Kitabı oku: «The Heart of Canyon Pass», sayfa 13

When Nell Blossom had recovered from the exposure sufficiently to go home to Mother Tubbs, and that was not until late in the day following the storm, Betty had gained from her brother all he knew and much that he surmised regarding Nell’s association with the gambler who had returned to the Grub Stake at so dramatic a moment.

For his part, Hunt had not the first suspicion that Betty held any personal interest in the man, Dick Beckworth. But he knew that his sister suspected his love for Nell Blossom.

Hunt braced himself for an argument, and a serious one. Betty veered from Nell herself in a most surprising manner and seemed to feel interest only in Dick the Devil.

“He is scarcely a person in whom you would find any interest did you meet him, Betty,” declared the parson. “Believe me, as Joe says, the fellow is one of those fungi attached to society that would much better be lopped off than allowed to develop and spread their vile spawn about.”

“Oh!” gasped Betty. “You mean it would have been better had you and – and Mr. Hurley found the man’s remains where you found his horse? Oh, Ford!”

“Somehow,” said the parson gravely, “I feel that way.”

“Ford!” cried his sister vehemently. “This is an awful place! Let – let us go back East.”

The parson shook his head slowly. “No, Betty. You may go if you wish. I do not blame you for wanting to give it up. There is no reason why you should sacrifice yourself. But for me – Canyon Pass is mine. I will not own to failure. Indeed, my work is not without promise. I am going to reach the heart of Canyon Pass in some way, and I will keep on in the quest as long as I am given strength.”

It was Betty’s last outbreak against conditions. Nor did her brother suspect for a moment the reason for the sudden renewal of her hatred of the mining town.

CHAPTER XXVI – THREATENING WEATHER

Joe Hurley had taken a new lease on cheerfulness; yet he scarcely could have explained why his condition of mind had so suddenly improved. But it was not difficult for him to put a digit upon that very moment of time when this new feeling had dawned in his mind.

It was when, with Hunt, he had plowed his way through the driving storm to the nook under the sheltering cliff and had, seemingly, by instinct, found Betty Hunt rather than Nell Blossom.

Joe told himself that this very fact – that he had stumbled upon Betty rather than Nell – was a miracle of love.

All the time they were beating through the blizzard, crossing the icy river and climbing the steep path, it seemed to Joe that Betty had been calling to him. It had been the most natural thing in the world that at the end of the fearful struggle he should find in his arms the girl whom he loved and whose peril had caused him such anguish.

And Betty did, quite of her own volition, enter that shelter. It was no mistake, no chance happening. Betty did not think he was her brother. “Oh, Joe! I was sure you would find us,” she had said.

Joe did not overlook the confession Betty had made that there was a man back East who must, in some way, hold her promise if not her affections. But Joe hoped that by now Betty had taken time to compare that unknown with himself; and that he, Joe, had a chance. He decided to await Betty’s good pleasure.

At least, Joe Hurley’s recklessness was submerged once more in those better qualities that the Reverend Willett Ford Hunt warmly liked. Joe was bound to be the parson’s chief assistant and backer in all his efforts for the betterment of Canyon Pass. And Hunt faced now – he had seen it coming of course – a situation that must practically make effective or mar seriously all that he had striven for since he had come West.

This emergency came up for discussion that Saturday night in Bill Judson’s Three Star Grocery. The interest of the more decent element of the town’s population was centering in the church and in Parson Hunt’s work. This was a rallying point for all progressive effort and determination in Canyon Pass.

In addition, the happenings of the past week seemed to have focused on Hunt and the good work the eyes of all those Passonians who possessed vision at all. The almost tragic brawl in Tolley’s Grub Stake had aroused a great deal of warm discussion. What did Canyon Pass and Canyon County have a sheriff for, if roughnecks were to go armed – and use those arms – just as they had been wont to do in the old days?

“Why, we’re plumb civilized now. We ain’t supposed to go around wearin’ shootin’-irons and pluggin’ holes in store-fronts and citizens’ hats. If a bunch of cow-punchers came riotin’ in yere and started to shoot up the camp, Sheriff Blaney would show ’em what-for, blame sudden.”

