The Son of his Father. Cullum Ridgwell
against the wits of such land speculators as he saw about him? He studied the faces of some of the clamorous crowd in the dining-room. They were a strangely mixed lot. There were undoubtedly men of substance among them, but equally surely the majority were adventurers looking to step into the arena of the coming boom and wrest a slice of fortune by hook, or, more probably, by crook. What did he know? What could he do? And his mind went back to the sharp on the train, and the way he had fallen to the man's snare. Again he wanted to laugh. He had counted the bills which Mallinsbee had handed him, in the privacy of his bathroom. He only remembered to have lost about two hundred dollars to the gambler. The dollars handed to him amounted to well over three hundred. The miracle of it all. He had nearly killed the gambler, and, instead of losing, he had made over a hundred dollars on the deal. The miracle of it!
"Do you believe in miracles?" he laughed abruptly.
Peter glanced up from his plate suspiciously. Then he promptly joined in the other's amusement. He always remembered that this newcomer was a friend of Silas Mallinsbee.
"Meracles?" he said reflectively. "I can't say I always did. But one or two things have made some difference that way. Takin' one extra drink saved my life once. The takin' of that drink wasn't jest a meracle," he added dryly. "It was more of a habit them days. Still, it was a meracle in a way. Me an' my brother wer' on a bust. We were feeling that good we was handin' out our pasts in lumps to each other, same as if we was strangers, and wasn't raised around the same cabbige patch. Wal, he'd borrowed an automobile and left the saloon to wind it up, and get things fixed. While he was gone the boys handed me another cocktail. Then the bartender slung one at me, an' I hadn't no more sense than to buy another one myself. Then some damn fool thought rye was the best mix for drinkin' on top o' cocktails, an' so they put me to bed. Guess I never see my brother get back from that joy ride." He sighed. "I allow they had to bury a lot of that automobile with him, he was so mussed up. Sort o' meracle, you'd say? Then there was another time. Guess it was my wife. She was one o' them females who make you feel you want to associate with tame earthworms. Sort o' female who never knew what a sick headache was, an' sang hymns of a Sunday evening, and played a harmonium when she was feelin' in sperits. Sort o' female who couldn't help smellin' out when you was lyin' to her, an' gener'ly told you of it. A good woman though, an' don't yer fergit it. Wal, I got sick once an' when I got right again she guessed it was up to 'em to insure myself in her favor. Guess I'd just paid my first premium when she goes an' takes colic an' dies. I did all I knew. I give her ginger, an' hot-water bags, an' poultices. It didn't make no sort o' difference. She died. I ain't paid no premiums since. Sort o' meracle that," he added, with a satisfied smile. "Then there's this coal. I hadn't started this hotel six months when Mallinsbee gets busy an' makes his deal with the corporation. You ain't goin' to make a pile out of a bum country hotel without a – meracle."
The man's gravity was impressive, and Gordon strove for sympathy.
"Yes," he declared, with smiling emphasis. "There are such things as miracles. One has happened this day – and here. My arrival here was certainly a miracle. A peculiarly earthy miracle, but, nevertheless, a – miracle. Say, I'll have to write some in the office. See you again."
Gordon pushed back his chair and hurried away through the crowded room towards the office. But here again was a crowd. Here again was "land" – always "land." And in desperation he betook himself to his bathroom. He felt he must write to his mother. He felt that on this his arrival in Snake's Fall he could do no less than reassure her of his well-being.
Mrs. James Carbhoy sighed contentedly as she raised her eyes from the last of a number of sheets of paper in her lap. Her husband turned from his contemplation of the scorching streets, and the parched foliage of the wide expanse of trees beyond the window.
"Well?" he inquired. "Where is the boy?"
There was the faintest touch of anxiety in his inquiry, but his face was perfectly controlled, and the humor in his eyes was quite unchanged.
Mrs. Carbhoy sighed again.
"I don't know. He doesn't say. Nor does he give the slightest clew." She examined the envelope of the letter. "It was mailed here in New York. It's a rambling sort of letter. I hope he is all right. This hot weather is – Do you think he – "
Her husband laughed.
"I guess he's all right. You see I don't fancy he wants us to know where he is. That's come through some friend, I'd say. Just read it out."
Gordon's mother leaned back in her chair again. She was more than ready to read her beloved boy's letter again, in spite of her misgivings. Besides, there was a hope in her thoughts that she had missed some clew as to his whereabouts which her clear-sighted husband might detect.
"DEAREST MUM:
"Destinations are mighty curious things which have a way of making up their minds as to whom they are terminals for, regardless of the individual. Most of us think the matter of destination is in our own hands. We make up our minds to go to the North Pole; well, if we get there it's because no other terminal on the way has made up its mind to claim us. I've surely arrived at my destination, a place I wasn't going to, nor had heard of, nor dreamed of – even when I had nightmare. I guess this place must have said to itself, 'Hello, here's Gordon Carbhoy on the train; he's every sort of fool, he don't know if it's Palm Sunday or Candlemas, he hasn't got more sense than an old hen with kittens, let's divert him where we think he ought to go.' So I arrived here quite suddenly this afternoon and, in consequence, have wasted some fifty odd dollars of passage money. It's a good beginning, and one the old Dad 'll surely appreciate.
"Talking of the old Dad, I'd like you to tell him from me that I don't think graft is confined to – big finance. This is a discovery he's likely to be interested in. Also, since he's largely interested in railroads, though not from a traveling point of view, I would point out that much might be done to improve accommodation. The aisles are too narrow and the corners of the seats are too sharp. Furthermore, the best money-making scheme I can think of at the moment is a billet as a conductor of a transcontinental express.
"However, these things are just first impressions.
"There are other impressions I won't discuss here. They relate to arrival platforms of depots. When a fellow gets out on his own in the world, there are many things with which he comes into contact liable to strike him forcibly. Those are the things in life calculated to teach him much that may be useful to him afterwards. I have already come into contact with such things, and though they are liable to leave an impression of soreness generally, their lessons are quite sound.
"On the whole, in spite of having lost fifty odd dollars on my railroad ticket, my first two or three days' adventures have left me with a margin of profit such as I could not reasonably have expected. I mention this to show you, presuming that the Dad has told you the object of my going, that my eye is definitely focused on the primary purpose of my ramblings.
"I am keeping my eyes well open and one or two of my observations might be of interest to you.
"I have discovered that the luxurious bath is not actually necessary to life, and, from a hygienic point of view, there's no real drawback to the kind of soap vulgarly known as 'hoss.' Furthermore, the filtration of water for ablutionary purposes is quite unnecessary. All it needs is to be of a consistency that'll percolate through a fish net. Moreover, judging from observations only, I have discovered that a comb and brush, if securely chained up, can be used on any number of heads without damaging results.
"Observation cannot be considered complete without its being turned upon one's fellow-creatures. I have already come into contact with some very interesting specimens of my kind. Without worrying you with details I have found some of them really worth while. Generalizing, I'd like to say right here that man seems to be a creature of curious habits – many of which are bad. I don't say this with malice. On the contrary, I say it with appreciation. And, too, I never realized what a general hobby amongst men the collecting of dollars was. It must be all the more interesting that, as a collection, it never seems completed. I'd like to remark that view points change quickly under given circumstances, and I am now bitten with the desire to become a collector.
"Furthermore, my focus had readjusted itself already. For instance, I feel no repulsion at the manners displayed in the dining-room of