VII
KATE; OR, UP FROM THE DEPTHS
This day I fared abroad with Ma Pettengill over wide spaces of theArrowhead Ranch. Between fields along the river bottom were gatesdistressingly crude; clumsy, hingeless panels of board fence, which Imust dismount and lift about by sheer brawn of shoulder. Such gatescombine the greatest weight with the least possible exercise of man'sinventive faculties, and are named, not too subtly, the Armstrong gate.This, indeed, is the American beauty of ranch humour, a flower ofimperishable fragrance handed to the visitor--who does the lifting withguarded drollery or triumphant snicker, as may be. Buck Devine or SandySawtelle will achieve the mot with an aloof austerity that abates no jotunto the hundredth repetition; while Lew Wee, Chinese cook of theArrowhead, fails not to brighten it with a nervous giggle, impairing itsvocal correctness, moreover, by calling it the "Armcatchum" gate.
Ma Pettengill was more versatile this day. The first gate I struggledwith she called Armstrong in a manner dryly descriptive; for the secondshe managed a humorous leer to illumine the term; for the third,secured with a garland of barbed wire that must be painfully untwisted,she employed a still broader humour. Even a child would then have knownthat calling this criminal device the Armstrong gate was a joke ofuncommon richness.
As I remounted, staunching the inevitable wound from barbed wire, Ibegan to speak in the bitterly superior tones of an efficiency expert aswe traversed a field where hundreds of white-faced Herefords wereputting on flesh to their own ruin. I said to my hostess that I vastlyenjoyed lifting a hundred-pound gate--and what was the loss of a littleblood between old friends, even when aggravated by probable tetanusgerms? But had she ever paused to compute the money value of time lostby her henchmen in dismounting to open these clumsy makeshifts? Isuggested that, even appraising the one reliable ranch joke in all theworld at a high figure, she would still profit considerably by puttingin gates that were gates, in place of contrivances that could be handledideally only by a retired weight lifter in barbed-wire-proof armour.
I rapidly calculated, with the seeming high regard for accuracy thatmarks all efficiency experts, that these wretched devices cost hertwenty-eight cents and a half each _per diem_. Estimating the total ofthem on the ranch at one hundred, this meant to her a loss oftwenty-eight dollars and a half _per diem_. I used _per diem_ twice toimpress the woman. I added that it was pretty slipshod business for agoing concern, supposing--sarcastically now--that the Arrowhead was agoing concern. Of course, if it were merely a toy for the idle rich--
She had let me talk, as she will now and then, affecting to be engrossedwith her stock.
"Look at them white-faced darlings!" she murmured. "Two years old andweighing eleven hundred this minute if they weigh a pound!"
Then I saw we approached a gate that amazingly was a gate. Hinges, yes;and mechanical complications, and a pendant cord on each side. I tuggedat one and the gate magically opened. As we passed through I tugged atthe other and it magically closed. This was luxury ineffable to one whohad laboured with things that seemed to be kept merely for the sake of ajest that was never of the best and was staling with use. It would alsobe, I hoped, an object lesson to my hostess. I performed the simple ritein silence, yet with a manner that I meant to be eloquent, evenprovocative. It was.
"Oh, sure!" spoke Ma Pettengill. "That there's one of your _per-diem_gates; and there's another leading out of this field, and about sixbeyond--all of 'em just as _per diem_ as this one; and, also, this hereranch you're on now is one of your going concerns." She chuckled at thisand repeated it in a subterranean rumble: "A going concern--my sakes,yes! It moved so fast you could see it go, and now it's went." Noisilyshe relished this bit of verbal finesse; then permitted her fancy againto trifle with it. "Yes, sir; this here going concern is plumb gone!"
With active malice I asked no question, maintaining a dignified silenceas I lightly manipulated a second paragon of gates. The lady now rumbledconfidentially to herself, and I caught piquant phrases; yet still Iforbore to question, since the woman so plainly sought to intrigue me.Even when we skirted a clump of cottonwoods and came--through anotherperfect gate--upon a most amazing small collection of ranch buildings,dying of desertion, I retained perfect control of a rising curiosity.
By unspoken agreement we drew rein to survey a desolation that was stillimmaculate. Stables and outbuildings were trim and new, and pure withpaint. All had been swept and garnished; no unsightly litter marred thescene. The house was a suburban villa of marked pretension and wouldhave excited no comment on Long Island. In this valley of the mountainsit was nothing short of spectacular. Only one item of decoration hintedan attempt to adapt itself to environment: in the noble stone chimneythat reared itself between two spacious wings a branding iron had beenembedded. Thus did it proclaim itself to the incredulous hills as aranch house.
Flowers had been planted along a gravelled walk. While I reminded myselfthat the gravel must have been imported from a spot at least ten milesdistant, I was further shocked by discovering a most improbable golfgreen, in gloomy survival. Then I detected a series of kennels facing awired dog run. This was overwhelming in a country of simple, steadfastdevotion to the rearing of cattle for market.
Ma Pettengill now spoke in a tone that, for her, could be called hushed,though it reached me twenty feet away.
"An art bungalow!" she said, and gazed upon it with seeming awe. Thenshe waved a quirt to indicate this and the painfully neat outbuildings."A toy for the idle rich--was that it? Well, you said something. Thiswas one little _per-diem_ going concern, all right. They even had thename somewhere round here worked out in yellow flowers--Broadmoor itwas. You could read it for five miles when the posies got up. There itis over on that lawn. You can't read it now because the letters are allovergrown. My Chinaman got delirious about that when he first seen itand wanted me to plant Arrowhead out in front of our house, and wasquite hurt when I told him I was just a business woman--and a tiredbusiness woman at that. He done what he could, though, to show we wassome class. The first time these folks come over to our place to lunchhe picked all my pink carnations to make a mat on the table, and spelledout Arrowhead round it in ripe olives, with a neat frame of celeryinclosing same. Yes, sir!"
This was too much. It now seemed time to ask questions, and I did so ina winning manner; but so deaf in her backward musing was the woman thatI saw it must all come in its own way.
"We got to make up over that bench yet," she said at last; and we rodeout past the ideal stable--its natty weather vane forever pointing thewind to the profit of no man--through another gate of superb cunning,and so once more to an understandable landscape, where sane cattlegrazed. Here I threw off the depression that comes upon one in placeswhere our humankind so plainly have been and are not. Again I questionedof Broadmoor and its vanished people.
The immediate results were fragmentary, serving to pique rather thansatisfy; a series of _hors d'oeuvres_ that I began to suspect must formthe whole repast. On the verge of coherence the woman would break off togloat over a herd of thoroughbred Durhams or a bunch of sportiveHereford calves or a field teeming with the prized fruits ofintermarriage between these breeds. Or she found diversion in stupendousstacks of last summer's hay, well fenced from pillage; or grounds forcriticising the sloth of certain of her henchmen, who had been told asplain as anything that "that there line fance" had to be finished bySaturday; no two ways about it! She repeated the language in which shehad conveyed this decision. There could have been no grounds formisunderstanding it.
