Part 14

“Meanin’ no disrespect to your dad,” said the colonel, “Mr. Mix, Senior, ortn’t to hev let you come out here—you ain’t strong enough—you’ll git fever ’n ager ’fore you’ve washed dirt half a day.”

“I ain’t got no dad,” replied the stranger; “leastways he ran away ten years ago, an’ mother had a powerful hard time since, a-bringin’ up the young uns, an’ we thought I might help along a big sight if I was out here.”

The colonel was not what in the States would be called a prayer-meeting man, but he looked steadily at the young man, and inwardly breathed a very earnest “God have mercy on you all.” Then he came back to the more immediate present, and, looking about, asked:

“Who’s got sleepin’-room for this young man?”

“I hev,” quickly answered Grump, who had approached, unnoticed, while the newcomer was being interviewed.

Every one started, and Grump’s countenance did not gather amiability as he sneakingly noticed the general distrust.

“Yer needn’t glare like that,” said he, savagely; “I sed it, an’ I mean it. Come along, youngster—it’s about the time I generally fry my pork.”

And the two beauties walked away together, while the crowd stared in speechless astonishment.

“He won’t make much out uv that boy, that’s one comfort,” said Black Tom, who had partially recovered from his wonder. “You ken bet yer eye-teeth that his pockets wouldn’t pan out five dollars.”

“Then what does he want uv him?” queried Slim Sam.

“Somethin’ mean an’ underhand, for certain,” said the colonel, “and the boy must be purtected. And I hereby app’int this whole crowd to keep an eye on Grump, an’ see he don’t make a slave of the boy, an’ don’t rob him of dust. An’ I reckon I’ll take one of yer with me, an’ keep watch of the old rascal to-night. I don’t trust him wuth a durn.”

That night the boys at the saloon wrinkled their brows like unto an impecunious Committee of Ways and Means, as they vainly endeavored to surmise why Grump could want that young man as a lodger. Men who pursued whittling as an aid to reason made pecks of chips and shavings, and were no nearer a solution than when they began.

There were a number of games played, but so great was the absentmindedness of the players, that several hardened scamps indulged in some most unscrupulous “stocking” of the cards without detection. But even one of these, after having dealt himself both bowers and the king, besides two aces, suddenly imagined he had discovered Grump’s motive, and so earnest was he in exposing that nefarious wretch, that one of his opponents changed hands with him. Even the barkeeper mixed the bottles badly, and on one occasion, just as the boys were raising their glasses, he metaphorically dashed the cup from their lips by a violent, “I tell you what,” and an unsatisfactory theory. Finally the colonel arose.

“Boys,” said he, in the tone of a man whose mind is settled, “’taint ’cos the youngster looked like lively comp’ny, fur he didn’t. ’Taint ’cos Grump wanted to do him a good turn, fur ’tain’t his style. Cons’kently, thar’s sumthin’ wrong. Tom, I reckon I take _you_ along.”

And Tom and the colonel departed.

During the month which had elapsed since his advent, Grump had managed to build him a hut of the usual mining pattern, and the colonel and Tom stealthily examined its walls, front and rear, until they found crevices which would admit the muzzle of a revolver, should it be necessary. Then they applied their eyes to the same cracks, and saw the youth asleep on a pile of dead grass, with Grump’s knapsack for a pillow, and one of Grump’s blankets over him. Grump himself was sitting on a fragment of stone, staring into the fire, with his face in his hands.

He sat so long that the worthy colonel began to feel indignant; to sit in a cramped position on the outside of a house, for the sake of abused human nature, was an action more praiseworthy than comfortable, and the colonel began to feel personally aggrieved at Grump’s delay. Besides, the colonel was growing thirsty.

Suddenly Grump arose, looked down at the sleeping youth, and then knelt beside him. The colonel briskly brought his pistol to bear on him, and with great satisfaction noted that Tom’s muzzle occupied a crack in the front walls, and that he himself was out of range.

A slight tremor seemed to run through the sleeper; “and no wonder,” said the colonel, when he recounted the adventure to the boys; “anybody’d shiver to hev _that_ catamount glarin’ at him.”