“Youbetcha!” agreed one of the storekeeper’s listeners. “That’s a true word, Bill. If a man means to be peaceable, why go ironed at all?”

“That’s just it,” complained the gangling Smithy. “There’s them that ain’t for peace. That’s why the rest of us hafter go heeled.”

Smithy had been waiting on customers with a gun belted to his waist ever since the night he had lost two teeth and gained a black eye. Perhaps the evidence of this gun so prominently displayed had saved the gangling clerk from much hectoring comment that he might otherwise have suffered from some of the patrons of the Three Star.

However, Smithy basked in a certain heroic light. He had been the first to resent Tolley’s scurrilous tale about Nell Blossom, and no matter what Joe Hurley and the parson had done later, Smithy’s small share of glory could not be ignored. On this very afternoon Nell herself had come into the Three Star Grocery and thanked Smithy very sweetly for his courageously expressed opinion on her behalf, the result of which had rather marred what good looks Smithy had ever been able to lay claim to.

“Layin’ off whatever that boy’s mother said about him when he was an infant,” drawled Judson, “nobody ever could honestly say that Smithy should take a medal for good looks. Now he looks plumb woeful! I come pretty near bustin’ out crying when I look at him.”

“Oh, it’s not as bad as all that, Bill Judson, and you know it,” Nell declared. “Don’t you believe him, Smithy. I don’t think it hurts your looks any.”

“It couldn’t,” was Judson’s grim comment.

But this missed Smithy. He fairly gasped with pleasure at Nell’s statement.

“Don’t you mind about it, Miss Nell,” he said. “I was goin’ to have them teeth drawed, anyway. I’ll get gold ones. And I’d have ’em all knocked out if ’twould do you a mite of good.”

Now that the conclave between the serious-minded citizens had begun, even Smithy was listened to with some respect. Besides, the gangling one put forward an unmistakably pregnant fact.

“If it wasn’t for Tolley and his gang, wouldn’t none of us hafter tote guns,” Smithy observed.

“Surest thing you know!” exclaimed Collins. “Run them out o’ town and the decent men here wouldn’t hafter develop saddle-galls from wearing ten pound or more of iron and lead belted around their waists. Yes, sir! I’m in favor of reviving the old vigilance committee and running these yere undesirable citizens out into the Topaz.”

“What would become of them?” put in Hunt mildly.

“Let ’em ‘root, hog, or die’!” muttered Judson. “Tolley, of course, has got a stake yere. We can’t take a man’s property away from him. But those hangers-on of his – ”

“It is a part of Tolley’s stake that is the immediate cause of this discussion, gentlemen,” put in the parson again. “Tolley still owns the place in which we hold our meetings, and Judson’s lease will soon run out.”

“Run Tolley out,” said Smithy, who had now enthusiastically taken sides with the church people, “and you needn’t worry about that shack.”

“Maybe he would sell,” Hurley suggested.

“You try to buy it,” and Judson grinned. “His eye teeth has done been cut a far time back. Tolley ain’t that kind of a fool. He is wise to the idea that we’d like to buy that place. If you paved the shack floor with gold eagles Tolley wouldn’t bite.”

“He’d like to bust up the church and run the parson out, if you ask me,” was the comment of another bystander. “And he’s got a sharp side-pardner now, boys. I hear tell Dick the Devil is a-hintin’ that things will go different in Canyon Pass, now that he’s come back.”

“How’s that?” asked Hurley quickly, his eyes sparkling as they always did when his temper was ruffled. “What’s Dick got to say about it?”

“He don’t favor no parson. He says so.”

“Looks to me,” drawled Judson, “that it’s comin’ close to a show-down. Either we folks that want a church and decency has got to cave in, or we got to fight.”

“The right kind of fighting, I hope,” said Hunt quickly. “We must hold our own without open quarreling.”

“Well, it won’t be peaceful when we try to hold onto Tolley’s shack,” growled Jib Collins.

“Look yere,” queried a voice from the dark end of the store, “what have you shorthorns been doin’ all this time you’ve had a parson? Why ain’t ye built him a church?”

