"Very well," I said, "go on. Don't mind me. If this creature wants to
sit in my lap, well and good. I expect it's tired."
But as they went on callously, I was obliged to shove the creature off
and to hobble on. Bill was still babbling about holdups, and Aggie was
saying that he was sunstruck, but of course it did not matter.
We made very slow progress, owing to taking frequent rests, and late in
the afternoon we were overtaken by Mr. Bell, on foot and carrying a
pack. He would have passed on without stopping, but Aggie hailed him.
"Not going to hike, are you?" she said pleasantly. Aggie is fond of
picking up the vernacular of a region.
"No," he said in a surly tone quite unlike his former urbane manner,
"I'm merely taking this pack out for a walk."
But he stopped and mopped his face.
"To tell you the truth, ladies," he said, "I'm working off a little
steam, that's all. I was afraid, if I stayed round the hotel, I'd do
something I'd be sorry for. There are times when I am not a fit
companion for any one, and this is one of them."
We invited him to join us, but he refused.
"No, I'm better alone," he said. "When things get too strong for me on
the trail I can sling things about. I've been throwing boulders down the
mountain every now and then. I'd just as soon they hit somebody as not.
Also," he added, "I'm safer away from any red-headed men."
We saw him glance at Bill, and understood. Mr. Oliver was red-headed.
"Love's an awful thing," said Bill as the young man went on, kicking
stones out of his way. "I'm glad I ain't got it."
Tish turned and eyed him. "True love is a very beautiful thing," she
rebuked him. "Although a single woman myself, I believe in it. 'Come
live with me and be my love,'" she quoted, sitting down to shake a stone
out of her riding-boot.
Bill looked startled. "I might say," he said hastily, "that I may have
misled you, ladies. I'm married."
"You said you had never been in love," Tish said sharply.
"Well, not to say real love," he replied. "She was the cook of an outfit
I was with and it just came about natural. She was going to leave, which
meant that I'd have to do the cooking, which I ain't much at, especially
pastry. So I married her."
Tish gave him a scornful glance but said nothing and we went on.
We camped late that afternoon beside Two Medicine Lake, and while Bill
put up the tents the three of us sat on a log and soaked our aching feet
in the water which was melted glacier, and naturally cold.
What was our surprise, on turning somewhat, to see the angry lover
fishing on a point near by. While we stared he pulled out a large trout,
and stalked away without a glance in our direction. As Tish, with her
usual forethought, had brought a trout rod, she hastily procured it, but
without result.
"Of course," Aggie said, "no fish! I could eat a piece of broiled fish.
I dare say I shall be skin and bone at the end of this trip--and not
much skin."
Bill had set up the sleeping-tent and built a fire, and it looked cozy
and comfortable. But Tish had the young man on her mind, and after
supper she put on a skirt which she had brought along and went to see
him.
"I'd take him some supper, Bill," she said, "but you are correct: you
are no cook."
She disappeared among the bushes, only to return in a short time,
jerking off her skirt as she came.
"He says all he wants is to be let alone," she said briefly. "I must say
I'm disappointed in him. He was very agreeable before."
I pass without comment over the night. Bill had put up the tent over the
root of a large tree, and we disposed ourselves about it as well as we
could. In the course of the night one of the horses broke loose and put
its head inside the tent. Owing to Aggie's thinking it was a bear, Tish
shot at it, fortunately missing it.
But the frightened animal ran away, and Bill was until noon the next day
finding it. We cooked our own breakfast, and Tish made some gems, having
brought the pan along. But the morning dragged, although the scenery was
lovely.
At twelve Bill brought the horse back and came over to us.
"If you don't mind my saying it, Miss Carberry," he observed, "you're a
bit too ready with that gun. First thing you know you'll put a hole
through me, and then where will you be?"
"I've got along without men most of my life," Tish said sharply. "I
reckon we'd manage."
"Well," he said, "there's another angle to it. Where would I be?"
"That's between you and your Creator," Tish retorted.
We went on again that afternoon, and climbed another precipice. We saw
no human being except a mountain goat, although Bill claimed to have
seen a bear. Tish was quite calm at all times, and had got so that she
could look down into eternity without a shudder. But Aggie and I were
still nervous, and at the steepest places we got off and walked.
The unfortunate part was that the exercise and the mountain air made
Aggie hungry, and there was little that she could eat.
"If any one had told me a month ago," she said, mopping her forehead,
"that I would be scaling the peaks of my country on crackers and tea, I
wouldn't have believed it. I'm done out, Lizzie. I can't climb another
inch."
Bill was ahead with the pack horse, and Tish, overhearing her, called
back some advice.