Grump arose, and softly went to a corner which was hidden by the chimney.

“Gone for his knife, I’ll bet,” whispered the colonel to himself. “I hope Tom don’t spile my mad by firin’ fust.”

Grump returned to view; but instead of a knife, he bore another blanket, which he gently spread over his sleeping guest, then he lay down beside Mix with a log of wood for a pillow.

The colonel withdrew his pistol, and softly muttered to himself a dozen or two enormous oaths; then he arose, straightened out his cramped legs, and started to find Tom. That worthy had started on a similar errand, and on meeting, the two stared at each other in the moonlight as blankly as a couple of well-preserved mummies.

“S’pose the boys ’ll believe us?” whispered the colonel.

“We ken bring ’em down to see the show themselves, ef they don’t,” replied Tom.

The colonel’s report was productive of the choicest assortment of ejaculations that had been heard in camp since Natchez, the leader of the Vinegar Gulch Boys, joined the Church and commenced preaching.

The good-natured Bozen was for drinking Grump’s health at once, but the colonel demurred. So did Slim Sam.

“He’s goin’ to make him work on sheers, or some hocus-pocusin’ arrangement, an’ he can’t afford to hev him git sick. That’s what his kindness amounts to,” said Sam.

“Ur go fur his gratitude—and dust, when he gets any,” suggested another, and no one repelled the insinuation.

It was evident, however, that there was but little chance of either inquest or funeral from Grump’s, and the crowd finally dispersed with the confirmed assurance that there would be one steady cause of excitement for some time to come.

Next morning young Mix staked a claim adjoining Grump. The colonel led him aside, bound him to secrecy, and told him that there was a far richer dirt further down the stream. The young man pointed toward the hut, and replied:

“He sed ’twas payin’ dirt, an’ I ort to take his advice, seein’ he giv me a pick an’ shovel an’ pan—sed he’d hev to git new ones anyhow.”

“Thunder!” ejaculated the colonel, more puzzled than ever, knowing well how a miner will cling as long as possible to tools with which he is acquainted.

“Jest wait till that boy gets a bag of dust,” said a miner, when the colonel had narrated the second wonder. “The express agent ’ll be here next week to git what fellers wants to send to their folks—the boy’ll want to send some to his’n—his bag ’ll be missin’ ’bout then—jist wait, and ef my words don’t come true, call me greaser.”

The colonel pondered over the prophecy, and finally determined on another vigil outside Grump’s hut.

Meanwhile, Grump’s Pet, as Mix had been nicknamed, afforded the camp a great deal of amusement. He was not at all reserved, and was easily drawn out on the subject of his protector, of whom he spoke in terms of unmeasured praise.

“By the piper that played before Moses,” said one of the boys one day, “ef half that boy sez is true, some day Grump ’ll hev wings sprout through his shirt, an’ ’ll be sittin’ on the sharp edge uv a cloud an’ playin’ onto a harp, jist like the other angels.”

As for Grump himself, he improved so much that suspicion was half disarmed when one looked at him; nevertheless the colonel deemed it prudent to watch the Pet’s landlord on the night preceding the express day.

The colonel timed himself by counting the games of old sledge that were played. At the end of the sixth game after dark he made his way to Grump’s hut and quietly located himself at the same crack as before.

The Pet and his friend were both lying down, but by the light of the fire the colonel could see the eyes of the former were closed, while those of the latter were wide open. The moments flew by, and still the two men remained in the same positions, the Pet apparently fast asleep, and Grump wide awake.

The interior of a miner’s hut, though displaying great originality of design, and ingenious artistic effects, becomes after a time rather a tiresome object of contemplation. The colonel found it so, and he relieved his strained eyes by an occasional amateur astronomical observation. On turning his head, with a yawn, from one of these, he saw inside the hut a state of affairs which caused him to feel hurriedly for his pistol.

Grump had risen upon one elbow, and was stealthily feeling with his other hand under the Pet’s head.

“Ha!” thought the colonel; “right at last.”

Slowly Grump’s hand emerged from beneath the Pet’s head, and with it came a leather bag containing gold dust.