“Another county heard from!” snapped Judson, as old Steve Siebert came forward. “Easy enough to ask that.”

“Why don’t ye answer it?” asked the old prospector. “I see you have got yere in Canyon Pass a blame good parson. I never seen one I liked better. I ain’t heard him preach, and I ain’t been to your meetin’s. But any parson that can walk barehanded up to a gang like that Boss Tolley and his whelps gets my vote, and he can have everything I’ve got when he wants it for his church.”

“Them that ain’t got nawthin’ can easy give it away,” muttered Judson.

But it was another voice that ruffled the serenity of Steve Siebert. On a box by the door the hooped figure of Andy McCann straightened up.

“I reckon,” he sneered, “that that old gray-backed lizard has got him a poke full o’ nuggets out in the Topaz, and he’s goin’ to hand it over for to pay for a church edifice,” and his senile giggle was more maddening than the laughter of the crowd.

“I likely brought in full as much as yonder ground-owl ever scooped out o’ the ground. But ye don’t answer my question, neither. Why ain’t you fellers made some preparation for buildin’?”

“Mr. Siebert,” said the parson soothingly, “the men and women interested in our work have subscribed several hundred dollars toward a building fund. But we are none of us prepared to finance such a work as yet. We wish to put up a fairly good structure when we get at it. We cannot freight in the frame and heavier timbers. They must be cut and sawn on the spot. The expense of getting in a mill, aside from the labor, is enormous.”

“I reckon these hard-shells have tol’ you that because their pockets squeal ev’ry time they put their hands in ’em,” growled Siebert. “I know ’em.”

“Look here, old-timer,” said Joe Hurley, sharply, “we figure it will cost close to ten thousand dollars to put up a church. What do you say to that?”

“Put your hand in your poke and hand over ten thousand in dust, you miser’ble desert rat!” cackled Andy McCann.

“And how much of it can you rake up, after prospectin’ this country for nigh on to thutty years?” was Steve’s answer, glowering at his enemy.

“Wal, dern your hide! there was a time when I might ha’ done my share of it without weepin’ none,” muttered Andy. “And if it hadn’t been for you – ”

“Is that so?” cried the other old man, his face ablaze with wrath. “And how about me bein’ right in sight once’t of the most promisin’ lead that ever was uncovered in Canyon County?”

“If it hadn’t been for you,” rejoined Andy, “I would ha’ been rollin’ in wealth. And you know it – dad burn your hide!”

“Look here,” interjected Joe Hurley, interested rather than amused. “If you both tell the truth, you must have together struck a rich streak. Why didn’t you develop it? You were partners, weren’t you?”

“Me, pardners with that yere!” croaked Steve.

“D’ye think for one moment,” demanded Andy, “that I’d help make that feller’s fortune? Not on your tintype!”

Here Judson, with enormous disgust, broke into the discussion. “Dad burn it!” he exclaimed, “this ain’t helpin’ none to build the parson a church.”

The others were laughing uproariously. Steve and Andy glared at each other like two angry dogs with a strong fence between them. But slowly their fierce expressions changed. Hunt, who was watching them with something more than idle curiosity, saw that both old men began to look slyly at each other as they calmed down. The others paid no further attention to Steve and Andy, the flurry of their verbal battle being over. But in the rheumy eyes of Andy there grew a light which seemed to register some secret amusement, while Steve’s toothless grin displayed a humorous appreciation of a phase of the argument that the bystanders in general quite failed to catch.

“Now,” thought the Reverend Willett Ford Hunt, “I wonder, to use one of Joe’s favorite expressions, what those two old fellows have up their sleeves. Perhaps the joke is on Canyon Pass, rather than on these two queer old prospectors. I wonder!”

CHAPTER XXVII – SEVERAL CONCLUSIONS

Nell Blossom had not gone back to sing at Colorado Brown’s place. It was some time before Hunt found this out, and he wondered why she had broken her agreement with Colorado, for he knew she had entirely recovered from the effects of her adventure in the storm.

