by B. M. Bower
CHAPTER XX. MISS GEORGIE ALSO MAKES A CALL
Saunders, limp and apathetic and colorless, shuffled over to the stationwith a wheelbarrow which had a decrepit wheel, that left an undulatingimprint of its drunken progress in the dust as it went. He loaded theboxes of freight with the abused air of one who feels that Fate has usedhim hardly, and then sidled up to the station door with the furtive airwhich Miss Georgie always inwardly resented.
She took the shipping bill from him with her fingertips, reckoned thecharges, and received the money without a word, pushing a few piecesof silver toward him upon the table. As he bent to pick them up clawingunpleasantly with vile finger-nails--she glanced at him contemptuously,looked again more attentively, pursed her lips with one corner betweenher teeth, and when he had clawed the last dime off the smooth surfaceof the table, she spoke to him as if he were not the reptile sheconsidered him, but a live human.
"Horribly hot, isn't it? I wish _I_ could sleep till noon. It would makethe days shorter, anyway."
"I opened up the store, and then I went back to bed," Saunders repliedlimply. "Just got up when the freight pulled in. Made so blamed muchnoise it woke me. I seem to need a good deal of sleep." He coughedbehind his hand, and lingered inside the door. It was so unusual forMiss Georgie to make conversation with him that Saunders was almostpitifully eager to be agreeable.
"If it didn't sound cruel, this weather," said Miss Georgie lightly,still looking at him--or, more particularly, at the crumpled, soiledcollar of his coarse blue shirt--"I'd advise you to get out of Hartleyonce a day, if it was no more than to take a walk. Though to be sure,"she smiled, "the prospect is not inviting, to say the least. Put itwould be a change; I'd run up and down the track, if I didn't have tostick here in this office all day."
"I can't stand walking," Saunders whined. "It makes me cough." Toillustrate, he gave another little hack behind his hand. "I went up tothe stable yesterday with a book, and laid down in the hay. And I wentto sleep, and Pete thought I was lost, I guess." He grinned, which wasnot pleasant, for he chewed tobacco and had ugly, discolored teeth intothe bargain.
"I like to lay in the hay," he added lifelessly. "I guess I'll take mybed up there; that lean-to is awful hot."
"Well, you're lucky that you can do exactly as you please, and sleepwhenever you please." Miss Georgie turned to her telegraph instrument,and began talking in little staccato sparks of electricity to the agentat Shoshone, merely as a hint to Saunders to take himself away.
"Ain't been anything for me?" he asked, still lingering.
Miss Georgie shook her head. He waited a minute longer, and thensidled out, and when he was heard crunching over the cinders with hisbarrow-load of boxes, she switched off the current abruptly, and wentover to the window to watch him.
"Item," she began aloud, when he was quite gone, her eyes staringvacantly down the scintillating rails to where they seemed to meet inone glittering point far away in the desert. "Item--" But whatever theitem was, she jotted it down silently in that mental memorandum bookwhich was one of her whims. "Once I put a thing in that little bluebook of mine," she used to tell her father, "it's there for keeps. Andthere's the advantage that I never leave it lying around to be lost,or for other people to pick up and read to my everlasting undoing. It'sbetter than cipher--for I don't talk in my sleep."
The four-thirty-five train came in its own time, and brought the twomissing placer miners. But it did not bring Baumberger, nor PeacefulHart, nor any word of either. Miss Georgie spent a good deal of timestaring out of the window toward the store that day, and when shewas not doing that she was moving restlessly about the little office,picking things up without knowing why she did so, and laying them downagain when she discovered them in her hands and had no use for them. Theice cream came, and the cake, and the magazines; and she left the wholepile just inside the door without undoing a wrapping.
At five o'clock she rose abruptly from the rocker, in which she had justdeposited herself with irritated emphasis, and wired her chief for leaveof absence until seven.
"It's important, Mr. Gray. Business which can't wait," she clickedurgently. "I'll be back before Eight is due. Please." Miss Georgie didnot often send that last word of her own volition. All up and down theline she was said to be "Independent as a hog on ice"--a simile notpretty, perhaps, nor even exact, but frequently applied, nevertheless,to self-reliant souls like the Hartley operator.