And thus the annals of Broadmoor began to dribble to me, overlaid toofrequently for my taste with philosophic reflections at large upon whata lone, defenceless woman could expect in this world--irrelevant,pointed wonderings as to whether a party letting on he was a good ranchhand really expected to perform any labour for his fifty a month, orjust set round smoking his head off and see which could tell the biggestlie; or mebbe make an excuse for some light job like oiling thetwenty-two sets of mule harness over aga
in, when they had already beenoiled right after haying. Furthermore, any woman not a born fool wouldget out of the business the first chance she got, this one often beingwilling to sell for a mutilated dollar, except for not wishing financialruin or insanity to other parties.
Yet a few details definitely emerged. "Her" name was called Posnett,though a party would never guess this if he saw it in print, because itwas spelled Postlethwaite. Yes, sir! All on account of having gone toEngland from Boston and found out that was how you said it, thoughCousin Egbert Floud had tried to be funny about it when shown the namein the Red Gap _Recorder_. The item said the family had taken apartmentsat Red Gap's premier hotel _de luxe_, the American House; and CousinEgbert, being told a million dollars was bet that he never could guesshow the name was pronounced in English, he up and said you couldn't foolhim; that it was pronounced Chumley, which was just like the oldsmarty--only he give in that he was surprised when told how it reallywas pronounced; and he said if a party's name was Postlethwaite whycouldn't they come out and say so like a man, instead of beating roundthe bush like that? All of which was promising enough; but then came theHereford yearlings to effect a breach of continuity.
These being enough admired, I had next to be told that I wouldn'tbelieve how many folks was certain she had retired to the countrybecause she was lazy, just keeping a few head of cattle fordiversion--she that had six thousand acres of land under fence, and hadmade a going concern _per diem_ of it for thirty years, even if partiesdid make cracks about her gates; but hardly ever getting a good night'ssleep through having a "passel" of men to run it that you couldn'tdepend on--though God only knew where you could find any other sort--theminute your back was turned.
A fat, sleek, prosperous male, clad in expensive garments, and wearing aderby hat and too much jewellery, became somehow personified in thistirade. I was led to picture him a residuary legatee who had never donea stroke of work in his life, and believed that no one else ever didexcept from a sportive perversity. I was made to hear him tell her thatshe, Mrs. Lysander John Pettengill, was leading the ideal life on hercountry place; and, by Jove! he often thought of doing the same thinghimself--get a nice little spot in this beautiful country, with somegreen meadows, and have bands of large handsome cattle strolling aboutin the sunlight, so he could forget the world and its strife in the sameidyllic peace she must be finding. Or if he didn't tell her this, thenhe was sure to have a worthless son or nephew that her ranch would bejust the place for; and, of course, she would be glad to take him on andmake something of him--that is, so the lady now regrettably put it, ashe had shown he wasn't worth a damn for anything else, why couldn't shemake a cattleman of him?
"Yes, sir; that's what I get from these here visitors that are enchantedby the view. Either they think my ranch is a reform school for poorchinless Chester, that got led away by bad companions and can't say no,or they think, like you said, that it's just a toy for the idle rich.Show 'em a shoe factory or a steel works and they can understand it's abusiness proposition; but a ranch--Shucks! They think I've done my day'swork when I ride out on a gentle horse and look pleased at thelandscape."
Again were we diverted. A dozen alien beeves fed upon the Arrowheadpreserves. Did I see that wattle brand--the jug-handle split? That wasthe Timmins brand--old Safety First Timmins. There must be a break inhis fence at the upper end of the field. Made it himself likely.Wouldn't she give the old penny-pincher hell if she had him here? Shewould, indeed! Continuous muttering of a rugged character for half amile of jog trot.
Then again:
"Cousin Egbert got all fussed up in his mind about the name and alwayscalled her Postle-nut. He don't seem to have a brain for such things.But she didn't mind. I give her credit for that. She was fifty if shewas a day, but very, very blond; laboratory stuff, of course. You'd ofcalled her a superblonde, I guess. And haggard and wrinkled in the face;but she took good care of that, too--artist's materials.
"You know old Pete--that Indian you see cutting up wood back on theplace. Pete took a long look at her and named her the Painted Desert.You always hear say an Indian hasn't got any sense of humour. I don'tknow; Pete was sure being either a humourist or a poet. However, thishere lady handed me a new one about my business. She thought it wasmerely an outdoor sport. I never could get that out of her head. Evenwhen she left she says she knows it's ripping good sport, but it's sucha terrific drain on one's income, and I must be quite mad about ranchingto keep it up. I said, yes; I got quite mad about it sometimes, and letit go at that. What was the use?"
A voiceless interval while we climbed a trail to the timbered benchwhere fence posts were being cut by half a dozen of the Arrowheadforces. Two of these were swiftly detached and bade to repair the breakin the fence by which one Timmins was now profiting, the entire sixbeing first regaled with a brief but pithy character analysis of theoffender, portraying him as a loathsome biological freak; headless, Igathered, and with the acquisitive instincts of a trade rat.
Then we rounded back on our way to the Arrow head ranch house. Fivemiles up the narrowing valley we could see its outposts and its smoke.Far below us the spick-and-span buildings of deserted Broadmoorglittered newly, demanding that I be told more of them. Yet for thefive-mile ride I added, as I thought, no item to my slender stock.Instead, when we had descended from the bench and were again in fieldswhere the gates might be opened only by galling effort, I learnedapparently irrelevant facts concerning Egbert Floud's pet kitten.
"Yes, sir; he's just like any old maid with that cat. 'Kitty!' here and'Kitty!' there; and 'Poor Kitty, did I forget to warm its milk?' And soon. It was give to him two years ago by Jeff Tuttle's littlest girl,Irene; and he didn't want it at first, but him and Irene is greatfriends, so he pretended he was crazy about it and took it off in hisovercoat pocket, thinking it would die anyway, because it was only skinand bones. Whenever it tried to purr you'd think it was going to shakeall its timbers loose. His house is just over on the other side ofArrowhead Pass there, and I saw the kitten the first day he brought itup, kind of light brown and yellow in colour, with some gray on the leftshoulder.
"Well, the minute I see these markings I recognized 'em and rememberedsomething, and I says right off that he's got some cat there; and hesays how do I know? And I tell him that there kitten has got at least aquarter wildcat in it. Its grandmother, or mebbe its great-grandmother,was took up to the Tuttle Ranch when there wasn't another cat withinforty miles, and it got to running round nights; and quite a long timeafter that they found it with a mess of kittens in a box out in theharness room. One look at their feet and ears was all you'd want to seethat their pa was a bobcat. They all become famous fighting characters,and was marked just like this descendant of theirs that Cousin Egberthas. And, say, I was going on like this, not suspecting anything exceptthat I was giving him some interesting news about the family history ofthis pet of his, when he grabs the beast up and cuddles it, and says Ihad ought to be ashamed of myself, talking that way about a poor littleinnocent kitten that never done me a stroke of harm. Yes, sir; he wasright fiery.