Had the parson asked his sister, Betty might have illuminated his mind not a little regarding this and other mysteries about Nell; but he was chary of ever speaking of the singer in other than a general way before Betty.

To tell the truth, he shrank from any argument regarding the Blossom of Canyon Pass. He had learned just how sweet and innocent Nell Blossom was. But he did not know how far Betty might approve of the younger girl, especially if he showed any personal interest in the latter.

He was firm in his conviction that Nell Blossom was a being set apart as his mate from the beginning! Strange as it might seem at first view, Hunt was positive that he and the half-tamed mining-camp girl held much in common. He had found opportunity to talk with her of late – both at Mother Tubbs’ and elsewhere – and he knew her tastes and aspirations far better than before. She had confided to him, although with much timidity, some of her girlish desires and her conclusions upon topics which she had thought seriously about.

She was, too, of the very stuff these Canyon Pass people were made – one of themselves. If he got Nell Blossom for a wife she would be of greater aid to him in his work here than any other one person possibly could be. With Nell Blossom for his very own, the Reverend Willett Ford Hunt would indeed have won the Heart of Canyon Pass.

Hunt kept all this a secret and said little to Betty about the cabaret singer. Nothing indeed that gave her a chance to tell him that her eyes had seen already most of what he thought was hidden from her, and seen it in a single glance.

As her brother sat beside the bed the day of the ice-storm and held Nell Blossom’s hand, Betty saw how it was with the Reverend Willett Ford Hunt. The only matter that puzzled her at all was Nell’s possible attitude. Unsophisticated as the mining-camp girl was, Betty could not know for sure what Nell’s feeling for the parson was.

But Betty might have given Hunt a pretty correct explanation of why Nell did not go back to sing at Colorado Brown’s place. The girls were together almost every day after their adventure in the storm.

Betty did not go to Mother Tubbs’. She scarcely left the hotel at all in the day time, though going out on the first Sunday following their perilous adventure to attend church service.

But Nell came to the Wild Rose, and the two girls grew to know each other better than before. This because they both wished a closer understanding. Nell had begun to admire something about Betty Hunt besides her frocks and the way she manicured her nails. The parson’s sister now desired to know Nell better for the parson’s sake.

“I’m sick to death, Betty, singing for those roughnecks,” Nell had burst forth on one occasion. “I used to think it was great to have ’em cheer me and clap me off and have ’em throw money at me. But I’m plumb sick of it.”

“It’s a great gift to be able to move people with one’s voice so.”

“It ain’t nothing of the kind!” Nell declared vehemently. “It’s because they ain’t got no brains – at least, what they’ve got are addled with hootch. I’ve only got just a nice, sweet, singing voice. Them fellers are so plumb ignorant that they hoot and holler for me because I please ’em. I’d love to be really able to sing!”

“I am not so sure that you cannot sing, as you mean it,” was Betty’s sympathetic rejoinder. “Merely, you do not sing worth-while songs – altogether.”

“I’m mighty ashamed about singing that ‘This Is No Place for a Minister’s Son,’” burst out Nell suddenly.

“Why, I think it’s funny,” and Betty laughed. “I’ve often heard Ford humming it.”

“Oh! I – I sang it at him, Betty. I did!”

“I am quite sure it never disturbed Ford in the least.”

“Well, no, I reckon not. Nothing a girl like me done – ”

“Did!”

“Did– could bother a man like Parson Hunt.”

“I am not so sure of that,” Betty rejoined, eyeing the other girl keenly.

But Nell Blossom, if she had a secret, hid it successfully. Betty did not miss the opportunity, however, of trying to help her friend.

“Suppose you learn some better songs – some really worth-while pieces? I brought my music with me, although I do not know if I shall ever touch a piano again.” She sighed. “But I sometimes sit and hum over my favorites. You read music of course, Nell?”

“I don’t know a note – to speak the name of it, I mean,” confessed the singer. “But I never saw the piece yet that I couldn’t pick up pretty easy. Rosabell Pickett says I’m a natural sight-reader with a great ear for harmony.”

She accepted with gratitude the selections Betty made from her library. Betty had chosen the songs with some little guile. That fact was proved by what occurred later.

