Produced by Blain Nelson, Eric Eldred, Charles Franks and
the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
ELDER CONKLIN
AND OTHER STORIES
By Frank Harris
New York
Macmillan And Co.
And London 1894
_All rights reserved_
COPYRIGHT, 1894,
BY MACMILLAN AND CO.
* * * * *
CONTENTS
ELDER CONKLIN
THE SHERIFF AND HIS PARTNER
A MODERN IDYLL
EATIN' CROW
THE BEST MAN IN GAROTTE
GULMORE, THE BOSS
ELDER CONKLIN.
As soon as the Elder left the supper-table his daughter and the new
schoolmaster went out on the stoop or verandah which ran round the
frame-house. The day had been warm, but the chilliness of the evening
air betokened the near approach of the Indian summer. The house stood
upon the crest of what had been a roll in the prairie, and as the two
leant together on the railing of the stoop, they looked out over a small
orchard of peach-trees to where, a couple of hundred yards away, at the
foot of the bluff, Cottonwood Creek ran, fringed on either bank by the
trees which had suggested its name. On the horizon to their right, away
beyond the spears of yellow maize, the sun was sinking, a ball of orange
fire against the rose mist of the sky. When the girl turned towards him,
perhaps to avoid the level rays, Bancroft expressed the hope that she
would go with him to the house-warming. A little stiffly Miss Conklin
replied that she'd be pleased, but--
“What have I done, Miss Loo, to offend you?” the young man spoke
deprecatingly.
“Nothin', I guess,” she answered, with assumed indifference.
“When I first came you were so kind and helped me in everything. Now for
the last two or three days you seem cold and sarcastic, as if you were
angry with me. I'd be sorry if that were so--very sorry.”
“Why did you ask Jessie Stevens to go with you to the house-warmin'?”
was the girl's retort.
“I certainly didn't ask her,” he replied hotly. “You must know I
didn't.”
“Then Seth lied!” exclaimed Miss Conklin. “But I guess he'll not try
that again with me--Seth Stevens I mean. He wanted me to go with him
to-night, and I didn't give him the mitten, as I should if I'd thought
you were goin' to ask me.”
“What does 'giving the mitten' mean?” he questioned, with a puzzled air.
“Why, jest the plainest kind of refusal, I guess; but I only told him
I was afraid I'd have to go with you, seein' you were a stranger.
'Afraid,'” she repeated, as if the word stung her. “But he'll lose
nothin' by waitin', nothin'. You hear me talk.” And her eyes flashed.
As she drew herself up in indignation, Bancroft thought he had never
seen any one so lovely. “A perfect Hebe,” he said to himself, and
started as if he had said the words aloud. The comparison was apt.
Though Miss Loo Conklin was only seventeen, her figure had all the
ripeness of womanhood, and her height--a couple of inches above the
average--helped to make her look older than she was. Her face was more
than pretty; it was, in fact, as beautiful as youth, good features, and
healthy colouring could make it. A knotted mass of chestnut hair set off
the shapely head: the large blue eyes were deepened by dark lashes. The
underlip, however, was a little full, and the oval of the face through
short curve of jaw a trifle too round. Her companion tried in vain to
control the admiration of his gaze. Unelated by what she felt to be
merely her due, Miss Conklin was silent for a time. At length she
observed:
“I guess I'll have to go and fix up.”
Just then the Elder appeared on the stoop. “Ef you're goin',” he said
in the air, as his daughter swept past him into the house, “you'd better
hitch Jack up to the light buggy.”
“Thank you,” said the schoolmaster; and for the sake of saying
something, he added, “What a fine view.” The Elder paused but did not
answer; he saw nothing remarkable in the landscape except the Indian
corn and the fruit, and the words “fine view” conveyed no definite
meaning to him; he went on towards the stables.
The taciturnity of the Elder annoyed Bancroft excessively. He had now
passed a couple of weeks as a boarder with the Conklins, and the Elder's
unconscious rudeness was only one of many peculiarities that had brought
him to regard these Western folk as belonging almost to a distinct
species. George Bancroft was an ordinary middle-class Bostonian. He
had gone through the University course with rather more than average
success, and had the cant of unbounded intellectual sympathies. His
self-esteem, however, was not based chiefly on his intelligence, but on
the ease with which he reached a conventional standard of conduct. Not
a little of his character showed itself in his appearance. In figure he
was about the middle height, and strongly though sparely built. The head
was well-proportioned; the face a lean oval; the complexion sallow;
the hair and small moustache very dark; the brown eyes inexpressive
and close-set, revealing a tendency to suspiciousness--Bancroft prided
himself on his prudence. A certain smartness of dress and a conscious
carriage discovered a vanity which, in an older man, would have been
fatuous. A large or a sensitive nature would in youth, at least,
have sought unconsciously to bring itself into sympathy with strange
surroundings, but Bancroft looked upon those who differed from him in
manners or conduct as inferior, and this presumption in regard to the
Conklins was strengthened by his superiority in book-learning, the
importance of which he had been trained to over-estimate.