"I don't know how he come to take it that cross way, for he hadn'tthought highly of the thing up to that moment. But some way it seemed tohim I was talking scandal about his pet--kind of clouding up itsancestry, if you know what I mean. He didn't seem to get any broad viewof it at all. You'd almost think I'd been reporting an indiscretion insome member of his family. Can you beat it? Heating up that way over apuny kitten, six inches from tip to tip, that he'd been thinking of as apest and only taken to please Irene Tuttle! So he starts in from thatminute to doctor it up and nurture it with canned soup and delicacies;and every time I see him after that he'd look indignant and say whatgreat hands for spreading gossip us women are, and his kitten ain't gotno more bobcat in its veins than what I have.
"He's a stubborn old toad. Irene had told him the kitten's name wasKate; so he kept right on calling it that even after it becomeincongruous, as you might say. Judge Ballard was up here on a fishingtrip one time and hea
rd him calling it Kate, and he says to Egbert: Whycall it Kate when it ain't? Egbert says that was the name little Irenegive it and it's too much trouble to think up another. The Judge says,Oh, no; not so much trouble, being that he could just change the nameswiftly from Kate to Cato, thus meeting all conventional requirementswith but slight added labour. But Egbert says there's the sentiment tothink of--whatever he meant by that; and if you was to go over thereto-day and he was home you'd likely hear him say: 'Yes; Kate iscertainly some cat! Why, he's at least half bobcat--mebbethree-quarters; and the fightingest devil!' What's that? Yes; he'schanged completely round about the wildcat strain. He's proud of it. IfI was to say now it was only a quarter bob he'd be as mad as he was atfirst; he says anybody can see it's at least half bob. What changed him?Oh, well, we're too near home. Some other time."
So it befell that not until we sat out for a splendid sunset thatevening did I learn in an orderly manner of Postlethwaite vicissitudes.Ma Pettengill built her first cigarette with tender solicitude; andthis, in consideration of her day's hard ride, I permitted her to burnin relaxed silence. But when her trained fingers began to combine paperand tobacco for the second I mentioned Broadmoor, Postlethwaite,Posnett, and parties in general that come round the tired businesswoman, harassed with the countless vexations of a large cattle ranch,telling her how wise she has been to retire to this sylvan quietude,where she can dream away her life in peace. She started easily:
"That's it; they always intimate that running a ranch is mere creampuffs compared to a regular business, and they'd like to do the samething to-morrow if only they was ready to retire from active life. Mebbethey get the idea from these here back-to-nature stories about abrokendown bookkeeper, sixty-seven years old, with neuritis and gastriccomplications and bum eyesight, and a wife that ain't ever seen a wellday; so they take every cent of their life savings of eighty-threedollars and settle on an abandoned farm in Connecticut and clear ninethousand dollars the first year raising the Little Giant caper forboiled mutton. There certainly ought to be a law against such romantictrifling. In the first place, think of a Connecticut farmer abandoninganything worth money! Old Timmins comes from Connecticut. Any time thatold leech abandons a thing, bookkeepers and all other parties will dowell to ride right along with him. I tell you now--"
The second cigarette was under way, and suddenly, without modulation,the performer was again on the theme, Posnett _nee_ Postlethwaite.
"Met her two years ago in Boston, where I was suffering a brief visitwith my son-in-law's aunts. She was the sole widow of a large woolenmill. That's about all I could ever make out--couldn't get any line onhim to speak of. The first time I called on her--she was in pink silkpyjamas, smoking a perfecto cigar, and unpacking a bale of lion andtiger skins she'd shot in Africa, or some place--she said she believedthere would be fewer unhappy marriages in this world if women would onlytry more earnestly to make a companion of their husbands; she said she'dtried hard to make one of hers, but never could get him interested inher pursuits and pastimes, he preferring to set sullenly at his deskmaking money. She said to the day of his death he'd never even had apolo mallet in his hand. And wasn't that pitiful!
"And right now she wanted to visit a snappy little volcano she'd heardabout in South America--only she had a grown son and daughter she wastrying to make companions of, so they would love and trust her; andthey'd begged her to do something nearer home that was less fatiguing;and mebbe she would. And how did I find ranching now? Was I awfully keenabout it and was it ripping good sport? I said yes, to an extent. Shesaid she thought it must be ripping, what with chasing the wild cattleover hill and dale to lasso them, and firing off revolvers in companywith lawless cowboys inflamed by drink. She went on to give me some moredetails of ranch life, and got so worked up about it that we settledthings right there, she being a lady of swift decisions. She said itwouldn't be very exciting for her, but it might be fine for son anddaughter, and bring them all together in a more sacred companionship.
"So I come back and got that place down the creek for her, and she sentout a professional architect and a landscape gardener, and some otherexperts that would know how to build a ranch _de luxe_, and the thingwas soon done. And she sent son on ahead to get slightly acquainted withthe wild life. He was a tall bent thing, about thirty, with a longsquinted face and going hair, and soft, innocent, ginger-colouredwhiskers, and hips so narrow they'd hardly hold his belt up. That rowdymother of his, in trying to make a companion of him, had near scared himto death. He was permanently frightened. What he really wanted to do, Ifound out, was to study insect life and botany and geography andarithmetic, and so on, and raise orchids, instead of being killed off ina sudden manner by his rough-neck parent. He loved to ride a horse thesame way a cat loves to ride a going stove.
"I started out with him one morning to show him over the valley. He gotinto the saddle all right and he meant well, but that don't go any toofar with a horse. Pretty soon, down on the level here, I started tocanter a bit. He grabbed for the saddle horn and caught a handful ofbunch grass fifteen feet to the left of the trail. He was game enough.He found his glasses and wiped 'em off, and said it was too bad themater couldn't have seen him, because it would have been a bright spotin her life.
"Then he got on again and we took that steep trail up the side of thecanon that goes over Arrowhead, me meaning to please him with somebeautiful and rugged scenery, where one false step might cause utterruin. It didn't work, though. After we got pretty well up to the rim ofthe canon he looks down and says he supposes they could recover one ifone fell over there. I says: 'Oh, yes; they could recover one. They'dget you, all right. Of course you wouldn't look like anything!'
"He shudders at that and gets off to lead his horse, begging me to dothe same. I said I never tried to do anything a horse could do better,and stayed on. Then he got confidential and told me a lot of interestingcrimes this mater of his had committed in her mad efforts to make acompanion of him. Once she'd tramped on the gas of a ninety-horsepowerracer and socked him against a stone wall at a turn some fool had madein the road; and another time she near drowned him in the Arctic Oceanwhen she was off there for the polar-bear hunting; and she'd got himwell clawed by a spotted leopard in India, that was now almost the bestskin in her collection; and once in Switzerland he fell off the side ofan Alp she was making him climb, causing her to be very short with himall day because it delayed the trip. Tied to a rope he was and hangingout there over nothing for about fifteen minutes--he must have lookedlike a sash weight.
