Kings of the Missouri. Hugh Pendexter
Bridger's voice after Lander had rapped for the second time.
Lander entered. Bridger peered up from his work and greeted:
"What does a A. F. C. man want here at this hour?"
"Work," was the laconic reply.
"Through?"
"Dismissed."
"Why?"
"Hurry-Up Parker."
"He's a good trader, a ripping good river and mountain man. One of the kings of the Missouri. What's his complaint against you?"
"He has a daughter. I—I like her. He doesn't like to have me like her."
Bridger grinned broadly in sympathetic amusement.
"Old man acted rough, eh? They sometimes do unless you marry a' Injun squaw. No chance for trouble with them as a feller is never spoken to by, an' mustn't speak to, his father-in-law. Everything goes as smooth as a fiddle. But work?"
"Parker said the A. F. C. would see to it I got none in St. Louis."
"It's like the A. F. C. Won't give a man his bread an' butter an' don't 'low to let any one else. They'll have more important things to think about afore the season's over. Now let's see. We're all finished up here. A few weeks ago I could have used you fine. This fussing round with papers makes me nervous, an' I reckon you'd done it quicker'n a wolf can steal meat."
"I've done quite a bit of it. Parker wants to fix it to drive me from town. And you can't use me here?"
"Not now. Mebbe later." And Bridger's voice was very kind. "You see the outfit gits under way to-morrow. Some of the men are at St. Charles with the keelboat. Some are waiting at Lexington for the steamer to fetch up goods an' supplies. Etienne Prevost will take the keel-boat as far as Fort Pierre. I shall take the land party through to the yearly rendezvous somewhere on Green River. An' some of the men are helling round St. Louis to-night an' will be lucky if they ain't left behind. I leave in an hour on my best mule to ride across country to Lexington. So, my young friend, the work down here is all done an' I'm sorry."
"It was only a chance," sighed Lander. "I didn't want to miss the shadow of a chance."
Bridger tugged at his brown hair and eyed Lander thoughtfully. Then he abruptly asked: "Why don't you take on with a mountain trip? Give you two hundred 'n' ninety dollars for the next year 'n' half—eighteen months—an' such grub as can be found in the Injun country. You're young. Once you git started no knowing how far you'll go."
Lander's eyes glistened and for a moment Bridger believed he was to sign up. Then his gaze fell. The mountain trip was all he would ask for it if were not for leaving Susette behind. At least he could not leave her until he had seen her and had explained things.
"If that offer could hold good for a few days," he began.
"No, sir! Take it or leave it as it stands," cut in Bridger. "We want men who can decide things right off the handle. The outfit starts to-morrow. Those who don't git across country to St. Charles to-night will git left."
"Well, I'm sorry I can't sign on, and I can't start to-morrow. I've several things to attend to. Much obliged for the offer, though."
"That's all right," grunted Bridger, nodding his head and returning to his lists.
Outside the store Lander recalled his appointment with Papa Clair at Tilton's place on the water-front near the foot of Cherry Street. He hurried to the rendezvous inflamed by his desire to find Phinny. In his despair and discouragement he needed something to feed upon; and so long as a successful love seemed dubious he would turn to the positive of hate. He now knew he had hated Phinny for a long time and had subconsciously resented the man's many petty treacheries. With desire for little Susette burgeoning his path he had put hate to one side. Had the path held smooth his ignorement of Phinny would have been permanent. Outraged by Hurry-Up Parker's contemptuous treatment he fished out his grievance against Phinny from its mental pigeonhole and knew it was a matter demanding imperative attention.
He minutely reviewed his career as storeman for the A. F. C. and easily traced the thread of treachery running through Phinny's daily actions. He recalled the innumerable little disagreeable incidents at the beginning of his employment, when he was made to appear awkward and slow-witted when Parker's attention was unnecessarily attracted to his minor faults. Phinny's perseverance in undermining his chances for favorable attention was like the malicious gnawing of the Missouri at its banks. What at the time had impressed him as being purposeless acts of mischief now bobbed to the surface of his recollections as deliberate traps. Phinny had plotted systematically from the beginning against the blind lover.
Lander's new perspective also permitted him to discern quite accurately the time Hurry-Up Parker shifted from his usual gruff attitude to evidences of surly dislike. Phinny was slated for promotion to Cabanne's Post, or Fort Union, on the upper river. Lander was being groomed to take his place in the store. Shortly after this arrangement was tacitly understood by Parker and his two employees, Parker had displayed a new face and the promotion was not spoken of again.
Lander was compelled to admit to himself that his failure to advance might be due in part to his own indifference. He had entered the A. F. C. with a fine mettle to see service above the Yellowstone. He had longed to take his chances with the keelboats fighting their way by the treacherous Aricara villages in the land of the Sioux near the mouth of Grand River. He had dreamed of visiting the Cheyennes at the eastern base of the Black Hills. There were the Mandans and Minnetarees along the Upper Missouri and the Knife to be explored, and the stories of Lewis and Clark to be verified. Between their villages and the Milk and extending far north were the numerous and powerful Assiniboins to be conquered in trade. From the Milk to the source of the Missouri were the Blackfeet, ferocious in their hatred toward the whites. What better adventuring than the sharp dash into the beaver country! In the valleys of the Yellowstone and the Big Horn were the Crows with their strange liking to have white men live among them. He eagerly had sought his information from returning traders and trappers. He had absorbed much about the various nations. He had drawn deductions his informants were too lazy mentally to indulge in, such as the probable halting of the fur trade for many years if the nations along the Missouri had not been poor boatmen, seeking the river largely for water and fuel. Had they been like the Eastern Indians, skilful in water-craft, what chance would boats have had prior to the coming of steam? And had the wooden canoe and the flatboat and keelboat been discouraged from penetrating the unknown country would steam have become sufficiently interested to take over the river?
There was no doubt but that he had started in on his work with a fine zeal, and that Parker had seized him as an unusual youngster and had been impressed by his enthusiasm. Then came the curly-headed rattle-pate, and the swish of her dainty skirts had sent all his fine ambitions a-flying.
As he made for Tilton's he confessed there was much room for self-criticism. He had feebly endeavored to criticize himself before, but his reproaches were always put to flight by the soothing realization he would see Susette on the morrow. So he had kept at his dead tasks, exchanging his chance to become a mountain man for the sake of her sweet smiles.
There was Bridger. He might have been like Bridger, a born topographer, more familiar with the mountain passes and streams than even Kit Carson. Bridger and Carson had trapped together on the Powder River two years back.
One year before, when but twenty-six years old, Bridger with Milton Sublette, Henry Frack and John B. Gervaise, had bought out the old partners of the Rocky Mountain Fur Company. Under Bridger's lead two hundred men had passed through the Big Horn basin, had crossed the Yellowstone, had followed the Missouri to its three forks, then up the Jefferson to the Divide and on to the Great Salt Lake. Twelve hundred miles before they returned to winter on the Powder.
"And all I've done is to wear out a path between goods and supplies in the store," groaned Lander. "Bridger, not much older'n I am, can travel all over the continent; and I can't make a trail to Pine Street."
Lander was honest enough