CHAPTER FOURTEEN
THE day of the momentous and eagerly anticipated raspberry festival had finally arrived, «and Zenith, as one man, made joyous preparation to see Myrtle and Mrs. Evans play off their finals, although outwardly professing merely a pious desire to show approval of the zeal of the Aid Society, under whose competent management the festival was to be given, the proceeds of the dancing and refreshment privileges to go for a new melodeon to be purchased for the church.
Just as the afternoon sun was sinking behind the peaks, Mrs. Nitschkan, who was on the entertainment committee for the evening, and who, if indications counted for anything, would, as usual, be late, hastened up Sunshine Avenue toward her home, fishing rod in hand and a basket of brook trout over her arm. As she passed the O'Brien home she paused to speak to the Black Pearl, who stood in her own doorway.
"Hello, Pearl!" called the hardy gipsy jovially. "How would you like a mess of brook trout?"
"First rate," responded the Pearl heartily. "You're all right, Nitschkan, even if you are crazy enough to live up in these old mountains—the desert's the place."
Mrs. Nitschkan shook her head. "The mountains for mine," she said emphatically. "Look at the fishin' an' the huntin'; nice cool streams to wade in an' fish; nice cool woods to hunt in, an' you never know when you're a-comin' around a corner an' meet a bear or a deer. It's sure the woods fer mine. I" She stopped and peered curiously into the other woman's face.
"What's that mark on your forehead, Pearl? You must have got an awful whack some way."
The Pearl turned her vague gaze from the distant peaks, with the last red glow of the sun on their shining summits, and became suddenly alive to the mundane. "Oh, that!" She ran her fingers across her brow and laughed. Her slightly crooked mouth broke into dimples and there was a cool deviltry in the sidelong glance she threw at the gipsy. "Why, Shock give me that three or four days ago. I can't go to the festival to-night unless I can get it powdered up good enough to cover it."
The mountain woman surveyed her a moment in tolerant, dispassionate curiosity. "Why can't you leave the boys alone, Pearl?" she asked finally. "They ain't none of 'em here nor anywheres else that's worth standin' a lickin' for."
"You bet," agreed Mrs. O'Brien indifferently, but with perfect acquiescence. "But, say, Nitschkan, I wasn't doin' a thing—just standin' at the gate, talkin' to a—a—fellow when Shock come down the road. Well, I wisht you'd 'a' seen him!" the reminiscent coquetry of her smile brightening her weary eyes. "That French-Irish face of his'n was blacker 'n a thunder-cloud an' his eyes was a-blazin' fire. We had it hot an' heavy about all night. Shock, you know him; he can't bear to see another man so much as look at me."
"Then what you always a-teasin' him for, Pearl?" asked Mrs. Nitschkan with indubitable reason and practicality.
"I do' know," with a slight shrug of the shoulders. "I always been used to the boys. They know an' I know that I wouldn't look at one of 'em now; but Shock, the big fool, he don't know nothin', an' Lord! but he's jealous."
"Jealous! Catsfoot!" replied Mrs. Nitschkan with sturdy scorn. "I'd like to see any man kick an' cuff me about as he pleases; that's what I'd like to see, an' you always yellin' about bein' free!"
There were tiny flickers of fire in Mrs. O'Brien's eyes. The slow, heavy crimson crept up under her dark skin and her thin, curving mouth became pointed and animal. The upper lip curled slightly on either side and showed two white pointed teeth like a wolf's.
"You think you're smart, don't you, Sadie Nitschkan?" in a coarse, muffled scream; "you think you know a thing or two. Well, let me tell you, once an' fer all, you don't. You think I'd stay with any man I didn't want to? Why, all hell couldn't hold me. You ask any of the boys down in the desert. They'd laugh in your face. They know I'd knife him without countin' one, two, three. Oh, you—you—tramp woman! You know a lot about huntin' an' fishin'; but you know a mighty little about women. You ain't never been one."
"Now, Pearl, there ain't no occasion to spit like a cat," returned Mrs. Nitschkan, unmoved by these taunts. "An' if you give me much more sass, I'll jerk you over the fence and throw you out in the road. Oh!" with a scornful laugh, "I ain't a mite af eared of that knife they say you always keep down in your stockin'."
But Mrs. O'Brien's tempest of anger had fallen to calm as quickly as it had flamed. Without further notice of her companion, she dropped her face into the cup of her hands and again gazed idly out at the rapidly blurring outlines of the hills.