"Then he told about learning to run a motor car all by himself, just toplease the mater. The first time he made the sharp turns round theircountry house he took nine shingles off the corner and crumpled a fenderlike it was tissue paper; but he stuck to it till he got the score downto two or three shingles only. He seemed right proud of that, like itwas bogey for the course, as you might say. He wasn't the greatesthumourist in the world, being too high-minded, but he appealed to all mybetter instincts; he was trying so hard to make the grade out of respectfor his bedizened and homicidal mother.
"And his poor sister, that come along later, was very much like him,being severe of outline and wearing the same kind of spectacles, and notfussing much about the fripperies of dress that engross so many of ourempty-headed sex and get 'em the notice of the male. Her complexion wasbrutally honest, which was about all her very best-wishers could say forit, but she was kind-hearted and earnest, and thought a good deal aboutthe real or inner meaning of life. What she really yearned for was tostay in Boston and go to concerts, holding the music on her lap andchecking off the notes with a gold pencil when the fiddlers played them.I watched her do it one night. I don't know what her notion was, keepingcases on the orchestra that way; but it seemed to give her a secretsatisfaction. She was also interested in bird life and other studies ofa high character, and she didn't want to be made a companion of by herrabid parent any more than brother did. They was just a couple oflambkins born to a tiger.
"Pretty
soon the ranch buildings was all complete and varnished andpolished, like you seen to-day, and the family moved in with all kindsof uniformed servants that looked unhappy and desperate. They had apained butler in a dress suit that never once set foot outside the housethe whole five months they was here. He'd of been thought too gloomy forgood taste, even at a funeral. He had me nervous every time I wentthere, thinking any minute he was going to break down and sob.
"And this lady loses no time making companions of her children thatdidn't want to be. First she tried to make 'em chase steers onhorseback. A fact! That was one of her ideas of ranch life. When I askedher what she was going to stock her ranch with she said didn't I havesome good heads of stock I could sell her? And I said yes, I had somegood heads, and showed her a bunch of my thoroughbreds, thinking nonebut the best would satisfy her. She looked 'em over with a glitteringeye and said they was too fat to run well. I didn't get her. I said itwas true; I hadn't raised 'em for speed. I said I didn't have an animalon the place that could hit better than three miles an hour, and notthat for long. I cheerfully admitted I didn't have a thoroughbred onthe place that wouldn't be a joke on any track in the country; but Iwanted to know what of it.
"'How do you get any sport out of them,' demands the lady, 'if theycan't give you a jolly good chase?'
"That's what she asked me in so many words. I says, does she aim tobreed racing cattle? And she says, where will the sport be withcreatures all out of condition with fat, like mine are? It took me aboutten minutes to get her idea, it was that heinous or criminal. When I didget it I sent her to old Safety First; and what does she do but buy aherd of twenty yearling steers from the old crook! Scrubby little runtsthat had been raised out in the hills and was all bone and muscle, andany one of 'em able to do a mile in four minutes flat, I guess.
"Old Safety was tickled to death at first when he put off this refuse onher at a price not much more than double what they would have brought ina tanyard, which was all they'd ever be good for except bone fertilizer,mebbe; but he was sick unto death when he found they was just what shewanted, the skinnier the better and he could have got anything he askedfor 'em. He says to me afterward why don't I train some of mine and trimher good? But I told him I'm cinched for hell, anyway, and don't have tomake it tighter by torturing poor dumb brutes.
"That's what it amounted to. Having got Angora chaps and cowboy hats forherself and offsprings, what do they do but get on ponies and chasethis herd all over creation, whirling their ropes, yelling, shooting inthe air--just like you see on any well-conducted ranch. Once in a whilethe old lady herself, being a demon rider, would rope an animal andfetch it down; but brother and sister was very careful not to tangletheir own ropes on anything. They didn't shoot their guns with anyproper spirit, either; and when they tried to yip like cowboys theysounded like rabbits. And brother having to smoke brown-papercigarettes, which he hated like poison and had trouble in rolling!
"Mother could roll 'em, all right--do it with one hand. And she urgedsister to; but sister rebelled for once. The old lady admitted this wasdue to a fault in her early training. It seems her grandmother had beenone of the old-fashioned sort; and, having studied the modern youngwoman of society in Boston and New York, she'd promised sister a stringof pearls if she didn't either smoke or drink till her twenty-firstbirthday. Sister had not only won the pearls but had come on totwenty-eight without being like other young girls of the day, and wasn'tgoing to begin now. So ma and brother had to do all the smoking.
"After a fine morning's run following the steers they'd like as not havea little branding in the afternoon, the old-fashioned kind that ain'tdone in the higher ranch circles any more, where a couple of sillypunchers rope an animal fore and aft and throw it, thereby setting itback at least four months in its growth. The old lady was puzzled againby me having my branding done in a chute, where the poor things ain'tworried more than is necessary. I bet she thought I was a short sport,not doing a thing on my place that would look well in a moving picture.She got a lot of ripping sport out of this branding. Made no differenceif they was already branded, they got it again; she'd brand 'em over andover. Two or three of that herd got it so often that they looked likethese leather suitcases parties bring back from Europe stuck all overwith hotel labels.
"Well, this branch of sport lasted quite a while, with them steersdeveloping speed every day till they got too fast for any one but theold lady. Brother and sister would be left far behind, or mebbe getstacked up and discouraged or sprained for the day. The old dame said itwas disheartening, indeed, trying to make companions of one's childrenwhen they showed such a low order of intelligence for it. Still, she wasfair-minded; so she had a golf links made, and put 'em at that. Shewouldn't play herself, saying it was an effeminate game, good for fatold men or schoolboys, but mebbe her chits would benefit by it and get ataste for proper sports, where you can break a bone now and then by notusing care.
"But golf wasn't much better. Sister would carry a book of poetry withher and read it as she loafed from one hit to another. The old lady nearshed tears at the sight. And brother was about as bad, gettinghypnotized by passing insect life and forgetting his score whileprodding some new kind of bug.
"The old lady said I'd never believe what a care and responsibilitychildren was. She had wanted 'em to go in for ranching and be awfullykeen about it, and look how they acted! Still, she wouldn't give up. Shesuggested polo next; but sister said it wasn't a lady's game, making nodemand upon the higher attributes of womanhood, and brother said hemight go in for it if she'd let him play his on a bicycle, as being morereliable or stauncher than a pony.
