Judith of the Plains

dneys

of her son should he fail in this particular; and Johnnie, hurt to the quick by the unjust suspicion that he could fail so signally in his duty to a lady, not only refused to replenish the flask, but threatened Chugg with a conditional vengeance in the event of accident befalling the stage. It was with a partially sobered

ing spark of their camp-fires and strained her ears to catch the last note of their singing, with something of the feeling of severed comradeship. Range cattle, startled from sleep by the stage, scrambled to their feet and bolted headlong in the blind impulse of panic, their horns and the confused massing of their bodies showing in sharp silhouette against the horizon for a moment, then all would s

ows that bordered a creek in a way that made Mary recall tales of banshees. And once, when the first pale streak of dawn trembled in the east and the mountains looked like jagged

ed over the sand and desolation were apparently brown. She could not be certain that they were brown, or that they were toiling over the sand and desolation, or that her name was Mary Carmichael, or indeed of a

pt along, the sun-dried timbers of the stage creaked and groaned in seeming protest at wearing its life away in endless journeyings over this desert waste, then settled down into one of those maddeningly monotonous reiterations to which certain inanimate things are given in seasons of nervous tension. This time it was: "All the world's-a stage-creak-screech-all-the wor

to say, "you have quite a feeli

reciprocity, these yere silent companions has their advantages. Why, compare Clara to them female blizzards-the two Mrs. Daxes-and you see Clara's good p'ints immejit. Yes,

they might easily have passed for porches of more than usually commodious size had it not been for the beds, bureaus, chairs, stove with attendant pots, kettles, and supper in the course of preparation. Seen from any vantage-point in the surrounding country, the effect was that of an interior on the stage-the background of some homely drama where pioneer life was being realistically depicted. The dramatis persona who occupied the centre of the stage when Mary Carmichael drove up was an elderly woman in a rocking-chair. She was dressed in a faded pink calico gown, limp and bedraggled, whose color brought out the parchment-like hue and texture of her skin in merciless contrast. Perhaps because she still harbored illusions about the peri

o wear the hours away. The snuff-brush was brought into more fiercely active commission, but she said nothing till Mary Carmichael was within a few inches of her. Then, shifting the snuff-brush to a position more

d still rumbling with the noise and motion of

along arter he was in his grave an' fit us and broke up the kentry so we had ter leave our home in Tennessee an' kem to this

re was nothing so very wonderful about "the gov'ment from the East." With a deftness compatible only with long practice, Mrs. Rodney [pg 110] now put a foot on the round of an adjoining chair and shoved it towards Mary Carmichael in hospitable pant

ncealed suspicion. "Miz Yellett givin' herself as many airs 'bout hirin' a gov'ment 's if she wuz goin' to Congress. Queer you don't know whether you be one or not!" She withdrew into the sun-bonnet, mutteri

ng down the potatoes as fast as I can fry 'em." "Go on, tattle-tale." This was the repartee, mingled with the hiss of frying meat, the grinding of coffee, the thumping sound made by [pg 111] bread being hastily mixed in a wooden bowl standing on a wooden table. The babel grew in volume. Dogs added to it by yelping emotionally when the smell of the newly fried m

Eu-dory!

e grasped the skirt of the greasy apron with the sleight of hand of a prestidigitateur and pleated it into a single handful. Her manner, too, was no slower of transformat

nction of a side wall, and indicated a family toilet service, [pg 112] which displayed every indication of having lately seen active service. A roll-towel, more frankly significant of the multitude of the Rodneys than had been the babel of voices, a discouraged fragment of comb, a tin basin, a slippery atom of soap, these Eudora proffered with an unction worthy of better things. "I declare Mist

was resting against a clump of sage-brush, whither it had been lifted by Chugg. Miss Carmichael's individual toilet service, which was nei

e bearing and her simple, convent accomplishments, was plainly the grande dame of the family. Eudora had now divested herself of the greasy, flour-smeared apron, flinging it [pg 113] under the wash-bench with a single all-

n was presently rewarded by a shouted summons to supper, and he stood erect but for the slouching droop of shoulders that was more a matter of temperament than of age, one saw a tall man of massive build, whose keen glance and slightly grizzled hair belied his groping, ineffectual labor. The head, and face were finely modelled. Unless nat

ession of deeper significance, the wavering lines of instability produced a curiously ambiguous effect of a fine head [pg 114] m

om his mother's vague, idle musings over paper-backed literature at certain "unchancy" seasons; there was Richards, named from pure policy, for a local great man of whom Warren Rodney had anticipated a helping hand at the time; there was Eudora, whose nominal origin was uncertain, unless it bore affiliation to that of Orlando; there was Sadie, thus termed to avoid the painful distinctio

ght have had forty had she desired it. Any one of the four would have cheerfully murdered the remaining three had opportunity presented itself. Supper was a mockery to them, a Barmecide feast. Each watched his rivals-and Eudora. This was a matter of life and death. There was no time for food. The girl revelled in the

