The One-Way Trail. Cullum Ridgwell
his dough. The Methodist lay-preacher, Abe C. Horsley, sold everything to cover up the body, whenever he wasn’t concerned with the soul. Then there was Angel Gay, an estimable butcher and a good enough fellow; but it hardly seemed right that he should be in combination with Zac Restless, the carpenter, for the disposal of Barnriff’s corpses. However, these things were, and had been accepted by the village folk for so long that it seemed almost a pity to disturb them.
Barnriff, viewed from a distance, was not without a certain picturesqueness; but the distance had to be great enough to lose sight of the uncouthness which a close inspection revealed. Besides, its squalor did not much matter. It did not affect the temper of the folk living within its boundaries. To them the place was a little temporary “homelet,” to coin a word. For frontier people are, for the most part, transient. They only pause at such place on their fighting journey through the wilder life. They pass on in time to other spheres, some on an upward grade, others down the long decline, which is the road of the ne’er-do-well. And with each inhabitant that comes and goes, some detail of evolution is achieved by the little hamlet through which they pass, until, in the course of long years, it, too, has fought its way upward to the mathematical precision and bold glory of a modern 32 commercial city, or has joined in the downward march of the ne’er-do-well.
The blazing summer sun burned down upon the unsheltered village. There was no shade anywhere––that is, outside the houses. For the place had grown up on the crests of the bald, green rollers of the Western plains as though its original seedling had been tossed there by the wanton summer breezes, and for no better reason.
Anthony Smallbones, familiarly known to his intimates as “fussy-breeches,” because he lived in a dream-fever of commercial enterprise, and believed himself to be a Napoleon of finance––he ran a store, at which he sold a collection of hardware, books, candy, stationery, notions and “delicatessen”––was on his way to the boarding-house for breakfast––there was only one boarding-house in Barnriff, and all the bachelors had their meals there.
He was never leisurely. He believed himself to be too busy for leisure. Just now he was concentrated upon the side issues of a great irrigation scheme that had occupied his small head for at least twenty-four hours, and thus it happened that he ran full tilt into Peter Blunt before he was aware of the giant’s presence. He rebounded and came to, and hurled a savage greeting at him.
“Wher’ you goin’?” he demanded.
“Don’t seem to be your way,” the large man vouchsafed, with quiet good-nature.
“No,” was the surly response.
“Kind of slack, aren’t you?” inquired Peter, his deep-set blue eyes twinkling with humor. “I’ve eaten two hours back. This lying a-bed is mighty bad for your business schemes.”
“Schemes? Gee! I was around at half after five, 33 man! Lying a-bed? Say, you don’t know what business means.” The little man sniffed scornfully.
“Maybe you’re right,” Peter responded. He hunched his great loose shoulders to shift the position of a small sack of stuff he was carrying.
He was a man of very large physique and uncertain age. He possessed a burned up face of great strength, and good-nature, but it was so weather-stained, so grizzled, that at first sight it appeared almost harsh. He was an Englishman who had spent years and years of hardy life wandering over the remotenesses of the Western plains of America. Little was known of him, that is to say, little of that life that must once have been his. He was well educated, traveled, and possessed an inexhaustible fund of information on any subject. But beyond the fact that he had once been a soldier, and that a large slice of his life had been lived in such places as Barnriff, no one knew aught of him. And yet it was probable that nobody on the Western prairies was better known than Peter Blunt. East and west, north and south, he was known for a kindly nature, and kindly actions. These things, and for a devotion to prospecting for gold in what were generally considered to be the most unlikely places.
“Right? Why o’ course I’m right. Ef you’se folk jest got busy around here, we’d make Barnriff hum an elegant toon. Say, now I got a dandy scheme fer irrigatin’ that land back there–––”
“Yep. You gave me that yesterday. It’s a good scheme.” The giant’s eyes twinkled. “A great scheme. You’re a wonder. But say, all you told me that day has set my slow head busy. I’ve been thinking a heap 34 since on what you said about ‘trusts.’ That’s it, ‘trusts,’ ‘trusts’ and ‘combines.’ That’s the way to get on to millions of dollars. Better than scratching around, eh? Now here’s an idea. I thought I’d like to put it to you, finance and such things being your specialty. There’s Angel Gay. Now he’s running a fine partnership with Restless. Now you take those two as a nucleus. You yourself open a side-line in drugs, and work in with Doc Crombie, and pool the result of the four. The Doc would draw his fees for making folks sick, you’d clear a handsome profit for poisoning them, Gay ’ud rake in his dollars for burying ’em, and Restless?––why Restless ’ud put in white pine for oak, and retire on the profits in five years. Say–––”
“What you got in that sack?” inquired Smallbones, blandly ignoring the other’s jest at his expense.
“Well, nothing that’s a heap of interest. I’ve been scratching around at the head waters of the river, back there in the foot-hills.”
“Ah, ‘prospects,’” observed the other, with a malicious shake of the head. “Guess you’re allus prospectin’ around. I see you diggin’ Eve Marsham’s tater patch yesterday. Don’t guess you made much of a ‘strike’ in that layout?”
“No.” Peter shook his head genially. The little man’s drift was obvious. He turned toward the one attractive cottage in the settlement, and saw a woman’s figure standing at the doorway talking to a diminutive boy.
“Guess though you’ll likely strike more profit diggin’ spuds fer folk than you do scratching up loam and loose rocks the way you do,” Smallbones went on sourly.
Peter nodded.
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“Sure. You’re a far-seeing little man. There’s a heap of gold about Eve’s home. A big heap; and I tell you, if that was my place, I’d never need to get outside her fences to find all I needed. I’d be a millionaire.”
Smallbones looked up into his face curiously. He was thinking hard. But his imagination was limited. Finally he decided that Peter was laughing at him.
“Guess your humor’s ’bout as elegant as a fun’ral. An’ it ain’t good on an empty stummick. I pass.”
“So long,” cried the giant amiably. “I’ll turn that ‘trust’ racket over in my mind. So long.”
He strode away with great lumbering strides heading straight for his humble, two-roomed shack. Smallbones, as he went on to the boarding-house, was full of angry contempt for the prospector. He was a mean man, and like most mean men he hated to be laughed at. But when his anger smoothed down he found himself pitying any one who spent his life looking for profit, by wasting a glorious energy, delving for gold in places where gold was known to be non-existent.
He ruminated on the matter as he went. And wondered. Then there came to him the memory of vague stories of gold in the vicinity of the Barnriff. Indian stories it is true. But then Indian stories often had a knack of having remarkably truthful foundations. Immediately his busy brain began to construct a syndicate of townspeople to hunt up the legends, with a small capital to carry on operations. He would have the lion’s share in the concern, of course, and––yes––they might make Peter Blunt chief operator. And by the time he reached the boarding-house all his irrigation scheme was forgotten in this new toy.
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CHAPTER IV