"So she throws up her hands in despair, but thinks hard again; and atlast she says she has the right sport for 'em and why didn't she thinkof it before! This new idea is to bring up her pack of prize-winningbeagles, the sport being full of excitement, and yet safe enough for allconcerned if they'll look where they walk and not stop to read slushypoems or collect insect life. Sister and brother said beagles, by allmeans, like drowning sailors clutching at a straw or something; and theold lady sent off a telegram.
"I admit I didn't know what kind of a game beagles was, but I didn'tbetray the fact when she told me about it. I was over to Egbert Floud'splace next day and I asked him. But he didn't know and he couldn't evenget the name right. He says: 'You mean beetles.' I says, 'Not at all';that it's beagles. Then he says I must of got the name twisted, andprobably it's one of these curly horns. That's as close as he ever didcome to the name; and until he actually saw the things he insisted theywas either something to blow on or something that crawled. 'Mark mywords,' he says,'they're either a horn or a bug; and I wonder what thishere blond guy will be doing next.' So I saw nothing sensible was to behad out of him, and I left him there, doddering.
"Then in about ten days, which was days of peace for brother and sister,because they didn't have to go in keenly for any new way of killingthemselves off, what comes up but several crates of beagles, in chargeof their valet or tutor! I'd looked forward to something of a thrillingor unknown character, and they turned out to be mere dogs; just littlebrown-and-white dogs that you wouldn't notice if you hadn't been excitedby their names; kind of yapping mutts that some parties would poison offif they lived in the same neighbourhood with 'em. They all had nameslike Rex II and Lady Blessington, and so on; and each one had cost morethan any three steers I had on the place. What do you think of that?They was yapping in their kennels when I first seen 'em, with the oldlady as excited as they was, and brother and sister trying to lookexcited in order to please mother, and at least looking relieved becauseno fatalities was in immediate prospect.
"I listened to the noise a while and acted nice by saying they wasundoubtedly the very finest beagles I'd ever laid eyes on--which was thesimple God's truth; and then I says won't she take one out of the cageand let him beagle some, me not having any idea what it would be like?But the old lady says not yet, because the costumes ain't come. Ithought at first it was the pups that had to be dres
sed up, but it seemsit was costumes for her and brother and sister to wear; so I asked a fewmore silly questions and found out the mystery. It seemed the secret ofa beagle's existence was rabbits. Yes, sir; they was mad about rabbitsand went in keenly for 'em. Only they wouldn't notice one, I gathered,if the parties that followed 'em wasn't dressed proper for it.
"Then we went in where we could hear each other without screaming, andthe lady tells me more about it, and how beagles is her last hope of herchits ever amounting to anything in the great world of sport. If theydon't go in keenly for beagles she'll just have to give up and letNature take its course with the poor things. And she said these wasA-Number-One beagles, being sure to get a rabbit if one was in thecountry. She'd just had 'em at a big fashionable country resort downSouth, some place where the sport attracted much notice from thesimple-minded peasantry, and it hadn't been a good country for rabbits;so the beagles had trooped into a backyard and destroyed a Belgian harethat had belonged to a little boy, whose father come out and swore atthe costumed hunters in a very common manner, and offered to lick anythree of 'em at once.
"And in hurrying acrost a field to get away from this rowdy, thatseemed liable to forget himself and do something they'd all regretlater, they was put up a tree by a bull that was sensitive aboutcostumes, and had to stay there two hours, with the bull trying to grubup the tree, and would of done so if his owner hadn't come along andrescued 'em.
"She made it sound like an exciting sport, all right, yet nothing Ithought I'd ever go in keenly for. It didn't seem like anything I'd getup in the night to indulge myself in. And I agreed with her that if herchits found beagling too adventurous, then all hope was gone and shemight as well let 'em die peacefully in their beds.
"Two days later the costumes come along and I was kindly sent word toshow up the next morning if I wanted to see some ripping sport that I'dbe quite mad about and go in for keenly, and all that sort of thing, byJove! Of course I go over, on account of this dame's atrocities neveryet having failed to interest me, and I didn't think she'd fall downnow. I felt strangely out of it, though, when I seen the costumes. Maand sister had, from the top down, black velvet jockey caps; greenvelvet coats with gold buttons; white pique skirts, coming to the knee;black silk stockings; and neat black shoes with white spats. Brother hadbeen abused the same, barring the white skirt, which left him lookinglike something out of a collection called The Dolls of All Nations.
"I saw right off that all these clothes must be necessary--they lookedso careful and expensive. Yes, Sir; that lady would no more of went outbeagling without being draped for it than she'd of gone steer huntingwithout a vanity-box lashed to her saddle horn.
"I sort of hung back with the awe-stricken help when the start was made.They was all out in front except the butler, who lurked in the entrylooking like he'd passed a night of grief at the new-made grave of hismother.
"The beagles surged all over the place the minute they was let loose,and then made for down in the willows below the house. And, sure enough,they started a cottontail down there and went in for him keenly,followed by ma and brother and sister. Brother started to yell 'Yoicks!Yoicks!' But ma shut him off with a good deal of severity that causedhim to blush at his words. It seems Yoicks is a cry you give at someother critical juncture in life. When beagles start you must yell 'Goneaway!' in a clear, ringing voice. Brother meant well, but didn't know.
"Anyhow, they followed those pups, and I trailed along at a decentdistance on my horse; and pretty soon they got the rabbit which had beenfool enough to come round in a wide circle back to where it startedfrom. Say! It was mere child's play for that plucky little band of ninedogs to clean up that rabbit. They never had a minute's fear of it andthe rabbit didn't have the least chance of winning the fight, not atany stage. Yes, sir! any time you see nine beagles setting on a tuckeredrabbit--I don't care how wild he is--you'll know how to put your moneydown.
"I never did see a rabbit put up a worse fight than that one did. I rodeup to its fragments, and the old lady was saying how ripping it was andcalling sister a mollycoddle, because here was sister crying like a babyover the rabbit's fate--a rabbit she'd never set eyes on before in herlife. Brother didn't look like he had gone in keenly for the sport,either. He was kind of green and yellow, like one of these parties onshipboard about the time he's saying he don't feel the boat's motion theleast bit; and, anyway, he's got a sure-fire remedy for it if anythingdoes happen. I just kind of stood around, neutral and revolted.
"Pretty soon the pack beagles off again with glad cries; and this time,up on the hillside, what do they start but a little spike buck that hasbeen down to a salt lick on the creek flat! They wasn't any more afraidof him than they had been of the rabbit and started to chase him out ofthe country. Of course they didn't do well after they got himinterested. The last I saw of the race he was making 'em look like theywas in reverse gear and backing up full speed. Anyway, that seemed toend the sport for the day, because the dogs and the buck must of beenover near the county line in ten minutes. The old lady was mad andblamed it on the valet, who come up and had to take as sweet a roastingas you ever heard a man get from a lady word painter. It seems he'dought to have taught 'em to ignore deer.