During their drive Miss Conklin made her companion talk of Eastern life;
she wanted to know what Chicago was like, and what people did in New
York. Stirred by her eager curiosity, Bancroft sketched both cities
in hasty outline, and proceeded to tell what he had read and heard of
Paris, and Rome, and London. But evidently the girl was not interested
by his praise of the art-life of European capitals or their historical
associations; she cut short his disquisition:
“See here! When I first seed you an' knew you was raised in Boston, an'
had lived in New York, I jest thought you no account for comin' to this
jumpin'-off place. Why did you come to Kansas, anyway, and what did you
reckon upon doin'? I guess you ain't goin' to teach school always.”
The young man flushed under the frankness of the girl's gaze and
question, and what appeared like contempt in her opinion of him. Again
he became painfully conscious that there was a wide social difference
between Miss Conklin and himself. He had been accustomed to more
reticence, and such direct questioning seemed impertinent. But he was so
completely under the spell of her beauty, that he answered with scarcely
visible hesitation:
“I came out here because I wanted to study law, and wasn't rich enough
to do it in the East. This school was the first position offered to me.
I had to take it, but I intend, after a term or two, to find a place in
a lawyer's office in some town, and get admitted to practice. If I'd had
fifteen hundred dollars I could have done that in Boston or New York,
but I suppose it will all come right in time.”
“If I'd been you I'd have stayed in New York,” and then, clasping her
hands on her knee, and looking intently before her, she added, “When
I get to New York--an' that won't be long--I'll stay there, you bet!
I guess New York's good enough for me. There's style there,” and she
nodded her head decisively as she spoke.
Miss Loo and Bancroft were among the latest arrivals at the Morrises'.
She stood beside him while he hitched Jack to a post of the fence amidst
a crowd of other horses, and they entered the house together. In
due form she presented the schoolmaster to Mr. and Mrs. Morris, and
smilingly produced three linen tablecloths as her contribution to the
warming. After accepting the present with profuse thanks and unmeasured
praise of it and of the giver, Mrs. Morris conducted the newcomers
across the passage into the best sitting-room, which the young folk had
already appropriated, leaving the second-best room to their elders.
In the small square apartment were some twenty boys and girls, ranging
between sixteen and twenty-two years of age. The boys stood about at
one end of the room, while the girls sat at the other end chattering
and enjoying themselves. Bancroft did not go among those of his own
sex, none of whom he knew, and whom he set down as mere uncouth lads. He
found it more amusing to stand near the girls and talk with them. By so
doing he unconsciously offended the young men.
Presently a tall youth came towards them:
“I guess we'd better play somethin'?”
“Forfeits! Mr. Stevens,” was a girl's quick reply, and it was arranged
to play forfeits in a queer educational fashion. First of all Mr.
Stevens left the room, presumably to think. When he came in again he
went over to Miss Conklin and asked her to spell “forgive.” After a
moment's pause she spelt it correctly. He retired slowly, and on
his return stopped again in front of Miss Conklin with the word
“reconciliation.” She withstood the test triumphantly. Annoyed
apparently with the pains she took, Mr. Stevens, on his next entrance,
turned to a pretty, quiet girl named Miss Black, and gave her
“stranger,” with a glance at Bancroft, which spread a laugh among the
boys. Miss Black began with “strai,” and was not allowed to go on, for
Mr. Stevens at once offered his arm, and led her into the passage.
“What takes place outside?” asked Bancroft confidentially of the girl
sitting nearest to him, who happened to be Miss Jessie Stevens. She
replied with surprise:
“I guess they kiss each other!”
“Ah!--Now I understand,” he said to himself, and from that moment
followed the proceedings with more interest. He soon found that
successive pairs called each other out in turn, and he had begun to tire
of the game, when Miss Jessie Stevens stopped before him and pertly gave
the word “friendship.” Of course he spelt it wrongly, and accompanied
her outside the door. As he kissed her cheek, she drew away her head
quickly:
“I only called you out to give you a chance of kissin' Loo Conklin.”
He thought it wiser not to reply to this, and contented himself with
thanking her as they entered the room. He paused before Miss Conklin,
and gave her “bumpkin,” adding, by way of explanation, “a rude country
fellow.” She spelt it cheerfully, without the “p.” When the mistake was
made plain to her, which took some little time, she accepted his arm,
and went with him into the passage. He kissed her more than once,
murmuring, “At last, Miss Loo!” She replied seriously:
“See here! You're goin' to get into a fuss with Seth Stevens if you call
me out often. And he's the strongest of them all. You ain't afraid? O.K.
then. I guess we'll pay him out for lyin'.”
On returning to the room, Bancroft became conscious of a thinly veiled
antagonism on the part of the young men. But he had hardly time to
notice it, when Miss Loo came in and said to him demurely, “Loo.” He
spelt “You.” Much laughter from the girls greeted the simple pleasantry.
So the game, punctuated by kisses, went on, until Miss Loo came in
for the fourth time, and stopped again before Bancroft, whereupon Seth
Stevens pushed through the crowd of young men, and said:
“Miss Loo Conklin! You know the rule is to change after three times.”
At once she moved in front of the stout youth, Richards, who had come
forward to support his friend, and said “liar!” flashing at the same
time an angry glance at Stevens. “Lire,” spelt Richards painfully, and
the pair withdrew.
Bancroft went over to the men's corner; the critical moment had come;
he measured his rival with a glance. Stevens was tall, fully six feet
in height, and though rather lank, had the bow legs and round shoulders
which often go with strength.
