Chapter 6

“I don't mind,” said Polly demurely, “if it ain't takin' ye outer y'ur way.”

Jack offered his arm, and hurrying past the saloon, the happy pair were soon on the road to Skinners Pass.

Jack did not, I regret to say, confess his blunder, but left the Reverend Mr. Withholder to remain under suspicion of having committed an unprovoked assault and battery. It was characteristic of Rocky Canyon, however, that this suspicion, far from injuring his clerical reputation, incited a respect that had been hitherto denied him. A man who could hit out straight from the shoulder had, in the language of the critics, “suthin' in him.” Oddly enough, the crowd that had at first sympathized with Jack now began to admit provocations. His subsequent silence, a disposition when questioned on the subject to smile inanely, and, later, when insidiously asked if he had ever seen Polly dancing with the goat, his bursting into uproarious laughter completely turned the current of opinion against him. The public mind, however, soon became engrossed by a more interesting incident.

The Reverend Mr. Withholder had organized a series of Biblical tableaux at Skinnerstown for the benefit of his church. Illustrations were to be given of “Rebecca at the Well,” “The Finding of Moses,” “Joseph and his Brethren;” but Rocky Canyon was more particularly excited by the announcement that Polly Harkness would personate “Jephthah's Daughter.” On the evening of the performance, however, it was found that this tableau had been withdrawn and another substituted, for reasons not given. Rocky Canyon, naturally indignant at this omission to represent native talent, indulged in a hundred wild surmises. But it was generally believed that Jack Filgee's revengeful animosity to the Reverend Mr. Withholder was at the bottom of it. Jack, as usual, smiled inanely, but nothing was to be got from him. It was not until a few days later, when another incident crowned the climax of these mysteries, that a full disclosure came from his lips.

One morning a flaming poster was displayed at Rocky Canyon, with a charming picture of the “Sacramento Pet” in the briefest of skirts, disporting with a tambourine before a goat garlanded with flowers, who bore, however, an undoubted likeness to Billy. The text in enormous letters, and bristling with points of admiration, stated that the “Pet” would appear as “Esmeralda,” assisted by a performing goat, especially trained by the gifted actress. The goat would dance, play cards, and perform those tricks of magic familiar to the readers of Victor Hugo's beautiful story of the “Hunchback of Notre Dame,” and finally knock down and overthrow the designing seducer, Captain Phoebus. The marvelous spectacle would be produced under the patronage of the Hon. Colonel Starbottle and the Mayor of Skinnerstown.

As all Rocky Canyon gathered open-mouthed around the poster, Jack demurely joined the group. Every eye was turned upon him.

“It don't look as if yer Polly was in THIS show, any more than she was in the tablows,” said one, trying to conceal his curiosity under a slight sneer. “She don't seem to be doin' any dancin'!”

“She never DID any dancin',” said Jack, with a smile.

“Never DID! Then what was all these yarns about her dancin' up at the pass?”

“It was the Sacramento Pet who did all the dancin'; Polly only LENT the goat. Ye see, the Pet kinder took a shine to Billy arter he bowled Starbottle over thet day at the hotel, and she thought she might teach him tricks. So she DID, doing all her teachin' and stage-rehearsin' up there at the pass, so's to be outer sight, and keep this thing dark. She bribed Polly to lend her the goat and keep her secret, and Polly never let on a word to anybody but me.”

“Then it was the Pet that Yuba Bill saw dancin' from the coach?”

“Yes.”

“And that yer artist from New York painted as an 'Imp and Satire'?”

“Yes.”

“Then that's how Polly didn't show up in them tablows at Skinnerstown? It was Withholder who kinder smelt a rat, eh? and found out it was only a theayter gal all along that did the dancin'?”

“Well, you see,” said Jack, with affected hesitation, “thet's another yarn. I don't know mebbe ez I oughter tell it. Et ain't got anything to do with this advertisement o' the Pet, and might be rough on old man Withholder! Ye mustn't ask me, boys.”

But there was that in his eye, and above all in this lazy procrastination of the true humorist when he is approaching his climax, which rendered the crowd clamorous and unappeasable. They WOULD have the story!