"Then I lied like a lady and said it was a ripping sport that I wouldsure go in keenly for if I had time; and we all went back to the houseand sat down to what they called a hunt breakfast. Ma said at last herchits could hold up their heads in the world of sport and not be areproach to her training. The chits looked very thoughtful, indeed.Sister still had red eyes and couldn't eat a mouthful of hunt breakfast,and brother just toyed with little dabs of it.
"Next day I learned the pack didn't get back till late that evening,straggling in one by one, and the valet having to go out and look forthe last two with a lantern. Also, these last two had been treatedbrutally by some denizen of the wildwood. Rex II had darn near lost hiseyesight and Lady Blessington was clawed something scandalous. Brothersaid mebbe a rabbit mad with hydrophobia had turned on 'em. He said itin hopeful tones, and sister cheered right up and said if these two hadit they would give it to the rest of the pack, and shouldn't they all beshot at once?
"Mother said what jolly nonsense; that they'd merely been scratched bythorns. I thought, myself, that mebbe they'd gone out of their class andtackled a jack rabbit; but I didn't say it, seeing that the owner wassensitive. Afterward she showed me a lot of silver things her pets hadwon--eye-cups and custard dishes, and coffee urns and things, about adozen, with their names engraved on 'em. She said it was very annoyingto have 'em take after deer that way. What she wanted 'em to do was tobutcher rabbits where parties in the right garments could stand and lookon.
"Next day they tried again; and one fool rabbit was soon gone in forkeenly to the renewed sound of sister's bitter sobs, and brother lookinglike he'd been in jail two years--no colour left at all in his face. Butpretty soon the pack took up the scent of a deer again, and that was theend of another day's sport. Brother and sister looked glad and resumedtheir peaceful sports. He hunted butterflies with a net, and she setdown and looked at birds through an opera glass and wrote down thingsabout their personal appearance in a notebook. The old lady changed toher cowboy suit and went out and roped three steers--just to work hermad off, I guess.
"Well, this time the beagles not only limped in at a shocking hour ofthe night but three of the others had had their beauty marred by a demonrabbit or something. They had been licked very thoroughly, indeed; andthe old lady now said it must be a grizzly bear, and brother and sisterbeamed on her and said: 'What a shame!' And would they hunt again nextday? For the first time they seemed quite mad about the sport. Mothersaid they better wait till she went out and shot the grizzly, but I toldher we hadn't had any grizzlies round here for years; so she said, allright, they could lick anything less than a grizzly. And they beagledagain next day, with terrible and inspiring results, not only to Rex IIand Lady Blessington again, but to two of the others that hadn't beentouched before.
&
nbsp; "This left only two of the pack that hadn't been horribly abused by someunknown varmint; so a halt had to be called for three days while RedCross work was done. Brother and sister tried to look regretful andcomplained about this break in the ripping sport; but their manner wasartificial. They spent the time riding peacefully round up in the canon,pretending to look for the wild creature that had chewed their littlepets. They come back one day and cheered their mother a whole lot bytelling her the pack had been over the pass as far as the house of aworthy rancher, Mr. Floud by name. They said Mr. Floud didn't believethere was any bears round, and further said he greatly admired thebeagles, even though at first they seriously annoyed his pet kitten.
"The old lady said this was ripping of Mr. Floud, to take it in such asporting way, because many people in the past had tried to make allsorts of nasty rows when her pets had happened to kill their kittens.Brother said, yes; Mr. Floud took the whole thing in a true sportingway, and he hoped the pack would soon be well enough to hunt again.Right then I detected falsity in his manner; I couldn't make out whatit was, but I knew he was putting something over on mother.
"Two days later the dogs was fit again, and another gay hunt was had,with a rabbit to the good in the first twenty minutes, and then theusual break, when they struck a deer scent. Brother said he'd follow onhis horse this time and try to get whatever was bothering 'em. Hedidn't. He said he lost 'em. They crawled back at night, well chewed;and mother was now frantic.
"There had to be another three days in bed for the cunning littlemurderers, after which brother and sister both went out with 'em onhorseback, with the same mysterious results--except that Rex II didn'tget in till next day and looked like he'd come through a feed chopper.For the next hunt, four days after that, the old lady went, too, all of'em on horseback; but the same slinking marauder got at the pack beforethey could come up with it, and two of 'em had to be brought back inarms. They all stopped here on the way home to tell about the mystery.Brother and sister was very cheerful and mad about the sport, but theirmanner was falser than ever. Mother says the pack is being ruined, andshe wouldn't continue the sport, except it has roused the first gleam ofinterest her chits has ever showed in anything worth while. I caught thechits looking at each other in a guilty manner when she says this, andmy curiosity wakes up. I says next time they go out I will be pleased togo with 'em; and the old lady thanks me and says mebbe I can solve thisreprehensible mystery.
"In another three days they come by for me. The beagles was looking anawful lot different from what I had first seen 'em. They was not onlybeautifully scarred but they acted kind of timid and reproachful, andtheir yapping had a note of caution in it that I hadn't noticed before.So I got on my pony and went along to help probe the crime. We worked upthe canon trail and over the pass, with the pack staying meekly behindmost of the time. Just the other side of the pass they actually got arabbit, though not working with their old-time recklessness, I thought.Of course we had to stop and watch this. Brother looked the other wayand sister just set there biting her lips, with an evil gleam in herpale-blue eyes. Not a beagle in the pack would have trusted himselfalone with her at that minute if he'd known his business.
"Then we rode on down toward Cousin Egbert's shack, with nothing furtherhappening and the pups staying back in a highly conservative manner.Brother says that yonder is the Mr. Floud's place he had spoken of, andma wants to know if he, too, goes in for ranching, and I says yes, he'sawfully keen about it; so she says we'll ride over and chat with him andperhaps he can suggest some solution of the mystery in hand. I said allright, and we ride up.
"Cousin Egbert is tipped back in a chair outside the door, reading aSunday paper. Whenever he gets one up here he always reads it cleanthrough, from murders to want ads. And he'd got into this about as faras the beauty hints and secrets of the toilet. Well, he was very politeand awkward, and asked us into his dinky little shack; and the old ladysays she hears he is quite mad about ranching, and he says, Oh,yes--only it don't help matters any to get mad; and he finds a chair forher, and the rest of us set on stools and the bed; and just then shenotices that the beagle pack has halted about thirty feet from the door,and some of 'em is milling and acting like they think of starting forhome at once.
"So out she goes and orders the little pets up. They didn't want to comeone bit; it seemed like they was afraid of something, but they was welldisciplined and they finally crawled forward, looking like they didn'tknow what minute something cruel might happen.
"The old lady petted 'em and made 'em lie down, and asked Cousin Egbertif he'd ever seen better ones, or even as good; and he said No, ma'am;they was sure fine beetles. Then she begun to tell him about some wildanimal that had been attacking 'em, a grizzly, or mebbe a mountain lion,with cubs; and he is saying in a very false manner that he can't thinkwhat would want to harm such playful little pets, and so on. All thistime the pets is in fine attitudes of watchful waiting, and I'm justbeginning to suspect a certain possibility when it actually happens.