As he took up his new position, Stevens remarked to a companion, in a
contemptuous drawl:
“Schoolmasters kin talk an' teach, but kin they fight?”
Bancroft took it upon himself to answer, “Sometimes.”
“Kin you?” asked Stevens sharply, turning to him.
“Well enough.”
“We kin try that to-morrow. I'll be in the lot behind Richards' mill at
four o'clock.”
“I'll be there,” replied the schoolmaster, making his way again towards
the group of girls.
Nothing further happened until the old folk came in, and the party broke
up. Driving homewards with Miss Conklin, Bancroft began:
“How can I thank you enough for being so kind to me? You called me out
often, almost as often as I called you.”
“I did that to rile Seth Stevens.”
“And not at all to please me?”
“Perhaps a little,” she said, and silence fell upon them.
His caution led him to restrain himself. He was disturbed by vague
doubts, and felt the importance of a decisive word. Presently Miss
Conklin spoke, in a lower voice than usual, but with an accent of
coquettish triumph in the question:
“So you like me after all? Like me really?”
“Do you doubt it?” His accent was reproachful. “But why do you say
'after all'?”
“You never kissed me comin' back from church last Sunday, and I showed
you the school and everythin'!”
“Might I have kissed you then? I was afraid of offending you.”
“Offendin' me? Well, I guess not! Every girl expects to be kissed when
she goes out with a man.”
“Let's make up for it now, Loo. May I call you Loo?” While speaking he
slipped his arm round her waist, and kissed her again and again.
“That's my name. But there! I guess you've made up enough already.” And
Miss Conklin disengaged herself. On reaching the house, however, she
offered her lips before getting out of the buggy.
When alone in his bedroom, Bancroft sat and thought. The events of the
evening had been annoying. Miss Loo's conduct had displeased him; he did
not like familiarity. He would not acknowledge to himself that he
was jealous. The persistent way Stevens had tried to puzzle her had
disgusted him--that was all. It was sufficiently plain that in the past
she had encouraged Stevens. Her freedom and boldness grated upon his
nerves. He condemned her with a sense of outraged delicacy. Girls ought
not to make advances; she had no business to ask him whether he liked
her; she should have waited for him to speak plainly. He only required
what was right. Yet the consciousness that she loved him flattered his
vanity and made him more tolerant; he resolved to follow her lead or to
improve upon it. Why shouldn't he? She had said “every girl expects to
be kissed.” And if she wanted to be kissed, it was the least he could do
to humour her.
All the while, at the bottom of his heart there was bitterness. He would
have given much to believe that an exquisite soul animated that lovely
face. Perhaps she was better than she seemed. He tried to smother
his distrust of her, till it was rendered more acute by another
reflection--she had got him into the quarrel with Seth Stevens. He did
not trouble much about it. He was confident enough of his strength and
the advantages of his boyish training in the gymnasium to regard the
trial with equanimity. Still, the girls he had known in the East would
never have set two men to fight, never--it was not womanly. Good girls
were by nature peacemakers. There must be something in Loo, he argued,
almost--vulgar, and he shrank from the word. To lessen the sting of
his disappointment, he pictured her to himself and strove to forget her
faults.
On the following morning he went to his school very early. The girls
were not as obtrusive as they had been. Miss Jessie Stevens did not
bother him by coming up every five minutes to see what he thought of her
dictation, as she had been wont to do. He was rather glad of this; it
saved him importunate glances and words, and the propinquity of girlish
forms, which had been more trying still. But what was the cause of the
change? It was evident that the girls regarded him as belonging to Miss
Conklin. He disliked the assumption; his caution took alarm; he would
be more careful in future. The forenoon melted into afternoon quietly,
though there were traces on Jake Conklin's bench of unusual agitation
and excitement. To these signs the schoolmaster paid small heed at the
moment. He was absorbed in thinking of the evening before, and in trying
to appraise each of Loo's words and looks. At last the time came for
breaking up. When he went outside to get into the buggy--he had brought
Jack with him--he noticed, without paying much attention to it, that
Jake Conklin was not there to unhitch the strap and in various other
ways to give proof of a desire to ride with him. He set off for
Richards' mill, whither, needless to say, Jake and half-a-dozen other
urchins had preceded him as fast as their legs could carry them.
As soon as he was by himself the schoolmaster recognized that the affair
was known to his scholars, and the knowledge nettled him. His anger
fastened upon Loo. It was all her fault; her determination to “pay
Stevens out” had occasioned the quarrel. Well, he would fight and win,
and then have done with the girl whose lips had doubtless been given to
Stevens as often and as readily as to himself. The thought put him in
a rage, while the idea of meeting Stevens on an equality humiliated
him--strife with such a boor was in itself a degradation. And Loo had
brought it about. He could never forgive her. The whole affair was
disgraceful, and her words, “Every girl expects to be kissed when she
goes out with a man,” were vulgar and coarse! With which conclusion in
his mind he turned to the right round the section-line, and saw the mill
before him.