"Bob Flick's here," advanced Mrs. Nitschkan in a casual and friendly tone, "but 'course you know. He's a-stayin' at our house. He's a-goin' to deal faro bank here for a while. He was a-talkin' last night to Jack an' me, an' he jus' couldn't get over you bein' here this away. 'Lord!' he says, over an' over again. 'It do beat everything to see the Pearl livin' up here so plain. Why,' he says, 'I shouldn't wonder if she's even forgot how to cross her feet—her that's danced in every town in the Southwest.'"
Pearl laughed. "I guess I ain't forgot," lazily. Then her whole appearance changed; the listlessness vanished from her face. "Here comes Shock!" she said.
"Oh," murmured Mrs. Nitschkan with a hurried glance at O'Brien, who hastened down the mountain road, his dinner pail over his arm.
"Wait a minute," said the Pearl in a rapid whisper. "I want to see Bob Flick. You tell him to be at the raspberry social to-night."
Appalled by her daring, Mrs. Nitschkan glanced apprehensively at O'Brien, almost at her elbow, and then hurried on; but after a few paces, she turned, like Lot's wife, to look back.
The Black Pearl, her arm through her husband's, was sauntering up the narrow path which led from the gate to the cottage. It was only when she walked that she showed to the full, her exquisite and undulating grace.
"I jus' been waterin' the flowers, Shock, while I was waitin' for you," her lazy, colourless voice was full of animation. "Don't they look great?" She stooped, and breaking off a scarlet geranium, thrust it into her hair.
"It jus' seems like I can't get enough reds an' yellows," complained Mrs. O'Brien. "But I tell you what, Shock, this garden rests my eyes a whole lot after lookin' out at those old mountains with snow on their tops. Ugh!" she shivered.
Jacques laughed. "What else you been doin', Pearl, besides waterin' the garden?"
"I finished my dress to wear to the raspberry social to-night." She stepped back from him that he might the better observe her handiwork. She had fashioned some cheap, pink material so that it fell as soft as crepe into wonderful long lines about her slender height. "Do you like it, Shock?" She tilted her head sideways and looked at him with her crooked, heart-shattering smile.
"Yes." He caught her hand and drew her toward him. "Air you glad to see me, Pearl?"
"Air I glad to see you? Air I glad to see you? No. Understand once an' fer all, No."
They laughed, and he pulled her sunburned head to his breast and kissed the faint purple bruise on her brow.
"Crazy!" She still laughed and dragged at his hand. "Come on in and eat your supper."
"Crazy's the word," philosophised Mrs. Nitschkan, shaking her head as she walked on. "Seems to me the Pearl's possessed. She sure acts like she's wild about Shock, an' yet, she's sendin' word to Bob Flick to meet her this evenin' at the festival. That's what comes of bein' a hussy. But Lord! I got to hurry, for I wouldn't miss that social to-night for all that's goin'."
She but voiced the universal sentiment of the village. Already "supper things" were being hastily cleared away, and blinds were drawn that no delay might be caused by the ceremony of dressing.
With that sixth sense common in isolated communities, where the interest in the drama before one's eyes is intense and absorbing, because at any moment the spectator may be called from the seclusion of the audience to take his place among the actors before the footlights, the participators in the raspberry festival were all intuitively aware that the immanent, psychological moment was at hand. There was no question of mistake or of postponement. The hour had struck.
Frances felt it and was vaguely troubled and perplexed. She realised with a feeling of depression that, so far as one might judge, the seed she had sown had fallen among the rocks, for Myrtle was more audacious than ever in her skirmishes with the enemy. The subtle intimation communicated itself to Mrs. Evans and "her click," and for once, that close and assured corporation was slightly irresolute.
"I know," muttered Mrs. Evans, as she and Mrs. Thomas wended their way toward the Town Hall, the scene of the festivity, "that this 'll be the last time I wear myself to skin an' bone to get any girl married. I ask you, Mis' Thomas, if Susie Hazen has ever said more than 'Yes, sir,' and 'No, sir,' to Preacher, an' if she ain't et like a wolf at every tea party we've give 'em? Now you know as well as I do, that no girl 's goin' to get house an' home, husband an' children, actin' that way. I will say for Myrtle that she certainly is enterprisin'."
"How true it is," said Mrs. Thomas, "that God helps those that helps theirselves. Well, here we are at the door."