"There was an open window high up in the log wall acrost from the door,and old Kate jumps up onto the sill from the outside. He was one fierceobject, let me tell you; weighing about thirty pounds, all muscle, withone ear gone, and an eye missing that a porcupine quill got into, and alot of fresh new battle scars. We all got a good look at him while hecrouched there for a second, purring like a twelve-cylinder car andtwitching his whiskers at us in a lazy way, like he wanted to have folksmake a fuss over him. And then, all at once, catching sight of the dogs,he changed to a demon; his back up, his whiskers in a stiff tremble, andhis half of a tail grown double in girth.
"I looked quick to the dogs, and they was froze stiff with horror for atleast another second. Then they made one scramble for the open door, andKate made a beautiful spring for the bunch, landing on the back of thelast one with a yell of triumph. Mother shrieked, too, and we all rushedto the door to see one of the prettiest chases you'd want to look at,with old Kate handing out the side wipes every time he could get nearone of the dogs. They fled down over the creek bank and a minute laterwe could see the pack legging it up the other side to beat the cars,losing Kate--I guess because he didn't like to get his hide wet.
"When the first shock of this wore off, here was silly old Egbert, in aweak voice, calling: 'Kitty, Kitty, Kitty! Here, Kitty! Here, Kitty!'Then we notice brother and sister. Brother is waving his hat in the airand yelling 'Yoicks!' and 'Gone away!' and 'Fair sport, by Jove!'--justlike some crazy man; and sister, with her chest going up and down, isclapping her hands and yelling 'Goody! Goody! Goody!' and squealing withhelpless laughter. Mother just stood gazing at 'em in horrible silence.Pretty soon they felt it and stopped, looking like a couple of kids thatknow it's spanking time.
"'So!' says mother. That's all she said--just, 'So!'
"But she stuffed the simple word with eloquence; she left it pregnantwith meaning, as they say. Then she stalked loftily out and got on herhorse, brother and sister slinking after her. I guess I slunk, too,though it was none of my doings. Cousin Egbert kind of sidled along,mumbling about Kitty:
"'Kitty was quite frightened of the pets first time he seen 'em; butsomeway to-day it seemed like he had lost much of his fear--seemed morelike he had wanted to play with 'em, or something.'
"Nobody listened to the doddering old wretch, but I caught brotherwinking at him behind mother's back. Then we all rode off in loftysilence, headed by mother, who never once looked back to her late host,even if he was mad about ranching. We got up over the pass and the packof ruined beagles begun to straggle out of the underbrush. A good bigbuck rabbit with any nerve could have put 'em all on the run again. Youcould tell that. They slunk along at the tail of the parade. I droppedout informally when it passed the place here. It seemed like somethingmight happen where they'd want only near members of the family present.
"I don't hear anything from Broadmoor next day; so the morning afterthat I ride over to Cousin Egbert's to see if I couldn't get a betterline on the recent tragedy
. He was still on his Sunday paper, havingfinished an article telling that man had once been scaly, like a fish;and was just beginning the fashion notes, with pictures showing that thesmart frock was now patterned like an awning. Old Kate was lying on abench in the sun, trying to lick a new puncture he'd got in his chest.
"I started right in on the old reprobate. I said it was a prettyhow-de-do if a distinguished lady amateur, trying to raise ranching tothe dignity of a sport, couldn't turn loose a few prize beagles withouthaving 'em taken for a hunt breakfast by a nefarious beast that ought tobe in a stout cage in a circus this minute! I thought, of course, thiswould insult him; but he sunned right up and admitted that Kate wasabout half to three-quarters bobcat; and wasn't he a fine specimen? Andif he could only get about eight more as good he'd have a pack ofbeagle-cats that would be the envy of the whole sporting world.
"'It ain't done!' I remarked, aiming to crush him.
"'It is, too!' Egbert says. 'I did it myself. Look what I already done,just with Kitty alone!'
"'How'd it start?' I asked him.
"'Easy! says he. 'They took Kate for a rabbit and Kate took them forrabbits. It was a mutual error. They found out theirs right soon; but Ibet Kate ain't found out his, even to this day. I bet he thinks they'rejust a new kind of rabbit that's been started. The first day they brokein here he was loafin' round out in front, and naturally he started for'em, though probably surprised to see rabbits travelling in a bunch.Also, they see Kate and start for him, which must of startled him goodand plenty. He'd never had rabbits make for him before. He pulled up soquick he skidded. I could see his mind working. Don't tell me that catain't got brains like a human! He was saying to himself: "Is this here anew kind of rabbits, or is it a joke--or what? Mebbe I better not tryanything rash till I find out."
"'They was still coming for him acrost the flat, with their tongues out;so he soopled himself up a bit with a few jumps and made for that therebig down spruce. He lands on the trunk and runs along it to where thetop begins. He has it all worked out. He's saying: "If this here is ajoke, all right; but if it ain't a joke I better have some place back ofme for a kind of refuge."
"'So up come these strange rabbits and started to jump for him on thetrunk of the spruce; but it's pretty high and they can't quite make it.And in a minute they sort of suspicion something on their part, becauseKate has rared his back and is giving 'em a line of abuse they neverheard from any rabbit yet. Awful wicked it was, and they sure gotpuzzled. I could hear one of 'em saying: "Aw, come on! That ain't noregular rabbit; he don't look like a rabbit, and he don't talk like arabbit, and he don't act like a rabbit!" Then another would say: "Whatof it? What do we care if he's a regular rabbit or not? Let's get him,anyway, and take him apart!"
"'So they all begin to jump again and can't quite make it till theirleader says he'll show 'em a real jump. He backs off a little to get arun and lands right on the log. Then he wished he hadn't. Old Kateworked so quick I couldn't hardly follow it. In about three seconds thisleader lands on his back down in the bunch, squealing like one of theseItalian sopranos when the flute follows her up. He crawls off on hisstomach, still howling, and I see he's had a couple of wipes over theeye, and one of his ears is shredded.
"'A couple of the others come over to ask him how it happened, and whathe quit for, and did his foot slip; and he says: "Mark my words,gentlemen; we got our work cut out for us here. That animal is actingless and less like a rabbit every minute. He's more turbulent and he'sgot spurs on." He goes on talking this way while the others bark atKate, and Kate dares any one of 'em to come on up there and have it out,man to man. Finally another lands on the tree trunk and gets what thefirst one got. I could see it this time. Kate done some dandy shortarmwork in the clinches and hurled him off on his back like the other one;then he stands there sharpening his claws on the bark and grinning in amasterful way. He was saying: "You will, will you?"