* * * * *
After the return from the house-warming, and the understanding, as she
considered it, with Bancroft, Miss Loo gave herself up to her new-born
happiness. As she lay in bed her first thought was of her lover: he
was “splendid,” whereby she meant pleasant and attractive. She wondered
remorsefully how she had taken him to be quite “homely-looking” when
she first saw him. Why, he was altogether above any one she knew--not
perhaps jest in looks, but in knowledge and in manners--he didn't stand
in the corner of the room like the rest and stare till all the girls
became uncomfortable. What did looks matter after all? Besides, he
wasn't homely, he was handsome; so he was. His eyes were lovely--she had
always liked dark eyes best--and his moustache was dark, too, and she
liked that. To be sure it wasn't very long yet, or thick, but it would
grow; and here she sighed with content. Most girls in her place would
be sorry he wasn't taller, but she didn't care for very tall men; they
sorter looked down on you. Anyway, he was strong--a pang of fear shot
suddenly through her--he might be hurt by that brute Seth Stevens on the
morrow. Oh, no. That was impossible. He was brave, she felt sure, very
brave. Still she wished they weren't going to fight; it made her uneasy
to think that she had provoked the conflict. But it couldn't be helped
now; she couldn't interfere. Besides, men were always fightin' about
somethin' or other.
Mr. Crew, the Minister, had said right off that he'd make his mark in
the world; all the girls thought so too, and that was real good. She'd
have hated a stupid, ordinary man. Fancy being married to Seth Stevens,
and she shuddered; yet he was a sight better than any of the others;
he had even seemed handsome to her once. Ugh! Then Bancroft's face came
before her again, and remembering his kisses she flushed and grew hot
from head to foot. They would be married soon--right off. As George
hadn't the money, her father must give what he could and they'd go
East. Her father wouldn't refuse, though he'd feel bad p'r'aps; he never
refused her anythin'. If fifteen hundred dollars would be enough for
George alone, three thousand would do for both of them. Once admitted
as a lawyer, he would get a large practice: he was so clever and
hard-working. She was real glad that she'd be the means of giving him
the opportunity he wanted to win riches and position. But he must begin
in New York. She would help him on, and she'd see New York and all the
shops and elegant folk, and have silk dresses. They'd live in a hotel
and get richer and richer, and she'd drive about with--here she grew hot
again. The vision, however, was too entrancing to be shut out; she
saw herself distinctly driving in an open carriage, with a negro nurse
holding the baby all in laces in front, “jest too cute for anythin',”
and George beside her, and every one in Fifth Avenue starin'.
Sleep soon brought confusion into her picture of a happy future; but
when she awoke, the glad confidence of the previous night had given
place to self-reproach and fear. During the breakfast she scarcely
spoke or lifted her eyes. Her silent preoccupation was misunderstood by
Bancroft; he took it to mean that she didn't care what happened to him;
she was selfish, he decided. All the morning she went about the house in
a state of nervous restlessness, and at dinner-time her father noticed
her unusual pallor and low spirits. To the Elder, the meal-times were
generally a source of intense pleasure. He was never tired of feasting
his eyes upon his daughter when he could do so without attracting
attention, and he listened to her fluent obvious opinions on men and
things with a fulness of pride and joy which was difficult to divine
since his keenest feelings never stirred the impassibility of his
features. He had small power of expressing his thoughts, and even in
youth he had felt it impossible to render in words any deep emotion.
For more than forty years the fires of his nature had been “banked up.”
Reticent and self-contained, he appeared to be hard and cold; yet his
personality was singularly impressive. About five feet ten in height, he
was lean and sinewy, with square shoulders and muscles of whipcord. His
face recalled the Indian type; the same prominent slightly beaked nose,
high cheek bones and large knot of jaw. But there the resemblance ended.
The eyes were steel-blue; the upper lip long; the mouth firm; short,
bristly, silver hair stood up all over his head, in defiant contrast to
the tanned, unwrinkled skin. He was clean-shaven, and looked less than
his age, which was fifty-eight.
All through the dinner he wondered anxiously what could so affect his
daughter, and how he could find out without intruding himself upon her
confidence. His great love for his child had developed in the Elder
subtle delicacies of feeling which are as the fragrance of love's
humility. In the afternoon Loo, dressed for walking, met him, and, of
her own accord, began the conversation:
“Father, I want to talk to you.”
The Elder put down the water-bucket he had been carrying, and drew the
shirt-sleeves over his nervous brown arms, whether out of unconscious
modesty or simple sense of fitness it would be impossible to say. She
went on hesitatingly, “I want to know--Do you think Mr. Bancroft's
strong, stronger than--Seth Stevens?”
The Elder gave his whole thought to the problem. “P'r'aps,” he said,
after a pause, in which he had vainly tried to discover how his daughter
wished him to answer, “p'r'aps; he's older and more sot. There ain't
much difference, though. In five or six years Seth'll be a heap
stronger than the schoolmaster; but now,” he added quickly, reading his
daughter's face, “he ain't man enough. He must fill out first.”
She looked up with bright satisfaction, and twining her hands round his
arm began coaxingly:
“I'm goin' to ask you for somethin', father. You know you told me
that on my birthday you'd give me most anythin' I wanted. Wall, I want
somethin' this month, not next, as soon as I can get it--a pianner. I
guess the settin'-room would look smarter-like, an' I'd learn to play.
All the girls do East,” she added, pouting.