The Town Hall was alight with a dozen lamps in brackets on the walls; the main part of the floor had been cleared for dancing, and polished until it shone; while at the lower end were placed long tables where raspberries and ice cream were served by the members of the Aid Society.
Interest was naturally centred in Myrtle and the "lunger preacher," as it was understood that Frank McGuire could not get down from the mine until after nine o'clock. Carrothers, placid and even gay in a bleating and lamb-like manner, was probably the only person present who was not enjoying the tense expectancy of a dramatic dénouement. He, one of the chief actors before the curtain, was in the paradoxical position of not knowing that he had assumed a leading rôle.
Curiosity was somewhat deflected by the appearance of the Black Pearl, who was presumably successful in powdering her bruise; but who arrived rather late, and greatly disappointed Zenith by refusing all invitations to dance. Bob Flick, too, had sauntered in a few moments afterwards, so if the principal performance in the large tent was somewhat delayed, there were not lacking side shows to keep up the interest of the spectators.
Flick was a tall, slow-moving fellow, with the pale impassive face of the professional gambler. There were tense lines about his mouth, and the deep crows' feet about his eyes betokened that he had long lived in the lands of vivid sunlight. For a few moments he stood leaning against the door, exchanging a curt word now and again with an acquaintance; but for the most part gazing with cold, narrowed eyes at Mrs. O'Brien, who sat, lazy and indifferent, with a faint smile on her scornful mouth, while about her chair eddied a boisterous court, which, however it might vary as to individuals, never diminished in size.
As far as one might judge, she made no especial effort to attract, when she spoke at all it was in monosyllables, though occasionally she interjected a brief word into the general conversation; but in the main she sat silent, listless; Inherently, perhaps unconsciously, man-compelling.
It was not, however, until Flick finally moved across the room and took his stand doggedly and immovably beside her chair, that she showed any signs of animation, although she still persisted in refusing his, as well as all other invitations to dance.
"No, I don't want to dance," her soft, sliding voice held the note of decision. "Come on, Bob, sit down here beside me an' tell me the news. How's Jim Hurd; an' was it true he got shot over the cards? An' Frank Applewaite? Did he, honest, run off with a Greaser girl, like one of the boys told me? Oh, I'm hungry for the news. Have they,"—with a wistful coquetry—"have they plumb forgot me yet, Bob?"
"I should say not,"—with emphasis. "But it does seem funny to see you like this, Pearl, with jus' that plain, gold ring on your finger. Why, I was a-talkin' to a jeweller down in Tucson the other day an' he says: 'I wonder if I could get the Black Pearl's necklace? She's got the finest matched string of emeralds I ever see.'"
"Well, he'll never get 'em," with smiling, indifferent finality.
"What did you do with 'em, Pearl?" asked Flick, curiously. "Sell 'em? "
"Sell 'em? No. I give 'em to Father Gonzales, the night before he married Shock an' me. I guess he's hung 'em around the neck of the Virgin, or maybe he's keepin' the poor in luxury on 'em yet. Lord! Can't you hear those old Mission bells, kind o' cracked and sweet an' far away? They always sounded like Time and Eternity to me. Oh, Bob, there ain't nothin' like the desert, is there? I can't get used to havin' the mountains so close. I feel all the time like they was a-crowdin' an' a-pushin' me. I want to be where I can breathe."
The gambler laughed outright. "Well, you ain't so changed, after all," he said, and some new almost exultant note rang in his voice. "Same old cry. Jim Hurd was a-speakin' to me, only a little while back, of the old days, an' he says: 'Can't you see the Pearl a flingin' up her arms an' sayin': "I want to be free"? I wonder what ailed that girl?' he said. 'She was always a-goin' on about wantin' to be free. Why how,' he says, 'could anyone be freer 'an her? When she got tired of one place, she was off to the next. Her pockets was always full of money, an' her fingers blazin' with coloured stones. If that ain't bein' free,' he said, ' I'd like to know what is.'"
"Those rings wasn't half so pretty nor so bright as the beetles that crawled out in the sand when you turned over a stone." The veil of moodiness had again fallen over her eyes.
"I kin just smell trouble in the air," sighed Mrs. Thomas at the farther end of the hall, pausing in her occupation of serving raspberries into small saucers, with a very large iron spoon. "Myrtle cavortin', an' the Pearl carryin' on with Bob Flick! You see if they ain't some shots passed before we get home. An' ain't it a high note for the Pearl not to dance. That's always the way with them perfessionals; they're so contrary that they take pleasure in puttin' their lights under bushels just to spite folks. My!" as Myrtle floated by her, "ain't that girl wild to-night! Well," sighing heavily, "she'll be gnashin' her teeth before mornin'. That's sure."