“Anyway,” Nell concluded, “I ain’t going back to Colorado’s place for a while. I got some money, and Sam’s bringing his pay home to Mother Tubbs pretty reg’lar now. I can live for a while without singing for those roughnecks, that’s a sure thing!”

But Betty had her own grave thoughts – thoughts that kept her awake at night. Hollow eyes and certain twitching lines about her sensitive mouth were the result of these secret cogitations. Hunt noticed his sister’s changed appearance but he misunderstood its source. He feared that Betty found the life at Canyon Pass, with winter coming on, too hard to bear. Yet he saw that she always cheered up when Joe Hurley ran in to see them.

The Eastern girl’s trouble did not arise from the locality in which she was forced to live; it was the presence of one person in the town that caused her such serious thoughts. The man who had passed Nell Blossom and her in the storm, whose unexpected appearance had made Nell faint, had shocked Betty much more deeply than he did the singer!

Without that heavy mustache, with his waving hair cut more to conform to Eastern ideas of propriety, the girl visualized the fellow as she had once known Andy Wilkenson. He was the man, thought of whom had so worried Betty’s mind for these long months since she had left Grandhampton Hall. Andy Wilkenson! The man she had hoped never to see or hear from again. Her worst fears on coming West were now realized. And his reappearance here at Canyon Pass warned Betty that she could never allow Joe Hurley to see just how much she had learned to care for him.

She went to church on that next Sunday morning in fear and trembling. She sat well forward as usual. But she knew when “Dick Beckworth” came in and sat down in one of the rear seats.

His coming here surprised them all. Heads were turned, and there was whispering. Dick was dressed in the same flashy way, for he had left a trunk at the Grub Stake when he went away in the spring. He sat during the sermon with a sneer on his handsome face and the dancing light of the demon flickering in his hard eyes. Hunt usually met strangers after the meeting with a cordial handclasp. He did not approach Dick Beckworth.

Betty drew a veil across her face before she arose for the benediction. She waited to return to the hotel with her brother.

She was the only person in the assembly who was not amused by the appearance of the two old prospectors, Siebert and McCann, at the service. They did not come in together; and when Andy McCann entered to see Steve seated at one side, he chose a seat just as far from the other old-timer as he could and on the other side of the house. Their scowls turned on each other were more significant than words.

Hunt did not let Steve and Andy get away without a personal word with them.

“I am very glad to welcome you among us, Mr. McCann,” he said to that individual when he shook the pocket-hunter’s wrinkled claw.

“Wal, it’s all right, I reckon,” muttered Andy. “In a meetin’ you’ve got to stand for most anybody droppin’ in. But that old rip,” nodding toward the distant Steve, “would look a heap better ’cordin’ to my idee in jail than at church.”

“We must be charitable, Mr. McCann,” said the parson, moving toward the other prospector.

Old Steve was quite as bitter in his comment. But he added something, too, that gave Hunt pause.

“It seems a good deal like old times. I used to go to church reg’lar, onc’t,” said Siebert. “But I miss something, parson – I sure do.”

“What’s that?” asked Hunt smiling.

“Let alone I never expected to see that old has-been at meetin’ – an’ I don’t reckon he’s come for any good – I see you don’t look jest like a preacher ought to look. Say, don’t ministers dress different no more from other folks? You might be a banker or a gambler as far as your coat goes to show.”

The blunt criticism shocked Hunt not a little. Up to this time he had carefully eschewed clerical dress. He began to wonder if, after all, he was not making a mistake.

Dick Beckworth was not on the street when the parson and his sister went back to the hotel. In fact Dick had slipped out very soon after the meeting ceased and was then in conference with Boss Tolley in the little office at the end of the long bar in the Grub Stake.

“Well,” said Tolley, eagerly, “did you see her?”

“Sure as sure.”

“Is it her?” demanded the dive keeper, grinning like a wolf.

“It sure is. It’s her that was Betty Hunt.”

“Dad burn it! And she paradin’ ’round here like an unmarried woman. Dick, we got that parson on the hip.”