“Yes,” the Elder agreed thoughtfully, doubting whether he should follow
her lead eastwards, “I reckon that's so. I'll see about it right off,
Loo. I oughter hev thought of it before. But now, right off,” and as
he spoke he laid his large hand with studied carelessness on her
shoulder--he was afraid that an intentional caress might be inopportune.
“I'm cert'in Mr. Bancroft's sisters play, an' I--” she looked down
nervously for a moment, and then, still blushing deeply, changed the
attack: “He's smart, ain't he, father? He'd make a good lawyer, wouldn't
he?”
“I reckon he would,” replied the Elder.
“I'm so glad,” the girl went on hurriedly, as if afraid to give herself
time to think of what she was about to say, “for, father, he wants to
study in an office East and he hain't got the money, and--oh, father!”
she threw her arms round his neck and hid her face on his shoulder, “I
want to go with him.”
The Elder's heart seemed to stop beating, but he could not hold his
loved one in his arms and at the same time realize his own pain. He
stroked the bowed head gently, and after a pause:
“He could study with Lawyer Barkman in Wichita, couldn't he? and then
you'd be to hum still. No. Wall! Thar!” and again came a pause of
silence. “I reckon, anyhow, you knew I'd help you. Didn't you now?”
His daughter drew herself out of his embrace. Recalled thus to the
matter in hand he asked: “Did he say how much money 'twould take?”
“Two or three thousand dollars”--and she scanned his face
anxiously--“for studyin' and gettin' an office and everythin' in New
York. Things are dearer there.”
“Wall, I guess we kin about cover that with a squeeze. It'll be full all
I kin manage to onc't--that and the pianner. I've no one to think of but
you, Loo, only you. That's what I've bin workin' for, to give you a fair
start, and I'm glad I kin jess about do it. I'd sorter take it better if
he'd done the studyin' by himself before. No! wall, it don't make much
difference p'r'aps. Anyway he works, and Mr. Crew thinks him enough
eddicated even for the Ministry. He does, and that's a smart lot. I
guess he'll get along all right.” Delighted with the expression of
intent happiness in his daughter's eyes, he continued: “He's young
yet, and couldn't be expected to hev done the studyin' and law and
everythin'. You kin be sartin that the old man'll do all he knows to
help start you fair. All I kin. If you're sot upon it! That's enough fer
me, I guess, ef you're rale sot on it, and you don't think 'twould be
better like to wait a little. He could study with Barkman fer a year
anyway without losin' time. No! wall, wall. I'm right thar when you want
me. I'll go to work to do what I kin....
“P'r'aps we might sell off and go East, too. The farm's worth money now
it's all settled up round hyar. The mother and me and Jake could get
along, I reckon, East or West. I know more'n I did when I came out in
'59.
“I'm glad you've told me. I think a heap more of him now. There must
be a pile of good in any one you like, Loo. Anyhow he's lucky.” And he
stroked her crumpled dress awkwardly, but with an infinite tenderness.
“I've got to go now, father,” she exclaimed, suddenly remembering the
time. “But there!”--and again she threw her arms round his neck and
kissed him. “You've made me very happy. I've got to go right off, and
you've all the chores to do, so I mustn't keep you any longer.”
She hurried to the road along which Jake would have to come with the
news of the fight. When she reached the top of the bluff whence the road
fell rapidly to the creek, no one was in sight. She sat down and gave
herself up to joyous anticipations.
“What would George say to her news? Where should they be married?”----a
myriad questions agitated her. But a glance down the slope from time to
time checked her pleasure. At last she saw her brother running towards
her. He had taken off his boots and stockings; they were slung round his
neck, and his bare feet pattered along in the thick, white dust of the
prairie track. His haste made his sister's heart beat in gasps of fear.
Down the hill she sped, and met him on the bridge.
“Wall?” she asked quietly, but the colour had left her cheeks, and Jake
was not to be deceived so easily.
“Wall what?” he answered defiantly, trying to get breath. “I hain't said
nothin'.”
“Oh, you mean boy!” she cried indignantly. “I'll never help you again
when father wants to whip you--never! Tell me this minute what happened.
Is _he_ hurt?”
“Is who hurt?” asked her brother, glorying in superiority of knowledge,
and the power to tease with impunity.
“Tell me right off,” she said, taking him by the collar in her
exasperation, “or--”
“I'll tell you nothin' till you leave go of me,” was the sullen reply.
But then the overmastering impulse ran away with him, and he broke out:
“Oh, Loo! I jest seed everythin'. 'Twar a high old fight! They wuz
all there, Seth Stevens, Richards, Monkey Bill--all of 'em, when
schoolmaster rode up. He was still--looked like he wanted to hear a
class recite. He hitched up Jack and come to 'em, liftin' his hat. Oh,
'twas O.K., you bet! Then they took off their clo's. Seth Stevens jerked
hisn loose on the ground, but schoolmaster stood by himself, and folded
hisn up like ma makes me fold mine at night. Then they comed together
and Seth Stevens he jest drew off and tried to land him one, but
schoolmaster sorter moved aside and took him on the nose, an' Seth he
sot down, with the blood runnin' all over him. An'--an'--that's all.
Every time Seth Stevens hauled off to hit, schoolmaster was thar first.