In truth, Myrtle was dancing indefatigably, the gayest of the gay, when Frances laid a detaining hand on her arm. "Myrtle," she begged, "put a stop to all this nonsense and talk to-night. Decide one way or another; Frank will soon be here now."
Myrtle's soft little face had grown hard, and her eyes glittered. There was a worried line or so about her mouth. "I can't help it," she cried. "I can't stand it to have Mis' Evans crowin' over me to the end of my days, an' sayin' I took Frank 'cause I couldn't get Preacher. Look at her now, grinnin' 'cause Preacher an Susie's talkin' together. She's a-drivin' me to it, Missioner. She's a-drivin' me sure to take him."
"But you told me he did not care for you," exclaimed Frances, in a tone at once impatient and bewildered.
"They ain't none of them so hard to get," said the girl with moody scorn. "I ain't fished for trout all my life in these mountains an' not know how to ketch a man."
A partner claimed her, and she danced away, her white dress fluttering through the moving figures about the hall. When she came to a stop at last, it was in the centre of a laughing, gasping group.
But suddenly their laughter, which had been ringing to the ceiling, faltered and died, silenced by a whisper which had run like lightning through the room. There was a moment's commotion. Men consulted briefly and started toward the door, while women hastily gathered up babies.
"What is it?" asked Frances of a man who passed her.
"Something wrong at The Gold Dirt. Three of the boys ain't come down."
Myrtle clutched her arm. "Frank!" she gasped. "He's workin' in The Gold Dirt, an' if it wasn't him, he'd been here before. Come on!" And pulling the Missionary strongly by the hand, she ran with her down the steps leading to the road.
Undisturbed by the confusion about her, Mrs. Evans stood by the deserted tables, calmly issuing orders. "You fetch all the ground coffee, Nitschkan. We'll need it up there. I'll take a basket of cups, an' you carry the pots, Mis' Thomas. Mis' Landvetter, gather up all the shawls that's left, an' don't forget to bring the matches. Let the kids stay here an' eat up the cream an' berries, no use wastin' 'em. Now you all ready? Then we'll start."
The wagon road up the mountain was black with people. Men with picks and lanterns in their hands, and women whose faces showed white under the shawls they had hastily thrown over their heads.
"What is it?" again asked Frances of a man they met hurrying down the road.
"An explosion in The Gold Dirt," he answered. "Three of the boys was down on the fifth level to do some blastin'. They signalled for the cage and the engineer sent it down; but they never signalled for it to be lifted. I guess they waited too long after they touched off their fuses."
"Who were they?" cried Myrtle.
"I ain't got no time to talk," he called back over his shoulder. "I'm a-goin' for a doctor."
"Oh," wailed the girl, her fingers sinking painfully deep in the Missionary's arm; but after that outcry, she made no further demonstration. She was a daughter of the mountains and knew that no breath must be wasted in lamentations. There was a long climb before them.
Once the clatter of hoofs behind them caused her to shiver convulsively.
"I wonder who it is?" said Frances, as a man on horseback pushed through the crowd on foot, and on up the slope.
"The surgeon," replied Myrtle, in a dull, muffled voice.
When at last they reached the mine, it was a weird and striking scene which met their eyes, solemn, vivid, almost awe-inspiring. The first arrivals with a practicality acquired in a life spent in battling with necessity, had built great, flaring bonfires of pitchpine logs. The red flames with their dense clouds of pitchy smoke leaped up against a background of violet-black mountains with the snow-covered peaks, and illuminated the bare wooden engine house and the huge, slate-coloured ore dumps.
Myrtle stood on the crest of the hill, tense, waiting. All her soft, peachy prettiness had vanished, showing a facial outline hard and stern. As Mrs. Evans panted up beside her, the girl caught that tiny woman by the arms, pinioning them to her sides, and lifted her off her feet.
In an instant Mrs. Nitschkan's man's coat sleeve was rolled up and her bare great-muscled arm shot out its clenched fist in Myrtle's face.
"Don't you hurt her, Myrtle," she warned. "If you do, I'll break your jaw as sure as I'm a-standin' here."
