.
The result of his cogitation was that he took no time for washing the
dishes after breakfast, but went to work at once to make a doll. The
initial step was to take the hide from the rabbit. Sadly but
unresistingly the little pilgrim resigned his pet, and never expected
again to possess the comfort of its fur against his face.
With the skin presently rolled up in a nice light form, however, the
miner was back in the cabin, looking for something of which to fashion
a body and head for the lady-to-be. There seemed to be nothing handy,
till he thought of a peeled potato for the lady's head and a big metal
powder-flask to supply the body.
Unfortunately, as potatoes were costly, the only tuber they had in the
house was a weazened old thing that parted with its wrinkled skin
reluctantly and was not very white when partially peeled. However, Jim
pared off enough of its surface on which to make a countenance, and
left the darker hide above to form the dolly's hair. He bored two
eyes, a nose, and a mouth in the toughened substance, and blackened
them vividly with soot from the chimney. After this he bored a larger
hole, beneath the chin, and pushed the head thus created upon the metal
spout of the flask, where it certainly stuck with firmness.
With a bit of cord the skin of the rabbit was now secured about the
neck and body of the lady's form, and her beauty was complete. That
certain particles of powder rattled lightly about in her graceful
interior only served to render her manners more animated and her person
more like good, lively company, for Jim so decided himself.
"There you are. That's the prettiest dolly you ever saw anywhere,"
said he, as he handed it over to the willing little chap. "And she all
belongs to you."
The mite of a boy took her hungrily to his arms, and Jim was peculiarly
affected.
"Do you want to give her a name?" he said.
Slowly the quaint little pilgrim shook his head.
"Have you got a name?" the miner inquired, as he had a dozen times
before.
This time a timid nod was forthcoming.
"Oh," said Jim, in suppressed delight. "What is your nice little name?"
For a moment coyness overtook the tiny man. Then he faintly replied,
"Nu-thans."
"Nuisance?" repeated the miner, and again he saw the timid little nod.
"But that ain't a name," said Jim. "Is 'Nuisance' all the name the
baby's got?"
His bit of a guest seemed to think very hard, but at last he nodded as
before.
"Well, string my pearls," said the miner to himself, "if somebody
'ain't been mean and low!" He added, cheerfully, "Wal, it's easier to
live down a poor name than it is to live up to a fine one, any day, but
we'll name you somethin' else, I reckon, right away. And ain't that
dolly nice?"
The two were in the midst of appreciating the charms of her ladyship
when the cabin door was abruptly opened and in came a coatless, fat,
little, red-headed man, puffing like a bellows and pulling down his
shirtsleeves with a great expenditure of energy, only to have them
immediately crawl back to his elbows.
"Hullo, Keno," drawled the lanky Jim. "I thought you was mad and gone
away and died."
"Me? Not me!" puffed the visitor.
"What's that?" and he nodded himself nearly off his balance towards the
tiny guest he saw upon a stool.
With a somewhat belated bark, Tintoretto suddenly came out from his
boot-chewing contest underneath the table and gave the new-comer an
apoplectic start.
"Hey!" he cried. "Hey! By jinks! a whole menajry!"
"That's the pup," said Jim. "And, Keno, here's a poor little skeezucks
that I found a-sittin' in the brush, 'way over to Coyote Valley. I
fetched him home last night, and I was just about to take him down to
camp and show him to the boys."
"By jinks!" said Keno. "Alive!"
"Alive and smart as mustard," said the suddenly proud possessor of a
genuine surprise. "You bet he's smart! I've often noticed how there
never yet was any other kind of a baby. That's one consolation left to
every fool man livin'--he was once the smartest baby in the world,"
"Alive!" repeated Keno, as before. "I'm goin' right down and tell the
camp!"
He bolted out at the door like a shot, and ran down the hill to
Borealis with all his might.
Aware that the news would be spread like a sprinkle of rain, the lanky
Jim put on his hat with a certain jaunty air of importance, and taking
the grave little man on his arm, with the new-made doll and the pup for
company, he followed, where Keno had just disappeared from view, down
the slope.
A moment later the town was in sight, and groups of flannel-shirted,
dusty-booted, slouchily attired citizens were discernible coming out of
buildings everywhere.
Running up the hill again, puffing with added explosiveness, Keno could
hardly contain his excitement.
"I've told em!" he panted. "They know he's alive and smart as mustard!"