It war bully!--That's all. An' I seed everythin'. You kin bet your life
on that! An' then Richards and the rest come to him an' said as how Seth
Stevens was faintin', an' schoolmaster he ran to the crick an' brought
water and put over him. An' then I runned to tell you--schoolmaster's
strong, I guess, stronger nor pappa. I seed him put on his vest, an'
Seth Stevens he was settin' up, all blood and water on his face, streaky
like; he did look bad. But, Loo----say, Loo! Why didn't schoolmaster
when he got him down the first time, jest stomp on his face with his
heels?--he had his boots on--an' that's how Seth Stevens broke Tom
Cooper's jaw when _they_ fit.”
The girl was white, and trembling from head to foot as the boy ended his
narrative, and looked inquiringly into her face. She could not answer.
Indeed, she had hardly heard the question. The thought of what might
have happened to her lover appalled her, and terror and remorse held her
heart as in a vice. But oh!--and the hot tears came into her eyes--she'd
tell him when they met how sorry she was for it all, and how bad she had
been, and how she hated herself. She had acted foolish, very; but she
hadn't meant it. She'd be more careful in future, much more careful. How
brave he was and kind! How like him it was to get the water! Oh! if he'd
only come.
All this while Jake looked at her curiously; at length he said, “Say,
Loo, s'pose he'd had his eye plugged out.”
“Go away--do!” she exclaimed angrily. “I believe you boys jest love
fightin' like dogs.”
Jake disappeared to tell and retell the tale to any one who cared to
listen.
Half an hour later Loo, who had climbed the bluff to command the view,
heard the sound of Jack's feet on the wooden bridge. A moment or two
more and the buggy drew up beside her; the schoolmaster bent forward and
spoke, without a trace of emotion in his voice:
“Won't you get in and let me drive you home, Miss Loo?” His victory
had put him in a good humour, without, however, altering his critical
estimate of the girl. The quiet, controlled tone of his voice chilled
and pained her, but her emotions were too recent and too acute to be
restrained.
“Oh, George!” she said, leaning forward against the buggy, and scanning
his face intently. “How can you speak so? You ain't hurt, are you?”
“No!” he answered lightly. “You didn't expect I should be, did you?” The
tone was cold, a little sarcastic even.
Again she felt hurt; she scarcely knew why; the sneer was too
far-fetched for her to understand it.
“Go and put the horse up, and then come back. I'll wait right here for
you.”
He did as he was told, and in ten minutes was by her side again. After a
long pause, she began, with quivering lips:
“George, I'm sorry--so sorry. 'Twas all my fault! But I didn't
know”--and she choked down a sob--“I didn't think.
“I want you to tell me how your sisters act and--an' what they wear and
do. I'll try to act like them. Then I'd be good, shouldn't I?
“They play the pianner, don't they?” He was forced to confess that one
of them did.
“An' they talk like you?”
“Yes.”
“An' they're good always? Oh, George, I'm jest too sorry for anythin',
an' now--now I'm too glad!” and she burst into tears. He kissed and
consoled her as in duty bound. He understood this mood as little as he
had understood her challenge to love. He was not in sympathy with her;
she had no ideal of conduct, no notion of dignity. Some suspicion
of this estrangement must have dawned upon the girl, or else she was
irritated by his acquiescence in her various phases of self-humiliation.
All at once she dashed the tears from her eyes, and winding herself out
of his arms, exclaimed:
“See here, George Bancroft! I'll jest learn all they know--pianner and
all. I ken, and I will. I'll begin right now. You'll see!” And her blue
eyes flashed with the glitter of steel, while her chin was thrown up in
defiant vanity and self-assertion.
He watched her with indifferent curiosity; the abrupt changes of mood
repelled him. His depreciatory thoughts of her, his resolution not to
be led away again by her beauty influencing him, he noticed the keen
hardness of the look, and felt, perhaps out of a spirit of antagonism,
that he disliked it.
After a few quieting phrases, which, though they sprang rather from
the head than the heart, seemed to achieve their aim, he changed the
subject, by pointing across the creek and asking:
“Whose corn is that?”
“Father's, I guess!”
“I thought that was the Indian territory?”
“It is!”
“Is one allowed to sow corn there and to fence off the ground? Don't the
Indians object?”
“'Tain't healthy for Indians about here,” she answered carelessly, “I
hain't ever seen one. I guess it's allowed; anyhow, the corn's there an'
father'll have it cut right soon.”
It seemed to Bancroft that they had not a thought in common. Wrong done
by her own folk did not even interest her. At once he moved towards
the house, and the girl followed him, feeling acutely disappointed
and humiliated, which state of mind quickly became one of rebellious
self-esteem. She guessed that other men thought big shucks of her
anyway. And with this reflection she tried to comfort herself.
* * * * *
A week or ten days later, Bancroft came downstairs one morning early
and found the ground covered with hoar-frost, though the sun had already
warmed the air. Elder Conklin, in his shirt-sleeves, was cleaning his
boots by the wood pile. When he had finished with the brush, but not
a moment sooner, he put it down near his boarder. His greeting, a mere
nod, had not prepared the schoolmaster for the question:
“Kin you drive kyows?”
“I think so; I've done it as a boy.”
“Wall, to-day's Saturday. There ain't no school, and I've some cattle
to drive to the scales in Eureka. They're in the brush yonder, ef you'd
help. That is, supposin' you've nothin' to do.”