"What do I care?" said Myrtle. "But I'll tell you this; this is a judgment on me and I ain't goin' to be punished alone, when there's others deserves it too. Her man's one of the best miners in the camp, an' he's got to go down an' bring out mine."
Mrs. Evans, completely in the power of the younger and larger woman, had merely cocked her head and gazed at her with cool defiance; but now her expression changed. In the world, so in Zenith. The eternal feminine knows modification, but no change. There had been warfare between herself and Myrtle; but at the first hint of trouble, the hatchet was buried, the ministrations began.
"You bet he'll go down, Myrtle, an' in the first cage. Put me down on the ground an' I'll see to it."
In the interval of waiting the women busied themselves in making coffee for the miners, and the always increasing crowd lingered breathlessly, and for the most part, silently. Myrtle had thrown herself on the ground and lay with her head in the Missionary's lap. Once Carrothers approached her and with a few words attempted to console and hearten her; but she threw out her hand with the impatient gesture of one waving away any.
"Aw, shut up!" she muttered. "I'd rather hear Mis' Nitschkan swear."
"Gosh a'mighty, child!" said that bluff King Hal in petticoats, "you mustn't take on this way. You got to get used to this. We've all seen our men brung out bloody an' smashed, times without number, ain't we, Mis' Evans?"
"Every bone in Sile's body's been broke in these blasted mines," returned that lady laconically. "Lift up your head, Myrtie, an' drink this nice hot coffee."
"Yes, take the blessed comfort of it," coaxed Mrs. Thomas. "My patience! Ain't it somethin' beautiful the way we take on when accidents happen to them, an' what do they do fer us in pain or grief? I've seen a man sit with his feet up on the kitchen stove readin' a newspaper an' never turnin' a hair, while his wife was screamin' herself black in the face with the strikes in the next room. Cheer up, Myrtie! They ain't no man worth it."
"Frank is," sobbed Myrtle. "I don't care if the rest is blown to pieces; one of 'em's a drunken Polack, an' the other's the dead-broke son of an English lord, an' it don't make no difference about them."
This exposition of an essentially feminine point of view occasioned no surprise among her sympathisers.
"That's the way we all feel when it comes to our man, no matter how cranky he may be; or our kids, no matter how devilish they are," murmured Mrs. Thomas, who took an artistic delight in her ability to mourn thoroughly and completely with those who mourn.
The slow, dragging watches of the night wore painfully away; and at last, after hours of waiting, it was announced that the miners had dug through the debris. Finally, one man, the drunken Polack, was borne out unconscious, injured; the surgeon worked over him. Then another, "the dead-broke son of an English lord"; and at last, exhausted, almost asphyxiated, his arm hanging helpless, Frank McGuire.
Like a flash, Myrtle burst through the crowd and threw her arms about him before their world. The smile she lifted to his dazed and doubting glance was full of rapture and relief, of a thousand capitulations and promises, and it fell like sunshine upon him, melting the winter of his discontent.
"Myrtle," he murmured. "Myrtle, are you sure?"
"Sure!" she cried in a burst of sobs. "I always been sure; but I was born so devilish that I never could take a dare."
Dawn was just breaking over the mountains when a little cavalcade wound down the hill. McGuire on a dusty, grey burro, was supported by Carrothers on one side, and by Myrtle on the other. They were environed by Mrs. Evans, Mrs. Thomas, Mrs. Nitschkan, Mrs. Landvetter and the "Missioner," bearing shawls, coffee utensils and baskets. In the reaction from the suspense and anxiety of the night, these ladies had become jocular, almost to hilarity, and the conversation frequently verged on that form of banter known as rude.
"Preacher and Missioner had better be gettin' ready to officiate at a weddin' soon, hadn't they, Frank?" called Mrs. Nitschkan jovially.
"Maybe Preacher 'll be thinkin' of a weddin' on his own hook." Myrtle's glance was still inherently coquettish. "Maybe that girl back in Illinois"
Carrothers flushed to the roots of his hair. "She writes she thinks she'll like it here." Then he took his courage in both hands: "It's—it's—to be at Christmas."
Of the disconcerted little group behind the burro, now huddling together and gazing at each other with round eyes, Mrs. Thomas alone retained her poise.
"Ain't they the critters for you!" she exclaimed, gazing admiringly at Carrothers's back. "They's two games they can sure beat us at—poker and love. Here were Myrtle an' Mis' Evans raisin' each other to the limit, an' Preacher had 'em cold decked from the start."