The colonel drew a perfect bead on Grump’s temple.

“I’ll jest wait till you’re stowin’ that away, my golden-haired beauty,” said the colonel, within himself, “an’ then we’ll see what cold lead’s got to say about it.”

Grump untied the bag, set it upon his own pillow, drew forth his own pouch, and untied it; the colonel’s aim remained true to its unconscious mark.

“Ef that’s the game,” continued the colonel, to himself, “I reckon the proper time to play my trump is just when you’re a-pourin’ from his bag into your’n. It ’ll be ez good’s a theatre, to bring the boys up to see how ’twas done. Lord! I wish he’d hurry up!”

Grump placed a hand upon each bag, and the colonel felt for his trigger. Grump’s left hand opened wide the mouth of Pet’s bag, and his right hand raised his own; in a moment he had poured out all his own gold into Pet’s bag, tied it, and replaced it under Pet’s head.

The colonel retired quietly for a hundred yards, or more, then he started for the saloon like a man inspired by a three-days’ thirst. As he entered the saloon the crowd arose.

“Any feller ken say I lie,” meekly spoke the colonel, “an’ I won’t shoot. _I_ wouldn’t believe it ef I hedn’t seen it with my own eyes. Grump’s poured all his gold into the Pet’s pouch!”

The whole party, in chorus, condemned their optical organs to supernatural warmth; some, more energetic than the rest, signified that the operation should extend to their lungs and lives. But the doubter of the party again spoke:

“Mind yer,” said he, “to-morrow he’ll be complainin’ that the Pet stole it, an’ then he’ll claim all in the Pet’s pouch.”

The colonel looked doubtful; several voices expressed dissent; Bozen, reviving his proposition to drink to Grump, found opinion about equally balanced, but conservative. It was agreed, however, that all the boys should “hang around” the express agent next day, and should, if Grump made the Pet any trouble, dispose of him promptly, and give the Pet a clear title to all of Grump’s rights and properties.

The agent came, and one by one the boys deposited their dust, saw it weighed, and took their receipts. Presently there was a stir near the door, and Grump and Pet entered. Pet’s gold was weighed, his mother’s name given, and a receipt tendered.

“Thinks he’s goin’ to hev conviction in writin’,” whispered the doubter to the colonel.

But the agent finished his business, took the stage, and departed. Grump started to the door to see the last of it. The doubter was there before him, and saw a big tear in the corner of each of Grump’s eyes.

* * * * *

A few days after Grump went to Placerville for a new pick for the Pet—the old one was too heavy for a light man, Grump said. Pet himself felt rather lonesome working on his neighbor’s claim, so he sauntered down the creek, and got a kind word from almost every man. His ridiculous anatomy had escaped the grave so long, he was so industrious and so inoffensive, that the boys began to have a sort of affection for the boy who had come so far to “help the folks.”

Finally, some weak miner, unable to hold the open secret any longer, told the Pet about Grump’s operation in dust. Great was the astonishment of the young man, and puzzling miners gained sympathy from the weak eyes and open mouth of the Pet as he meandered homeward, evidently as much at a loss as themselves.

Unlucky was the spirit which prompted Grump in the selection of his claim! It was just beyond a small bend which the Run made, and was, therefore, out of sight of the claims of the other men belonging to the camp. And it came to pass that while Pet was standing on his own claim, leaning on his spade, and puzzling his feeble brain, there came down the Run the great Broady, chief of the Jolly Grasshoppers, who were working several miles above.

Mr. Broady had found a nugget a few days before, and, in his exultation, had ceased work and become a regular member of the bar. A week’s industrious drinking developed in him that peculiar amiability and humanity which is characteristic of cheap whisky, and as Pet was small, ugly and alone, Broady commenced working off on him his own superfluous energy.

Poor Pet’s resistance only increased the fury of Broady, and the family at Pawkin Centre seemed in imminent danger of being supported by the town, when suddenly a pair of enormous stubby hands seized Broady by the throat, and a harsh voice, which Pet joyfully recognized as Grump’s, exclaimed:

“Let him go, or I’ll tear yer into mince-meat, curse yer!”