“No. I've nothing else to do, and shall be glad to help you if I can.”
Miss Loo pouted when she heard that her lover would be away the greater
part of the day, but it pleased her to think that her father had asked
him for his help, and she resigned herself, stipulating only that he
should come right back from Eureka.
After breakfast the two started. Their way lay along the roll of ground
which looked down upon the creek. They rode together in silence, until
the Elder asked:
“You ain't a Member, air you?”
“No.”
“That's bad. I kinder misdoubted it las' Sunday; but I wasn't sartin. Ef
your callin' and election ain't sure, I guess Mr. Crew oughter talk to
you.”
These phrases were jerked out with long pauses separating them, and then
the Elder was ominously silent.
In various ways Bancroft attempted to draw him into conversation--in
vain. The Elder answered in monosyllables, or not at all. Presently he
entered the woods on the left, and soon halted before the shoot-entrance
to a roughly-built corral.
“The kyows is yonder,” he remarked; “ef you'll drive them hyar, I'll
count them as they come in.”
The schoolmaster turned his horse's head in the direction pointed
out. He rode for some minutes through the wood without seeing a single
animal. Under ordinary circumstances this would have surprised him;
but now he was absorbed in thinking of Conklin and his peculiarities,
wondering at his habit of silence and its cause:
“Has he nothing to say? Or does he think a great deal without being able
to find words to express his thoughts?”
A prolonged moan, a lowing of cattle in pain, came to his ears. He made
directly for the sound, and soon saw the herd huddled together by the
snake-fence which zigzagged along the bank of the creek. He went on till
he came to the boundary fence which ran at right angles to the water,
and then turning tried to drive the animals towards the corral. He met,
however, with unexpected difficulties. He had brought a stock-whip with
him, and used it with some skill, though without result. The bullocks
and cows swerved from the lash, but before they had gone ten yards they
wheeled and bolted back. At first this manoeuvre amused him. The Elder,
he thought, has brought me to do what he couldn't do himself; I'll show
him I can drive. But no! in spite of all his efforts, the cattle would
not be driven. He grew warm, and set himself to the work. In a quarter
of an hour his horse was in a lather, and his whip had flayed one or
two of the bullocks, but there they stood again with necks outstretched
towards the creek, lowing piteously. He could not understand it.
Reluctantly he made up his mind to acquaint the Elder with the
inexplicable fact. He had gone some two hundred yards when his tired
horse stumbled. Holding him up, Bancroft saw he had tripped over a mound
of white dust. A thought struck him. He threw himself off the horse,
and tasted the stuff; he was right; it was salt! No wonder he could not
drive the cattle; no wonder they lowed as if in pain--the ground had
been salted.
He remounted and hastened to the corral. He found the Elder sitting on
his horse by the shoot, the bars of which were down.
“I can't move those cattle!”
“You said you knew how to drive.”
“I do, but they are mad with thirst; no one can do anything with them.
Besides, in this sun they might die on the road.”
“Hum.”
“Let them drink; they'll go on afterwards.”
“Hum.” And the Elder remained for some moments silent. Then he said, as
if thinking aloud: “It's eight miles to Eureka; they'll be thirsty again
before they get to the town.”
Bancroft, too, had had his wits at work, and now answered the other's
thought. “I guess so; if they're allowed just a mouthful or two they can
be driven, and long before they reach Eureka they'll be as thirsty as
ever.”
Without a word in reply the Elder turned his horse and started off at
a lope. In ten minutes the two men had taken down the snake fence for a
distance of some fifty yards, and the cattle had rushed through the gap
and were drinking greedily.
After they had had a deep draught or two, Bancroft urged his horse into
the stream and began to drive them up the bank. They went easily enough
now, and ahead of them rode the Elder, his long whitey-brown holland
coat fluttering behind him. In half an hour Bancroft had got the herd
into the corral. The Elder counted the three hundred and sixty-two
beasts with painstaking carefulness as they filed by.
The prairie-track to Eureka led along the creek, and in places ran close
to it without any intervening fence. In an hour under that hot October
sun the cattle had again become thirsty, and it needed all Bancroft's
energy and courage to keep them from dashing into the water. Once or
twice indeed it was a toss-up whether or not they would rush over him.
He was nearly exhausted when some four hours after the start they came
in sight of the little town. Here he let the herd into the creek. Glad
of the rest, he sat on his panting horse and wiped the perspiration from
his face. After the cattle had drunk their fill, he moved them quietly
along the road, while the water dripped from their mouths and bodies.
At the scales the Elder met the would-be purchaser, who as soon as he
caught sight of the stock burst into a laugh.
“Say, Conklin,” he cried out, “I guess you've given them cattle enough
to drink, but I don't buy water for meat. No, sir; you bet, I don't.”
“I didn't allow you would,” replied the Elder gravely; “but the track
was long and hot; so they drank in the crik.”
“Wall,” resumed the dealer, half disarmed by this confession, which
served the Elder's purpose better than any denial could have done, “I
guess you'll take off fifty pound a head for that water.”
“I guess not,” was the answer. “Twenty pound of water's reckoned to be
about as much as a kyow kin drink.”
The trading began and continued to Bancroft's annoyance for more than
half an hour. At last it was settled that thirty pounds' weight
should be allowed on each beast for the water it had drunk. When this
conclusion had been arrived at, it took but a few minutes to weigh the
animals and pay the price agreed upon.