Seeing which, Jack leaned back against a rock with great gravity, put his hands in his pockets, looked discontentedly at the ground, and began: “You see, boys, old Parson Withholder had heard all these yarns about Polly and thet trick-goat, and he kinder reckoned that she might do for some one of his tablows. So he axed her if she'd mind standin' with the goat and a tambourine for Jephthah's Daughter, at about the time when old Jeph comes home, sailin' in and vowin' he'll kill the first thing he sees,--jest as it is in the Bible story. Well, Polly didn't like to say it wasn't HER that performed with the goat, but the Pet, for thet would give the Pet dead away; so Polly agrees to come thar with the goat and rehearse the tablow. Well, Polly's thar, a little shy; and Billy,--you bet HE'S all there, and ready for the fun; but the darned fool who plays Jephthah ain't worth shucks, and when HE comes in he does nothin' but grin at Polly and seem skeert at the goat. This makes old Withholder jest wild, and at last he goes on the platform hisself to show them how the thing oughter be done. So he comes bustlin' and prancin' in, and ketches sight o' Polly dancin' in with the goat to welcome him; and then he clasps his hands--so--and drops on his knees, and hangs down his head--so--and sez, 'Me chyld! me vow! Oh, heavens!' But jest then Billy--who's gettin' rather tired o' all this foolishness--kinder slues round on his hind legs, and ketches sight o' the parson!” Jack paused a moment, and thrusting his hands still deeper in his pockets, said lazily, “I don't know if you fellers have noticed how much old Withholder looks like Billy?”

There was a rapid and impatient chorus of “Yes! yes!” and “Go on!”

“Well,” continued Jack, “when Billy sees Withholder kneelin' thar with his head down, he gives a kind o' joyous leap and claps his hoofs together, ez much ez to say, 'I'm on in this scene,' drops his own head, and jest lights out for the parson!”

“And butts him clean through the side scenes into the street,” interrupted a delighted auditor.

But Jack's face never changed. “Ye think so?” he said gravely. “But thet's jest whar ye slip up; and thet's jest whar Billy slipped up!” he added slowly. “Mebbe ye've noticed, too, thet the parson's built kinder solid about the head and shoulders. It mought hev be'n thet, or thet Billy didn't get a fair start, but thet goat went down on his fore legs like a shot, and the parson gave one heave, and jest scooted him off the platform! Then the parson reckoned thet this yer 'tablow' had better be left out, as thar didn't seem to be any other man who could play Jephthah, and it wasn't dignified for HIM to take the part. But the parson allowed thet it might be a great moral lesson to Billy!”

And it WAS, for from that moment Billy never attempted to butt again. He performed with great docility later on in the Pet's engagement at Skinnerstown; he played a distinguished role throughout the provinces; he had had the advantages of Art from “the Pet,” and of Simplicity from Polly, but only Rocky Canyon knew that his real education had come with his first rehearsal with the Reverend Mr. Withholder.

DICK SPINDLER'S FAMILY CHRISTMAS

There was surprise and sometimes disappointment in Rough and Ready, when it was known that Dick Spindler intended to give a “family” Christmas party at his own house. That he should take an early opportunity to celebrate his good fortune and show hospitality was only expected from the man who had just made a handsome “strike” on his claim; but that it should assume so conservative, old-fashioned, and respectable a form was quite unlooked-for by Rough and Ready, and was thought by some a trifle pretentious. There were not half-a-dozen families in Rough and Ready; nobody ever knew before that Spindler had any relations, and this “ringing in” of strangers to the settlement seemed to indicate at least a lack of public spirit. “He might,” urged one of his critics, “hev given the boys,--that had worked alongside o' him in the ditches by day, and slung lies with him around the camp-fire by night,--he might hev given them a square 'blow out,' and kep' the leavin's for his old Spindler crew, just as other families do. Why, when old man Scudder had his house-raisin' last year, his family lived for a week on what was left over, arter the boys had waltzed through the house that night,--and the Scudders warn't strangers, either.” It was also evident that there was an uneasy feeling that Spindler's action indicated an unhallowed leaning towards the minority of respectability and exclusiveness, and a desertion--without the excuse of matrimony--of the convivial and independent bachelor majority of Rough and Ready.