The chief of the Jolly Grasshoppers was not in the habit of obeying orders, but Grump’s hands imparted to his command considerable moral force.

No sooner, however, had Broady extricated himself from Grump’s grasp than he drew his revolver and fired. Grump fell, and the chief of the Jolly Grasshoppers, his injured dignity made whole, walked peacefully away.

The sound of the shot brought up all the boys from below.

“They’ve fit!” gasped the doubter, catching his breath as he ran, “an’ the boy—boy’s hed to—lay him out.

It seemed as if the doubter might be right, for the boys found Grump lying on the ground bleeding badly, and the Pet on his hands and knees.

“How did it come ’bout?” asked the colonel of Pet.

“Broady done it,” replied Grump, in a hoarse whisper; “he pounded the boy, and I tackled him—then he fired.”

The doubter went around and raised the dying man’s head. Pet seemed collecting all his energies for some great effort; finally he asked:

“What made you pour your dust into my pouch?”

“‘Cause,” whispered the dying man, putting one arm about Pet’s neck, and drawing him closer, “_‘cause I’m yer dad_; give this to yer mar,” and on Pet’s homely face the ugliest man at Painter Bar put the first token of human affection ever displayed in that neighborhood.

The arm relaxed its grasp and fell loosely, and the red eyes closed. The experienced colonel gazed into the upturned face, and gently said:

“Pet, yer an orphan.”

Reverently the boys carried the dead man into his own hut. Several men dug a grave beside that of Perkins, while the colonel and doubter acted as undertakers, the latter donating his only white shirt for a shroud.

This duty done, they went to the saloon, and the doubter called up the crowd. The glasses filled, the doubter raised his own, and exclaimed:

“Boys, here’s corpse—corpse is the best-looking man in camp.”

And so he was. For the first time in his wretched life his soul had reached his face, and the Judge mercifully took him while he was yet in His own image.

The body was placed in a rude coffin, and borne to the grave on a litter of spades, followed by every man in camp, the colonel supporting the only family mourner. Each man threw a shovelful of dirt upon the coffin before the filling began. As the last of the surface of the coffin disappeared from view, Pet raised a loud cry and wept bitterly, at which operation he was joined by the whole party.

WARDELOW’S BOY.

NEW Boston has once been the most promising of the growing cities of the West, according to some New York gentleman who constituted a land improvement company, distributed handsome maps gratis, and courted susceptible Eastern editors. Its water-power was unrivaled; ground for all desirable public buildings, and for a handsome park with ready-grown trees and a natural lake, had been securely provided for by the terms of the company’s charter; building material abounded; the water was good; the soil of unequaled fertility; while the company, with admirable forethought, had a well-stocked store on the ground, and had made arrangements to send to the town a skillful physician, and a popular preacher.

A reasonable number of colonists found their way to the ground in the pleasant Spring time, and, in spite of sundry local peculiarities not mentioned in the company’s circular, they might have remained, had not a mighty freshet, in June, driven them away, and even saved some of them the trouble of moving their houses.

When, however, most of the residences floated down the river, some of them bearing their owners on their roofs, such of the inhabitants as had money left the promised land for ever; while the others made themselves such homes as they could in the nearest settlements which were above water, and fraternized with the natives through the medium of that common bond of sympathy in the Western lowlands, the ague.

Only a single one of the original inhabitants remained, and he, although he might have chosen the best of the abandoned houses for his residence, or even the elegant but deserted “company’s store,” continued to inhabit the cabin he had built upon his arrival. The solid business men of the neighboring town of Mount Pisgah, situated upon a bluff, voted him a fool whenever his name was mentioned; but the wives of these same men, when they chanced to see old Wardelow passing by, with the wistful face he always wore, looked after him tenderly, and never lost an opportunity to speak to him kindly. When they met at tea-parties, or quilting-bees, or sewing-societies, or in other gatherings exclusively feminine, there were not a few of them who had the courage to say that the world would be better if more men were like old Wardelow.