Be that as it may, she received gracious permission to lock the officedoor from the outside, and she was not long in doing so, and heaved agreat sigh of relief when it was done. She went straight to the store,and straight back to where Pete Hamilton was leaning over a barrelredolent of pickled pork. He came up with dripping hands and atreasure-trove of flabby meat, and while he was dangling it over thebarrel until the superfluous brine dripped away, she asked him for ahorse.
"I dunno where Saunders is again," he said, letting his consent betaken for granted. "But I'll go myself and saddle up, if you'll mind thestore. Soon as I finish waitin' on this customer," he added, casting aglance toward a man who sat upon the counter and dangled his legs whilehe apathetically munched stale pretzels and waited for his purchases.
"Oh, I can saddle, all right, Pete. I've got two hours off, and I wantto ride down to see how the Harts are getting along. Exciting times downthere, from all accounts."
"Maybe I can round up Saunders. He must be somewheres around," Petesuggested languidly, wrapping the pork in a piece of brown paper andreaching for the string which dangled from the ball hung over his head.
"Saunders is asleep, very likely. If he isn't in his room, never mindhunting him. The horse is in the stable, I suppose. I can saddle betterthan Saunders."
Pete tied the package, wiped his hands, and went heavily out. Hereturned immediately, said that Saunders must be up at the stable, andturned his attention to weighing out five pounds of white beans.
Miss Georgie helped herself to a large bag of mixed candy, and putthe money in the drawer, laid her key upon the desk for safe-keeping,repinned her white sailor hat so that the hot wind which blew should nottake it off her head, and went cheerfully away to the stable.
She did not saddle the horse at once. She first searched the pile ofsweet-smelling clover in the far end, made sure that no man was there,assured herself in the same manner of the fact that she was absolutelyalone in the stable so far as humans were concerned, and continued hersearch; not for Saunders now, but for sagebrush. She went outside, andlooked carefully at her immediate surroundings.
"There's hardly a root of it anywhere around close," she said toherself. "Nor around the store, either--nor any place where one would beapt to go ordinarily."
She stood there meditatively for a few minutes, remembered that twohours do not last long, and saddled hurriedly. Then, mounting awkwardlybecause of the large, lumpy bag of candy which she must carry in herhands for want of a pocket large enough to hold it, she rode away to theIndian camp.
The camp was merely a litter of refuse and the ashes of variouscampfires, with one wikiup standing forlorn in the midst. Miss Georgienever wasted precious time on empty ceremony, and she would have goneinto that tent unannounced and stated her errand without any compunctionwhatever. Put Peppajee was lying outside, smoking in the shade, with hisfoot bandaged and disposed comfortably upon a folded blanket. She tossedhim the bag of candy, and stayed upon her horse.
"Howdy, Peppajee? How your foot? Pretty well, mebbyso?"
"Mebbyso bueno. Sun come two time, mebbyso walk all same no snakebiteum." Peppajee's eyes gloated over the gift as he laid it down besidehim.
"That's good. Say, Peppajee," Miss Georgie reached up to feel herhatpins and to pat her hair, "I wish you'd watch Saunders. Him no good.I think him bad. I can't keep an eye on him. Can you?"
"No can walk far." Peppajee looked meaningly at his bandages. "No canwatchum."
"Well, but you could tell somebody else to watch him. I think he dobad thing to the Harts. You like Harts. You tell somebo
dy to watchSaunders."
"Indians pikeway--ketchum fish. Come back, mebbyso tellum watchum."
Miss Georgie drew in her breath for further argument, decided that itwas not worth while, and touched up her horse with the whip. "Good-by,"she called back, and saw that Peppajee was looking after her with hiseyes, while his face was turned impassively to the front.
"You're just about as satisfying to talk to as a stump," she paidtribute to his unassailable calm. "There's four bits wasted," shesighed, "to say nothing of the trouble I had packing that candy toyou--you ungrateful old devil." With which unladylike remark shedismissed him from her mind as a possible ally.