“Ef he was stuck after some gal and was kinder looking ahead, I'd hev understood it,” argued another critic.

“Don't ye be too sure he ain't,” said Uncle Jim Starbuck gloomily. “Ye'll find that some blamed woman is at the bottom of this yer 'family' gathering. That and trouble ez almost all they're made for!”

There happened to be some truth in this dark prophecy, but none of the kind that the misogynist supposed. In fact, Spindler had called a few evenings before at the house of the Rev. Mr. Saltover, and Mrs. Saltover, having one of her “Saleratus headaches,” had turned him over to her widow sister, Mrs. Huldy Price, who obediently bestowed upon him that practical and critical attention which she divided with the stocking she was darning. She was a woman of thirty-five, of singular nerve and practical wisdom, who had once smuggled her wounded husband home from a border affray, calmly made coffee for his deceived pursuers while he lay hidden in the loft, walked four miles for that medical assistance which arrived too late to save him, buried him secretly in his own “quarter section,” with only one other witness and mourner, and so saved her position and property in that wild community, who believed he had fled. There was very little of this experience to be traced in her round, fresh-colored brunette cheek, her calm black eyes, set in a prickly hedge of stiff lashes, her plump figure, or her frank, courageous laugh. The latter appeared as a smile when she welcomed Mr. Spindler. “She hadn't seen him for a coon's age,” but “reckoned he was busy fixin' up his new house.”

“Well, yes,” said Spindler, with a slight hesitation, “ye see, I'm reckonin' to hev a kinder Christmas gatherin' of my”--he was about to say “folks,” but dismissed it for “relations,” and finally settled upon “relatives” as being more correct in a preacher's house.

Mrs. Price thought it a very good idea. Christmas was the natural season for the family to gather to “see who's here and who's there, who's gettin' on and who isn't, and who's dead and buried. It was lucky for them who were so placed that they could do so and be joyful.” Her invincible philosophy probably carried her past any dangerous recollections of the lonely grave in Kansas, and holding up the stocking to the light, she glanced cheerfully along its level to Mr. Spindler's embarrassed face by the fire.

“Well, I can't say much ez to that,” responded Spindler, still awkwardly, “for you see I don't know much about it anyway.”

“How long since you've seen 'em?” asked Mrs. Price, apparently addressing herself to the stocking.

Spindler gave a weak laugh. “Well, you see, ef it comes to that, I've never seen 'em!”

Mrs. Price put the stocking in her lap and opened her direct eyes on Spindler. “Never seen 'em?” she repeated. “Then, they're not near relations?”

“There are three cousins,” said Spindler, checking them off on his fingers, “a half-uncle, a kind of brother-in-law,--that is, the brother of my sister-in-law's second husband,--and a niece. That's six.”

“But if you've not seen them, I suppose they've corresponded with you?” said Mrs. Price.

“They've nearly all of 'em written to me for money, seeing my name in the paper ez hevin' made a strike,” returned Spindler simply; “and hevin' sent it, I jest know their addresses.”

“Oh!” said Mrs. Price, returning to the stocking.

Something in the tone of her ejaculation increased Spindler's embarrassment, but it also made him desperate. “You see, Mrs. Price,” he blurted out, “I oughter tell ye that I reckon they are the folks that 'hevn't got on,' don't you see, and so it seemed only the square thing for me, ez had 'got on,' to give them a sort o' Christmas festival. Suthin', don't ye know, like what your brother-in-law was sayin' last Sunday in the pulpit about this yer peace and goodwill 'twixt man and man.”

Mrs. Price looked again at the man before her. His sallow, perplexed face exhibited some doubt, yet a certain determination, regarding the prospect the quotation had opened to him. “A very good idea, Mr. Spindler, and one that does you great credit,” she said gravely.

“I'm mighty glad to hear you say so, Mrs. Price,” he said, with an accent of great relief, “for I reckoned to ask you a great favor! You see,” he fell into his former hesitation, “that is--the fact is--that this sort o' thing is rather suddent to me,--a little outer my line, don't you see, and I was goin' to ask ye ef you'd mind takin' the hull thing in hand and runnin it for me.”

“Running it for you,” said Mrs. Price, with a quick eye-shot from under the edge of her lashes. “Man alive! What are you thinking of?”