"Take your horse's tail and let him pull you up, Aggie," she said. "I've
read it somewhere."
Aggie, although frequently complaining, always does as Tish suggests. So
she took the horse's tail, when a totally unexpected thing happened.
Docile as the creature generally was, it objected at once, and kicked
out with both rear feet. In a moment, it seemed to me, Aggie was gone,
and her horse was moving on alone.
"Aggie!" I called in a panic.
Tish stopped, and we both looked about. Then we saw her, lying on a
ledge about ten feet below the trail. She was flat on her back, and her
riding-hat was gone. But she was uninjured, although shaken, for as we
looked she sat up, and an agonized expression came over her face.
"Aggie!" I cried. "Is anything broken?"
"Damnation!" said Aggie in an awful voice. "The upper set is gone!"
I have set down exactly what Aggie said. I admit that the provocation
was great. But Tish was not one to make allowances, and she turned and
went on, leaving us alone. She is not without feeling, however, for from
the top of the pass she sent Bill down with a rope, and we dragged poor
Aggie to the trail again. Her nerves were shaken and she was repentant
also, for when she found that her hat was gone she said nothing,
although her eyes took on a hunted look.
At the top of the pass Tish was sitting on a stone. She had taken her
mending-box from the saddle, where she always kept it handy, and was
drawing up a hole in her stocking. I observed to her pleasantly that it
was a sign of scandal to mend clothing while still on, but she ignored
me, although, as I reflected bitterly, I had not been kicked over the
cliff.
It was a subdued and speechless Aggie who followed us that afternoon
along the trail. As her hat was gone, I took the spare dish towel and
made a turban for her, with an end hanging down to protect the back of
her neck. But she expressed little gratitude, beyond observing that as
she was going over the edge piecemeal, she'd better have done it all at
once and be through with it.
The afternoon wore away slowly. It seemed a long time until we reached
our camping-place, partly because, although a small eater ordinarily,
the air and exercise had made me feel famished. But the disagreement
between Tish and Aggie, owing to the latter's unfortunate exclamation
while kicked over the cliff, made the time seem longer. There was not
the usual exchange of pleasant nothings between us.
But by six o'clock Tish was more amiable, having seen bear scratches on
trees near the camp, and anticipating the sight of a bear. She mixed up
a small cup cake while Bill was putting up our tent, and then, taking
her rod, proceeded to fish, while Aggie and I searched for grasshoppers.
These were few, owing to the altitude, but we caught four, which we
imprisoned in a match-box.
With them Tish caught four trout and, broiling them nicely, she offered
one to poor Aggie. It was a peace offering, and taken as such, so that
we were soon on our former agreeable footing, and all forgotten.
The next day it rained, and we were obliged to sit in the tent. Bill sat
with us, and talked mainly of desperadoes.
"As I observed before," he said, "there hasn't been any tourist holdup
yet. But it's bound to come. Take the Yellowstone, now,--one holdup a
year's the average, and it's full of soldiers at that."
"It's a wonder people keep on going," I observed, moving out of a puddle.
"Oh, I don't know," he said. "In one way it's good business. I take it
this way: When folks come West they want the West they've read about.
What do they care for irrigation and apple orchards? What they like is
danger and a little gunplay, the sort of thing they see in these here
moving pictures."
"I'm sure I don't," Aggie remarked. It was growing dusk, and she peered
out into the forest round us. "There is something crackling out there
now," she said.
"Only a bear, likely," Bill assured her. "We have a sight of bears here.
No, ma'am, they want danger. And every holdup's an advertisement. You
see, the Government can't advertise these here parks; not the way it
should, anyhow. But a holdup's news, so the papers print it, and it sets
people to thinking about the park. Maybe they never thought of the place
and are arranging to go elsewhere. Then along comes a gang and raises
h--, raises trouble, and the park's in every one's mouth, so to speak.
We'd get considerable business if there was one this summer."
At that moment the crackling outside increased, and a shadowy form
emerged from the bushes. Even Bill stood up, and Aggie screamed.
It was, however, only poor Mr. Bell.
"Mind if I borrow some matches?" he said gruffly.
"We can't lend matches," Tish replied. "At least, I don't see the use of
sending them back after they've been lighted. We can give you some."
"My mistake," he said.
That was all he said, except the word "Thanks" when I reached him a box.
"He's a surly creature," Tish observed as he crackled through the brush
again. "More than likely that girl's better off without him."
"He looks rather downhearted," Aggie remarked. "Much that we think is
temper is due to unhappiness."
"Much of your charitable view is due to a good dinner too," Tish said.