At the ranch, the boys were enthusiastically blistering palms andstiffening the muscles of their backs, turning the water away from theditches that crossed the disputed tracts so that the trespassers thereshould have none in which to pan gold--or to pretend that they werepanning gold. Since the whole ranch was irrigated by springs running outhere and there from under the bluff, and all the ditches ran to meadowand orchard and patches of small fruit, and since the springs could notwell be stopped from flowing, the thing was not to be done in a minute.
And since there were four boys with decided ideas upon thesubject--ideas which harmonized only in the fundamental desire to harrythe interlopers, the thing was not to be done without much time beingwasted in fruitless argument.
Wally insisted upon running the water all into a sandy hollow where muchof it would seep away and a lake would do no harm, the main objectionto that being that it required digging at least a hundred yards of newditch, mostly through rocky soil.
Jack wanted to close all the headgates and just let the water go whereit wanted to--which was easy enough, but ineffective, because most of itfound its way into the ditches farther down the slope.
Gene and Clark did not much care how the thing was done--so long as itwas done their way. At least, that is what they said.
It was Good Indian who at length settled the matter. There were fivesprings altogether; he proposed that each one make himself responsiblefor a certain spring, and see to it that no water reached the jumpers.
"And I don't care a tinker's dam how you do it," he said. "Drink it all,if you want to. I'll take the biggest--that one under the milk-house."Whereat they jeered at him for wanting to be close to Evadna.
"Well, who has a better right?" he challenged, and then inconsideratelyleft them before they could think of a sufficiently biting retort.
So they went to work, each in his own way, agreeing mostly in untiringindustry. That is how Miss Georgie found them occupied--except that GoodIndian had stopped long enough to soothe Evadna and her aunt, andto explain that the water would really not rise much higher in themilk-house, and that he didn't believe Evadna's pet bench at the head ofthe pond would be inaccessible because of his efforts.
Phoebe was sloshing around upon the flooded floor of her milk-house,with her skirts tucked up and her indignation growing greater as shegave it utterance, rescuing her pans of milk and her jars of cream.Evadna, upon the top step, sat with her feet tucked up under her as ifshe feared an instant inundation. She, also, was giving utterance to herfeminine irritation at the discomfort--of her aunt presumably, since sheherself was high and dry.
"And it won't do a BIT of good. They'll just knock that dam business allto pieces to-night--" She was scolding Grant.
"Swearing, chicken? Things must be in a great state!"
Grant grinned at Miss Georgie, forgetting for the moment his rebuff thatmorning. "She did swear, didn't she?" he confirmed wickedly. "And she'sbeen working overtime, trying to reform me. Wanted to pin me down to 'mygoodness!' and 'oh, dear!'--with all this excitement taking place on theranch!"
"I wasn't swearing at all. Grant has been shoveling sand all afternoon,building a dam over by the fence, and the water has been rising andrising till--" She waved her hand gloomily at her bedraggled Aunt Phoebeworking like a motherly sort of gnome in its shadowy grotto. "Oh, if Iwere Aunt Phoebe, I should just shake you, Grant Imsen!"
"Try it," he invited, his eyes worshiping her in her pretty petulance."I wish you would."
As Miss Georgie went past them down the steps, her face had the setlook of one who is consciously and deliberately cheerful under tryingconditions.
"Don't quarrel, children," she advised lightly. "Howdy, Mrs. Hart? Whatare they trying to do--drown you?"
"Oh, these boys of mine! They'll be the death of me, what with thethings they won't do, and the things they WILL do. They're trying nowto create a water famine for the jumpers, and they're making their ownmother swim for the good of the cause." Phoebe held out a plump hand,moist and cold from lifting cool crocks of milk, and laughed at her ownpredicament.
"The water won't rise any more, Mother Hart," Grant called down to herfrom the top step, where he was sitting unblushingly beside Evadna. "Itold you six inches would be the limit, and then it would run off in thenew ditch. You know I explained just why--"
"Oh, yes, I know you explained just WHY," Phoebe cut in disconsolatelyand yet humorously, "but explanations don't seem to help my poormilk-house any. And what about the garden, and the fruit, if you turnthe water all down into the pasture? And what about the poor horsesgetting their feet wet and catching their death of cold? And what's tohinder that man Stanley and his gang from packing water in buckets fromthe lake you're going to have in the pasture?"