ed with her daughter from the rising of the sun to the setting of the same, she added the last straw to the burd

er's guests, he said nothing. His family, in their dealings with him, seemed to accord him the exemptions

eighborhood and hoped to make use of the young prospector's interest in his sister by securing an invitation to return with him. Ira regarded the inquiry in the light of a special pro

ay." At this Eudora gave him the wealth of her eyes, and her mother reached

n Swift, openly flouting such prophecy. "Yes, who sez it?" inquired H

ff," mumbled Mrs. Rodney, as she helpe

ute at Washington, he said it, and h

job." Ben Swift charged the table with the statement as the prosecution subtly appeals to the high grade of intellige

oftly: "Ira, it's a heap risky puttin' your faith in maverick sharps that trail around the country, God-a'mightying it, renaming little, old rocks into precious stones, seein' gold mines in e

flutter, was visibly impressed by Hawks's presentation of the case. Looking towards her daughter from under the eaves of her sun-bonnet, she "'

"reckoned that herdin' sheep over to the Basin was a heap easier on the skin than livin' in a comf'table

off her sentence before she came [pg 118] to the pith of it she continued to maintain the proprieties, and at the same time conveyed to her audience that she

the snuff-brush. "When me an' paw war keepin' comp'ny, satin warn't good enough for me. He lowed I wuz to have ha

h vegetables, a prospect of possible employment for one of the boys, a donation of money from Judith, Mrs. Rodney remembered the unbuilt bird-house and indulged herself to the full of me

about the table for some one to make excuses for him. The family broke into hearty peals of laughter;

at they ain't no birds. We have offered time and time again to build you a house fo' buzzuds

ition. As she advanced further through the dim perspective of years, the little mountain town in Tennessee became more and more the centre of cultivation and civic importance. The desolate cabin that she had lef

m tentatively, then grinned. At her time of life, why should she put faith in the promises

seventeen-year locusts. Eudora, ever economic in the value she placed not only upon herself but her [pg 120] environment, proposed to her guests that they should wash the dishes, an art in which they were by no means deficient, being no except

ld be trails and defined routes over this vast, unvaried stretch of space seemed more wonderful to Mary than the charted high-roads of the Atlantic. The foot-hills seemed to have grown during the long journey till they were foot-hills no longer; they had come to be the smaller peaks of the towering range that had for

day, and all the laughter and light footsteps and gayly ringing voices of the young folk could not dispel the feeling [pg 121

e hour of day or her passing mood by the action of the chair, knew by her pacific gait that she would lament the unbuilt bird-house no more that night. The snuff-brush, newly replenished fr

glazed way, and, having found them, he would forget the reason of his quest. Not once that evening had they rested on his wife or any member of his family. He had shown no interest in any of the small happenings of home, the frank rivalry of Eudora's suitors, the bickerings of the girls and boys over the division of household l

shadows; the crazy house invading the great company of mountains, penetrating brazenly to the very threshold of their silent councils, seemed but a pitiful ant-hill at the mercy of some possible giant tread. The ill-adjusted family, disputing every inch of ground with the wilderness, became invested with a dignity quite out of keeping with its achievements. Their very weaknesses and vanities, old Sally still clinging to her sun-bonnet and her limp rose-colored s

eling of reticence regarding the disclosure of family affairs before strangers. News travels in the desert by some unknown agency. Twenty-four hours after a thing happened it would be safe to assume that every cow and sheep outfit in a radius of three hundred mile

keep a prisoner out of more grievous trouble, she could not understand giving him his freedom. To her the case was analogous to releasing a child from the duress of a corner and turning him loose to play with matc

f cattle-thieves, and that Jim would be no exception to the rule. With her purely instinctive maternity, she had been fond of Jim. He had been one more boy to mother. She harbored no ill-feeling towards him that he was not her own. Moreover, she wanted

iously plumb locoed as to tu'n a man out to get hisself hanged. An' Jim never wuz a

wly. The thing she dreaded had already come to pass in her imagination. Jim a free man was Jim a dead man. He was so dead that already his step-mother was going on with a full acceptance of the idea. She reviewed her relationship to him. No, she had nothing to blame herself for.

e impending tragedy in the family had robbed her of all the joy in her suitors. They sat on a bench on

he'd a seen two, but seem' he was aged for an infant havin' such practices, I tried to shame him out'n it. But, Lord a massy, men folks is hard

o with his gettin' lynched now?" demanded Eudor

of maternal experience, "an' see the infant that's allowed to suck its thumb has the makin's

id they speak thus [pg 126] intimately. Old Sally belonged to that class of mothers who feel a pride in their reticent dealings wi

one of them men," she jerked her thumb towards the opposite side of the house, "git one tha's clar o'

ions of curiosity as to the unknown male animal pro

ty gums-"the most of 'em does. But you must shet your eyes to it. The moment t

Eudora. "Ain'

er. "It be that old Ma'am

g