"'Then one of these beetles must of said, "Come on, boys--all togethernow!" for four of 'em landed up on the trunk all to once. And Katewasn't there. He'd had the top of this fallen tree at his back, and hekites up a limb about ten feet above their heads and stretches out for arest, cool as anything, licking his paws and purring like he enjoyed thebeautiful summer day, and wasn't everything calm and lovely? It wasawful insulting the way he looked down on 'em, with his eyes half shut.And you never seen beetles so astonished in your life. They justcouldn't believe their eyes, seeing a rabbit act that way! The leaderlimps over and says: "There! What did I tell you, smarties? I guess nexttime you'll take my word for it. I guess you can see plain enough now heain't no rabbit, the way he skinned up that tree."
"'They calm down a mite at this, and one or two says they thought he wasright from the first; and some others says: "Well, it wouldn't make nodifference what he was, rabbit or no rabbit, if he'd just come down andmeet the bunch of us fair and square; but the dirty coward is afraid tofight us, except one at a time." The leader is very firm, though. Hetells 'em that if this here object ain't a rabbit they got no right tomolest him, and if he is a rabbit he's gone crazy, and wouldn't be goodto eat, anyway; so they better go find one that acts sensible. And hegets 'em away, all talking about it excitedly.
"'Well, sir, you wouldn't believe how tickled Kate was all that day. Itwas like he'd found a new interest in life. And next time these beetlescome up they pull off another grand scrap. Kate laid for 'em just thisside of the creek and let 'ern chase him back to his tree. He skun upthree others that day, still pursuin' his cowardly tactics of fighting'em one at a time, and retirin' to his perch when three or four wouldcome at once. Also, when they give him up again and started off he comedown and chased 'em to the creek bank, like you seen the other day,telling 'em to be sure and not forget the number, because he ain't hadso much fun since he met up with a woodchuck. The next time they showedup he'd got so contemptuous of 'em that he'd leap down and engage onethat had got separated from the pack. He had two of 'em darn' near outbefore they was rescued by their friends.
"'Then, a few days later, along comes the pack again--only this timethey're being herded by the lad with the ginger-coloured whiskers. Hegets off his horse and says how do I do, and what lovely weather, andhow bracing the air is; and I says what pretty beetles he has; and hesays it's ripping sport; and I says, yes; Kate has ripped up a number of'em, but I hope he don't blame me none, because my Kitty has to defendhimself. Say, this guy brightened up and like to took me off my feet! Hegrabs both my hands and shakes 'em warmly for a long time and says do Ithink my cat can put the whole bunch on the blink?--or words to thateffect. And I says it's the surest thing in the world; but why? And hesays, then the sooner the better, because it's a barbarous sport andevery last beetle ought to be thoroughly killed; and when they are, incase his mother don't find out the crooked work, mebbe he'll be let toraise orchids or do something useful in the world, instead of fritteringhis life away in the vain pursuit of pleasure.
"'Oh, he was the chatty lad, all right! And I felt kind of sorry forhim; so I says Kate would dearly love to wipe these beetles out one byone; and he says: 'Capital, by Jove!' And I call Kitty and we pull offanother nice little scrap on the fallen tree, though it's hard to makethe beetles take much interest in it now, except in the way ofself-defense. Even at that, they're kept plenty occupied.
"'Say, this guy is the happiest you ever see one when Kate has aboutfour more of 'em licked to a standstill in jigtime. He says he has onemore favour to ask of me: Will I allow his sister to come up some dayand see the lovely carnage? And I says, Sure! Kate will be glad tooblige any time. He says he'll fetch her up the first time the pack isable to get out again, and he keeps on chattering like a child that'sfound a new play-pretty.
"'I can't hardly get him off the place, he's so greatful to me. He tellsme his biography and about how this here blond guy has been roughinghim all over Europe and Asia, and how it had got to stop right here,because a man has a right to live his own life, after all; and then hebranches off in a nutty way to tell
me that he always takes a coldshower every morning, winter and summer, and he never could read a lineof Sir Walter Scott, and why don't some genius invent a fountain penthat will work at all times? and so on, till it sounded delirious. Buthe left at last.
"'And we had some good ripping sport when him and sister come up. Inever seen such a blood-thirsty female. She'd nearly laugh her head offwhen Kitty was gouging the eye out of one of these cunning littlescamps. She said if I'd ever seen the nasty curs pile on to one poordefenseless little bunny I'd understand why she was so keen about mybeetle-cat. That's what she called Kate.
"'Kate, he got kind of bored with the whole business after that. Hehadn't actually eat one yet, and mebbe that was all that kept himgoing--wanting to see if they'd taste any better than regular rabbits.But you bet they knew now that Kate wasn't any kind of a rabbit. Theydidn't have any more arguments on that point--they knew darn' well hedidn't have a drop of rabbit blood in his veins. Oh, he's somebeetle-cat, all right!'
"That's Cousin Egbert for you! Can you beat him--changing round andbeing proud of this mixed marriage that he had formerly held to be ascandal!
"Well, I go back home, and here is mother waiting for me. And she's achanged woman. She's actually give up trying to make anything out of herchits, because after considerable browbeating and third-degree stuff,they've come through with the whole evil conspiracy--how they'd got herprize-winning beagles licked by a common cat that wouldn't be let intoany bench show on earth! Her spirit was broke.
"'My poor son,' she says, 'I shall allow to go his silly way after thisoutrageous bit of double-dealing. I think it useless to strive furtherwith him. He has not only confessed all the foul details, but he camebrazenly out with the assertion that a man has a right to lead his ownlife--and he barely thirty!'
"She goes on to say that it's this terrible twentieth-century modernismthat has infected him. She says that, first woman sets up a claim tolive her own life, and now men are claiming the same right, even one ascarefully raised and guarded as her boy has been; and what are we comingto? But, anyway, she did her best for him.
"Pretty soon Broadmoor was closed like you seen it to-day. Sister is nowback in Boston, keeping tabs on orchestras and attending lectures on thehigher birds; and brother at last has his orchid ranch somewhere down inCalifornia. He's got one pet orchid that I heard cost twelve thousanddollars--I don't know why. But he's very happy living his own life. Thelast I heard of mother she was exploring the headwaters of the AmazonRiver, hunting crocodiles and jaguars and natives, and so on.
"She was a good old sport, though. She showed that by the way shesimmered down about Cousin Egbert's cat before she left. At first, shewanted to lay for it and put a bullet through its cowardly heart. Thenshe must of seen the laugh was on her, all right; for what did she do?Why, the last thing she done was to box up all these silver cups herbeagles had won and send 'em over to Kate, in care of his owner--all theeye-cups and custard bowls, and so on. Cousin Egbert shows 'em off toevery one.
"'Just a few cups that Kate won,' he'll say. 'I want to tell you he'ssome beetle-cat! Look what he's come up to--and out of nothing, youmight say!'"
Somewhere in Red Gap Page 7