For love seemed the sole motive of old Wardelow’s life. The cemetery which the thoughtful projectors of New Boston had presented to the inhabitants had for its only occupant the wife of old Wardelow; and she had been conveyed thereto by a husband who was both young and handsome. The freshet which had, soon afterward, swept the town, had carried with it Wardelow’s only child, a boy of seven years, who had been playing in a boat which he, in some way, unloosed.

From that day the father had found no trace of his child, yet he never ceased hoping for his return. Every steamboat captain on the river knew the old man, and the roughest of them had cheerfully replied in the affirmative when asked if they wouldn’t bring up a small boy who might some day come on board, report himself as Stevie Wardelow, and ask to be taken to New Boston.

Almost every steamboat man, from captain and pilot down to fireman and roustabout, carried and posted Wardelow’s circulars wherever they went—up Red River, the Yazoo, the White, the Arkansas, the Missouri, and all the smaller tributaries of the Mississippi.

New Boston had long been dropped from the list of post-towns, but every cross-road for miles around had a fingerboard showing the direction and telling the distance to New Boston. Upon a tall cottonwood-tree on the river-bank, and nearly in front of Wardelow’s residence, was an immense signboard bearing the name of “New Boston Landing,” and on the other side of the river, at a ferry-staging belonging to a crossing whose other terminus was a mile further down the river, was a sign which informed travelers that persons wishing to go to New Boston would find a skiff marked “Wardelow” tied near the staging.

The old man never went to Mount Pisgah for stores, or up the river to fish, or even into his own cornfield and garden, without affixing to his door a placard telling where he had gone and when he would return.

When he went to the cemetery, which he frequently did, a statement to that effect, and a plan showing the route to and through the cemetery, was always appended to his door, and, as he could never clearly imagine his boy as having passed the childhood in which he had last seen him, all the signboards, placards, and circulars were in large capital letters.

Even when the river overflowed its banks, which it did nearly every Spring, the old man did not leave his house. He would not have another story built upon it, as he was advised to do, lest Stevie might fail to recognize it on his return; but, after careful study, he had the house raised until the foundation was above high-water mark, and then had the ground made higher, but sloped so gradually that the boy could not notice the change.

When one after another of the city’s “plots,” upon which deserted houses stood, were sold for default in payment of taxes, old Wardelow bought them himself—they always went for a song, and the old man preferred to own them, lest some one else might destroy the ruins, and thus make the place unfamiliar to the returning wanderer.

Of friends he had almost none. Although he was intelligent, industrious, ingenious, and owned a library which passed for quite a large one in those days and in the new West, he cared to talk on only one subject, and as that was

of no particular interest to other people, and became, in the course of time, extremely stale to those who did not like it, the people of Mount Pisgah and the adjoining country did not spend more time upon old Wardelow than was required by the necessities of business.

There were a few exceptions to this rule. Old Mrs. Perry, who passed for a saint, and whose life did not belie her reputation, used to drive her old pony up to New Boston about once a month, carrying some home-made delicacy with her, and chatting sympathetically for an hour or two.

Among the Mount Pisgah merchants there was one—who had never had a child of his own—who always pressed the old man’s hand warmly, and admitted the possibility of whatever new hope Wardelow might express.

The pastors of the several churches at Mount Pisgah, however much they disagreed on doctrinal points, were in perfect accord as to the beauty of a character which was so completely under the control of a noble principle that had no promise of money in it; most of them, therefore, paid the old man professional visits, from which they generally returned with more benefit than they had conferred.

Time had rolled on as usual, in spite of Wardelow’s great sorrow. The Mexican war was just breaking out when New Boston was settled, and Wardelow’s hair was black, and Mount Pisgah was a little cluster of log huts; but when Lincoln was elected, Wardelow had been gray and called old for nearly ten years, and Mount Pisgah had quite a number of two-story residences and brick stores, and was a county town, with court-house and jail all complete.

None of the railway lines projected toward and through Mount Pisgah had been completed, however, nor had the town telegraphic communication with anywhere; so, compared with localities enjoying the higher benefits of civilization, Mount Pisgah and its surroundings constituted quite a paradise for horse-thieves.

There were still sparsely settled places, too, which needed the ministrations of the Methodist circuit-rider.