“Bossin' the whole job for me,” hurried on Spindler, with nervous desperation. “Gettin' together all the things and makin' ready for 'em,--orderin' in everythin' that's wanted, and fixin' up the rooms,--I kin step out while you're doin' it,--and then helpin' me receivin' 'em, and sittin' at the head o' the table, you know,--like ez ef you was the mistress.”

“But,” said Mrs. Price, with her frank laugh, “that's the duty of one of your relations,--your niece, for instance,--or cousin, if one of them is a woman.”

“But,” persisted Spindler, “you see, they're strangers to me; I don't know 'em, and I do you. You'd make it easy for 'em,--and for me,--don't you see? Kinder introduce 'em,--don't you know? A woman of your gin'ral experience would smooth down all them little difficulties,” continued Spindler, with a vague recollection of the Kansas story, “and put everybody on velvet. Don't say 'No,' Mrs. Price! I'm just kalkilatin' on you.”

Sincerity and persistency in a man goes a great way with even the best of women. Mrs. Price, who had at first received Spindler's request as an amusing originality, now began to incline secretly towards it. And, of course, began to suggest objections.

“I'm afraid it won't do,” she said thoughtfully, awakening to the fact that it would do and could be done. “You see, I've promised to spend Christmas at Sacramento with my nieces from Baltimore. And then there's Mrs. Saltover and my sister to consult.”

But here Spindler's simple face showed such signs of distress that the widow declared she would “think it over,”--a process which the sanguine Spindler seemed to consider so nearly akin to talking it over that Mrs. Price began to believe it herself, as he hopefully departed.

She “thought it over” sufficiently to go to Sacramento and excuse herself to her nieces. But here she permitted herself to “talk it over,” to the infinite delight of those Baltimore girls, who thought this extravaganza of Spindler's “so Californian and eccentric!” So that it was not strange that presently the news came back to Rough and Ready, and his old associates learned for the first time that he had never seen his relatives, and that they would be doubly strangers. This did not increase his popularity; neither, I grieve to say, did the intelligence that his relatives were probably poor, and that the Reverend Mr. Saltover had approved of his course, and had likened it to the rich man's feast, to which the halt and blind were invited. Indeed, the allusion was supposed to add hypocrisy and a bid for popularity to Spindler's defection, for it was argued that he might have feasted “Wall-eyed Joe” or “Tangle-foot Billy,”--who had once been “chawed” by a bear while prospecting,--if he had been sincere. Howbeit, Spindler's faith was oblivious to these criticisms, in his joy at Mr. Saltover's adhesion to his plans and the loan of Mrs. Price as a hostess. In fact, he proposed to her that the invitation should also convey that information in the expression, “by the kind permission of the Rev. Mr. Saltover,” as a guarantee of good faith, but the widow would have none of it. The invitations were duly written and dispatched.

“Suppose,” suggested Spindler, with a sudden lugubrious apprehension,--“suppose they shouldn't come?”

“Have no fear of that,” said Mrs. Price, with a frank laugh.

“Or ef they was dead,” continued Spindler.

“They couldn't all be dead,” said the widow cheerfully.

“I've written to another cousin by marriage,” said Spindler dubiously, “in case of accident; I didn't think of him before, because he was rich.”

“And have you ever seen him either, Mr. Spindler?” asked the widow, with a slight mischievousness.

“Lordy! No!” he responded, with unaffected concern.

Only one mistake was made by Mrs. Price in her arrangements for the party. She had noticed what the simple-minded Spindler could never have conceived,--the feeling towards him held by his old associates, and had tactfully suggested that a general invitation should be extended to them in the evening.

“You can have refreshments, you know, too, after the dinner, and games and music.”

“But,” said the unsophisticated host, “won't the boys think I'm playing it rather low down on them, so to speak, givin' 'em a kind o' second table, as ef it was the tailings after a strike?”

“Nonsense,” said Mrs. Price, with decision. “It's quite fashionable in San Francisco, and just the thing to do.”