The Elder now declared himself ready to go “to hum” and get somethin'
to eat. In sullen silence Bancroft remounted, and side by side they
rode slowly towards the farm. The schoolmaster's feelings may easily
be imagined. He had been disgusted by the cunning and hypocrisy of
the trick, and the complacent expression of the Elder's countenance
irritated him intensely. As he passed place after place where the cattle
had given him most trouble in the morning, anger took possession of him,
and at length forced itself to speech.
“See here, Elder Conklin!” he began abruptly, “I suppose you call
yourself a Christian. You look down on me because I'm not a Member.
Yet, first of all, you salt cattle for days till they're half mad with
thirst, then after torturing them by driving them for hours along this
road side by side with water, you act lies with the man you've sold them
to, and end up by cheating him. You know as well as I do that each of
those steers had drunk sixty-five pounds' weight of water at least; so
you got” (he couldn't use the word “stole” even in his anger, while the
Elder was looking at him) “more than a dollar a head too much. That's
the kind of Christianity you practise. I don't like such Christians, and
I'll leave your house as soon as I can. I am ashamed that I didn't tell
the dealer you were deceiving him. I feel as if I had been a party to
the cheat.”
While the young man was speaking the Elder looked at him intently. At
certain parts of the accusation Conklin's face became rigid, but he
said nothing. A few minutes later, having skirted the orchard, they
dismounted at the stable-door.
After he had unsaddled his horse and thrown it some Indian corn,
Bancroft hastened to the house; he wanted to be alone. On the stoop he
met Loo and said to her hastily:
“I can't talk now, Loo; I'm tired out and half crazy. I must go to my
room and rest. After supper I'll tell you everything. Please don't keep
me now.”
Supper that evening was a silent meal. The Elder did not speak once;
the two young people were absorbed in their own reflections, and Mrs.
Conklin's efforts to make talk were effectual only when she turned
to Jake. Mrs. Conklin, indeed, was seldom successful in anything she
attempted. She was a woman of fifty, or thereabouts, and her face still
showed traces of former good looks, but the light had long left her
round, dark eyes, and the colour her cheeks, and with years her figure
had grown painfully thin. She was one of the numerous class who delight
in taking strangers into their confidence. Unappreciated, as a rule,
by those who know them, they seek sympathy from polite indifference or
curiosity. Before he had been a day in the house Bancroft had heard
from Mrs. Conklin all about her early life. Her father had been a
large farmer in Amherst County, Massachusetts; her childhood had been
comfortable and happy: “We always kept one hired man right through the
winter, and in summer often had eight and ten; and, though you mightn't
think it now, I was the belle of all the parties.” Dave (her husband)
had come to work for her father, and she had taken a likin' to him,
though he was such a “hard case.” She told of Dave's gradual conversion
and of the Revivalist Minister, who was an Abolitionist as well, and had
proclaimed the duty of emigrating to Kansas to prevent it from becoming
a slave state. Dave, it appeared, had taken up the idea zealously, and
had persuaded her to go with him. Her story became pathetic in spite
of her self-pity as she related the hardships of that settlement in
the wilds, and described her loneliness, her shivering terror when her
husband was away hauling logs for their first home, and news came that
the slave-traders from Missouri had made another raid upon the scattered
Abolitionist farmers. The woman had evidently been unfit for such
rude transplanting. She dwelt upon the fact that her husband had never
understood her feelings. If he had, she wouldn't have minded so much.
Marriage was not what girls thought; she had not been happy since
she left her father's house, and so forth. The lament was based on
an unworthy and futile egoism, but her whining timidity appeared to
Bancroft inexplicable. He did not see that just as a shrub pales and
dies away under the branches of a great tree, so a weak nature is apt
to be further enfeebled by association with a strong and self-contained
character. In those early days of loneliness and danger the Elder's
steadfastness and reticence had prevented him from affording to his wife
the sympathy which might have enabled her to overcome her fears. “He
never talked anythin' over with me,” was the burden of her complaint.
Solitude had killed every power in her save vanity, and the form her
vanity took was peculiarly irritating to her husband, and in a lesser
degree to her daughter, for neither the Elder nor Loo would have founded
self-esteem on adventitious advantages of upbringing. Accordingly, Mrs.
Conklin was never more than an uncomfortable shadow in her own house,
and this evening her repeated attempts to bring about a semblance of
conversation only made the silence and preoccupation of the others
painfully evident.
As soon as the supper things were cleared away, Loo signalled to
Bancroft to accompany her to the stoop, where she asked him what had
happened.
“I insulted the Elder,” he said, “and I told him I should leave his
house as soon as I could.”
“You don't mean that!” she exclaimed. “You must take that back, George.
I'll speak to pappa; he'll mind me.”
“No,” he replied firmly; “speaking won't do any good. I've made up my
mind. It's impossible for me to stay here.”
“Then you don't care for me. But that's not so. Say it's not so, George.
Say you'll stay--and I'll come down this evening after the old folks
have gone to bed, and sit with you. There!”
Of course the man yielded to a certain extent, the pleading face
upturned to his was too seductive to be denied, but he would not promise
more than that he would tell her what had taken place, and consult with
her.