She looked at Miss Georgie whimsically. "I'm an ungrateful, bad-temperedold woman, I guess, for they're doing it because it's the only thingthey can do, since I put my foot down on all this bombarding and burninggood powder just to ease their minds. They've got to do something, Isuppose, or they'd all burst. And I don't know but what it's a goodthing for 'em to work off their energy digging ditches, even if it don'tdo a mite of good."
Good Indian was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, murmuringlover's confidences behind the shield of his tilted hat, which hidfrom all but Evadna his smiling lips and his telltale, glowing eyes. Helooked up at that last sentence, though it is doubtful if he had heardmuch of what she had been saying.
"It's bound to do good if it does anything," he said, with an optimismwhich was largely the outgrowth of his beatific mood, which in its turnwas born of his nearness to Evadna and her gracious manner toward him."We promised not to molest them on their claims. But if they get overthe line to meddle with our water system, or carry any in buckets--whichthey can't, because they all leak like the deuce"--he grinned as hethought of the bullet holes in them--"why, I don't know but what someonemight object to that, and send them back on their own side of the line."
He picked up a floating ribbon-end which was a part of Evadna's belt,and ran it caressingly through his fingers in a way which set MissGeorgie's teeth together. "I'm afraid," he added dryly, his eyes oncemore seeking Evadna's face with pure love hunger, "they aren't going tomake much of a stagger at placer mining, if they haven't any water."He rolled the ribbon up tightly, and then tossed it lightly toward herface. "ARE they, Goldilocks?"
"Are they what? I've told you a dozen times to stop calling me that. Ihad a doll once that I named Goldilocks, and I melted her nose off--shewas wax--and you always remind me of the horrible expression it gaveto her face. I'd go every day and take her out of the bureau-drawerand look at her, and then cry my eyes out. Won't you come and sit down,Georgie? There's room. Now, what was the discussion, and how far had wegot? Aunt Phoebe, I don't believe it has raised a bit lately. I've beenwatching that black rock with the crack in it." Evadna moved nearer toGood Indian, and pulled her skirts close upon the other side,thereby making a space at least eight inches wide for Miss Georgie'saccommodation.
"I can't sit anywhere," said Miss Georgie, looking at her watch. "By theway, chicken, did you have to walk all the way home?"
Evadna looked sidelong at Good Indian, as if a secret had beenbetrayed. "No," she said, "I didn't. I just got to the top of the gradewhen a squaw came along, and she was leading Huckleberry. A gaudy youngsquaw, al
l red and purple and yellow. She was awfully curious about you,Grant. She wanted to know where you were and what you were doing. I hopeyou aren't a flirtatious young man. She seemed to know you pretty well,I thought."
She had to explain to her Aunt Phoebe and Grant just how she came to bewalking, and she laughed at the squaw's vivid costume, and declared shewould have one like it, because Grant must certainly admire colors. Shemanaged, innocently enough, to waste upon such trivialities many of MissGeorgie's precious minutes.
At last that young woman, after glancing many times at her watch, anddeclining an urgent invitation to stay to supper, declared that shemust go, and tried to give Good Indian a significant look without beingdetected in the act by Evadna. But Good Indian, for the time beingwholly absorbed by the smiles of his lady, had no eyes for her, andseemed to attach no especial meaning to her visit. So that Miss Georgie,feminine to her finger-tips and oversensitive perhaps where those twowere concerned, suddenly abandoned her real object in going to theranch, and rode away without saying a word of what she had come to say.
She was a direct young woman who was not in the habit of mincing matterswith herself, or of dodging an issue, and she bluntly called herself afool many times that evening, because she had not said plainly that shewould like to talk with Grant "and taken him off to one side--by theear, if necessary--and talked to him, and told him what I went downthere to tell him," she said to herself angrily. "And if Evadna didn'tlike it, she could do the other thing. It does seem as if girls likethat are always having the trail smoothed down for them to dance theirway through life, while other people climb over rocks--mostly withpacks on their shoulders that don't rightly belong to them." She sighedimpatiently. "It must be lovely to be absolutely selfish--when you'repretty enough and young enough to make it stick!" Miss Georgie was,without doubt, in a nasty temper that night.