To this decision Spindler, in his blind faith in the widow's management, weakly yielded. An announcement in the “Weekly Banner” that, “On Christmas evening Richard Spindler, Esq., proposed to entertain his friends and fellow citizens at an 'at home,' in his own residence,” not only widened the breach between him and the “boys,” but awakened an active resentment that only waited for an outlet. It was understood that they were all coming; but that they should have “some fun out of it” which might not coincide with Spindler's nor his relatives' sense of humor seemed a foregone conclusion.

Unfortunately, too, subsequent events lent themselves to this irony of the situation.

He was so obviously sincere in his intent, and, above all, seemed to place such a pathetic reliance on her judgment, that she hesitated to let him know the shock his revelation had given her. And what might his other relations prove to be? Good Lord! Yet, oddly enough, she was so prepossessed by him, and so fascinated by his very Quixotism, that it was perhaps for these complex reasons that she said a little stiffly:--

“One of these cousins, I see, is a lady, and then there is your niece. Do you know anything about them, Mr. Spindler?”

His face grew serious. “No more than I know of the others,” he said apologetically. After a moment's hesitation he went on: “Now you speak of it, it seems to me I've heard that my niece was di-vorced. But,” he added, brightening up, “I've heard that she was popular.”

Mrs. Price gave a short laugh, and was silent for a few minutes. Then this sublime little woman looked up at him. What he might have seen in her eyes was more than he expected, or, I fear, deserved. “Cheer up, Mr. Spindler,” she said manfully. “I'll see you through this thing, don't you mind! But don't you say anything about--about--this Vigilance Committee business to anybody. Nor about your niece--it was your niece, wasn't it?--being divorced. Charley (the late Mr. Price) had a queer sort of sister, who--but that's neither here nor there! And your niece mayn't come, you know; or if she does, you ain't bound to bring her out to the general company.”

At parting, Spindler, in sheer gratefulness, pressed her hand, and lingered so long over it that a little color sprang into the widow's brown cheek. Perhaps a fresh courage sprang into her heart, too, for she went to Sacramento the next day, previously enjoining Spindler on no account to show any answers he might receive. At Sacramento her nieces flew to her with confidences.

“We so wanted to see you, Aunt Huldy, for we've heard something so delightful about your funny Christmas Party!” Mrs. Price's heart sank, but her eyes snapped. “Only think of it! One of Mr. Spindler's long-lost relatives--a Mr. Wragg--lives in this hotel, and papa knows him. He's a sort of half-uncle, I believe, and he's just furious that Spindler should have invited him. He showed papa the letter; said it was the greatest piece of insolence in the world; that Spindler was an ostentatious fool, who had made a little money and wanted to use him to get into society; and the fun of the whole thing was that this half-uncle and whole brute is himself a parvenu,--a vulgar, ostentatious creature, who was only a”--

“Never mind what he was, Kate,” interrupted Mrs. Price hastily. “I call his conduct a shame.”

“So do we,” said both girls eagerly. After a pause Kate clasped her knees with her locked fingers, and rocking backwards and forwards, said, “Milly and I have got an idea, and don't you say 'No' to it. We've had it ever since that brute talked in that way. Now, through him, we know more about this Mr. Spindler's family connections than you do; and we know all the trouble you and he'll have in getting up this party. You understand? Now, we first want to know what Spindler's like. Is he a savage, bearded creature, like the miners we saw on the boat?”

Mrs. Price said that, on the contrary, he was very gentle, soft-spoken, and rather good-looking.

“Young or old?”

“Young,--in fact, a mere boy, as you may judge from his actions,” returned Mrs. Price, with a suggestive matronly air.

Kate here put up a long-handled eyeglass to her fine gray eyes, fitted it ostentatiously over her aquiline nose, and then said, in a voice of simulated horror, “Aunt Huldy,--this revelation is shocking!”

Mrs. Price laughed her usual frank laugh, albeit her brown cheek took upon it a faint tint of Indian red. “If that's the wonderful idea you girls have got, I don't see how it's going to help matters,” she said dryly.

“No, that's not it? We really have an idea. Now look here.”

Mrs. Price “looked here.” This process seemed to the superficial observer to be merely submitting her waist and shoulders to the arms of her nieces, and her ears to their confidential and coaxing voices.

Twice she said “it couldn't be thought of,” and “it was impossible;” once addressed Kate as “You limb!” and finally said that she “wouldn't promise, but might write!”

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