"Here we are, in the center of the wilderness, with great peaks on every
hand, and we meet a fellow creature who speaks nine words, and begrudges
those. If he's as stingy with money as with language she's had a narrow
escape."
"He's had kind of a raw deal," Bill put in. "The girl was stuck on him
all right, until this moving-picture chap came along. He offered to take
some pictures with her in them, and it was all off. They're making up a
play now, and she's to be in it."
"What sort of a play?" Tish demanded.
"Sorry not to oblige," Bill replied. "Can't say the nature of it."
But all of us felt that Bill knew and would not say.
Tish, to whom a mystery is a personal affront, determined to find out
for herself; and when later in the evening we saw the light of Bell's
camp-fire, it was Tish herself who suggested that we go over and visit
with him.
"We can converse about various things," she said, "and take his mind
from his troubles. But it would be better not to mention affairs of the
heart. He's probably sensitive."
So we left Bill to look after things, and went to call on Mr. Bell. It
was farther to his camp than it had appeared, and Tish unfortunately ran
into a tree and bruised her nose badly. When it had stopped bleeding,
however, we went on, and at last arrived.
He was sitting on a log by the fire, smoking a pipe and looking very
sad. Behind him was a bit of a tent not much larger than an umbrella.
Aggie touched my arm. "My heart aches for him," she said. "There is
despair in his very eyes."
I do not believe that at first he was very glad to see us, but he
softened somewhat when Tish held out the cake she had brought.
"That's very nice of you," he said, rising. "I'm afraid I can't ask you
to sit down. The ground's wet and there is only this log."
"I've sat on logs before," Tish replied. "We thought we'd call, seeing
we are neighbors. As the first comers it was our place to call first, of
course."
"I see," he said, and poked up the fire with a piece of stick.
"We felt that you might be lonely," said Aggie.
"I came here to be lonely," he replied gloomily. "I want to be lonely."
Tish, however, was determined to be cheerful, and asked him, as a safe
subject, how he felt about the war.
"War?" he said. "That's so, there is a war. To tell the truth, I had
forgotten about it. I've been thinking of other things."
We saw that it was going to be difficult to cheer him. Tish tried the
weather, which brought us nowhere, as he merely grunted. But Aggie
broached the subject of desperadoes, and he roused somewhat.
"There are plenty of shady characters in the park," he said shortly.
"Wolves in sheep's clothing, that's what they are."
"Bill, our guide, says there may be a holdup at any time."
"Sure there is," he said calmly. "There's one going to be pulled off in
the next day or two."
We sat petrified, and Aggie's eyes were starting out of her head.
"All the trimmings," he went on, staring at the fire. "Innocent and
unsuspecting tourists, lunch, laughter, boiled coffee, and cold ham.
Ambush. The whole business--followed by highwaymen in flannel shirts and
revolvers. Dead tourist or two, desperate resistance--everything."
Aggie rose, pale as an aspen. "You--you are joking!" she cried.
"Do I look like it?" he demanded fiercely. "I tell you there is going to
be the whole thing. At the end the lovely girl will escape on horseback
and ride madly for aid. She will meet the sheriff and a posse, who are
out for a picnic or some such damfool nonsense, and--"
"Young man," Tish said coldly, "if you know all this, why are you
sitting here and not alarming the authorities?"
"Pooh!" he said disagreeably. "It's a put-up scheme, to advertise the
park. Yellowstone's got ahead of them this year, and has had its
excitement, with all the papers ringing with it. That was a gag, too,
probably."
"Do you mean--"
"I mean considerable," he said. "That red-headed movie idiot will be on
a rise, taking the tourists as they ride through. Of course he doesn't
expect the holdup--not in the papers anyhow. He happens to have the
camera trained on the party, and gets it all. Result--a whacking good
picture, revolvers firing blank cartridges, everything which people will
crowd to see. Oh, it's good business all right. I don't mind admitting
that."
Tish's face expressed the greatest rage. She rose, drawing herself to
her full height.
"And the tourists?" she demanded. "They lend themselves to this
imposition? To this infamy? To this turpitude?"
"Certainly not. They think it's the real thing. The whole business hangs
on that. And as the sheriff, or whoever it is in the fool plot, captures
the bandits, the party gets its money back, and has material for
conversation for the next twenty years."
"To think," said Tish, "of our great National Government lending itself
to such a scheme!"
"Wrong," said the young man. "It's a combination of Western railroads
and a movie concern acting together."
"I trust," Tish observed, setting her lips firmly, "that the tourists
will protest."
"The more noise, the better." The young man, though not more cheerful as
to appearance, was certainly more talkative. "Trust a clergyman for
yelling when his pocket's picked."