"Suppose, Gun, that she showed up now; loved you more than ever for what you have done, and renewed her old proposal? You know it's leap year."

"Well, old man, if an angel flew down out of the sky and give me a second-hand pair of wings just rebuilt, and ordered me to put 'em on and follow her, I guess I wouldn't refuse to go out. Time was, though, when I'd a-held out for new, gold-mounted ones, or nothing; but that won't come, John; but you just ort to a been to the consolidation; it was just simply--well, pulling the president's special would be just like hauling a gravel-train to it!"

The train stopped suddenly here, and "Gun" said he was going ahead to get acquainted with the water-boiler, and I took out my note-book and jotted down a few points.

After the train got into motion again, I was reading over my notes, when, without looking, I thought Gunderson had come back, and I moved along in the seat to give him room, but a black dress sat down beside me.

We had been sitting with our backs to a curtain between the first berth and a state-room. The lady came from the state-room.

"Pardon me, sir," she said, "I want to finish that story. I have heard it all; I am Sister Florence, music teacher to Mr. Gunderson's daughter; he does not know that I am on this train.

"Mr. Gunderson did not tell you that the Phoenix bank failed some months ago, and that the fortune of his adopted child was lost. He never told her and she does not know it to-day--"

"He said he paid her the full amount--" I interrupted.

"Very true. He did; but he paid it out of his own pocket. Sold his farm; put up all his securities, and borrowed seven hundred dollars to make the sum complete. That is the reason he is going to run an engine again. He does not know that I am aware of this, so don't mention it to him."

"Gun is a man," said I; "a great, big-hearted, true man."

"He is a n.o.bleman!" said the nun, arising and going back into the state-room.

Half an hour later, Gunderson came back, took a seat beside me and commenced to talk.

"Say, John, that's the hardest-riding old pelter I ever see, about three inches of slack between engine and tank, pounding like a stamp-mill and--" looking over his shoulder and then at me, "John, I could a swore there was some one standing right there, I _felt_ 'em.

"It seems to me they ort to keep up their engines here in pretty good shape. They've got bad water, and so much boiler work that they have to have new flues before the machinery gets worn much. But, Lord, they don't seem--" he looked over his shoulder again, quickly, then settled in his seat to resume, when a pair of hands covered Gun's eyes--the nun's hands.

"Guess who it is, Gun," said I; and noticed that he was very pale.

"It's Mabel," said he, putting up his hands and taking both of hers; "no one but her ever made me feel like that."

MORMON JOE, THE ROBBER

I'm on intimate terms with one of the biggest robbers in this country.

He's an expert at the business, but has now retired from active work.

The fact of the matter is, Joe didn't know he was robbing, at the time he did it, but he got there, just the same, and come mighty nigh doing time in the penitentiary for it, too.

Maybe I'd better commence at the beginning and tell you that I first knew Joe Hogg in '79, out at the front, on the Santa Fe. Joe hailed from Salt Lake City, and had run on the Utah Central, which gave him the nickname of "Mormon Joe," a name he never resented being called, and to which he always answered. I never did really know whether he was a Mormon or not, and never cared; he was a good engineer, that's about all I cared for. Joe took good care of his engine, wore a clean shirt and behaved himself--which was doing more than the average engineer at the front did.

I remember, one night, Jack McCabe--"Whisky Jack," we used to call him--made some mean remark about the Mormons in general and Joe in particular, and Joe replied: "I don't propose to defend the Mormon faith; it's as good as any, to my mind. I don't propose to judge or misjudge any man by his belief or absence of belief. All that I have got to say is, that the Mormon religion is a _practical_ religion. They don't give starving women a tract, or tramps jobs on the stone-pile. The women get bread, and the tramps work for _pay_. Their faith is based on the Christian Bible, with a book added--guess they have as big a right to add or take away as some of the old kings had--bigamy is upheld by the Bible, but has been dead in Utah, for some years. It can't live for the young people are against it. In Utah the woman has all the rights a man has, votes, and is a _person_. (Since cut out of new const.i.tution.) Before the Gentiles came to Salt Lake, the Mormons had but _one_ policeman, no jail, few saloons, no houses of prost.i.tution--now the Gentile Christian has sway, and the town is full of them. I guess you could argue on the quality and quant.i.ty of rot-gut whisky a good engineer ought to drink, better than on theology, anyhow."

I never heard any of the gang twit Joe about the Mormons again.

I didn't take an awful sight of notice about Joe until I came in, one night, and the boys told me that Joe was arrested as an accomplice in the robbery of the Black Prince mine, in Const.i.tution gulch.

This Black Prince was a gold placer owned by two middle-aged Englishmen.

They had a small stamp-mill, run by mule power; and a large number of sluice-boxes. They always worked alone, and said they were developing the mine. No one had any idea that they were taking out much dust, until the mill and sluice-boxes were burned one night, and the story came out that they had been robbed of more than thirty thousand dollars.

Each partner accused the other of the theft. Both were arrested, and detectives commenced to follow every clue.

Joe's arrest fell like a thunder-clap among us. The Brotherhood men took it up right away, and I went to see Joe, that very night. It was said that Joe had visited the Black Prince, the day before, and had been seen carrying away a large package, the night before the robbery.

Joe absolutely refused to say a word for or against himself.

"The detectives got this scheme up and know what they are doing," said he; "I don't. When they get all through, you'll know how it'll come out."

To all questions as to his guilt or innocence, to every query about the crime or his arrest, he replied alike, to friend or foe:

"Ask the sheriff; he's doing this."

He was in jail a long time, but nothing was proven against him and he was finally released.

Neither of the Englishmen could fasten the crime on his partner, and they sold out and drifted away, one going back to England and the other to Mexico.

Joe ran awhile on the road again and then took a job as chief-engineer of a big stamp-mill in Arizona, and going there he was lost to myself and the men on the road, and finally the Black Prince robbery pa.s.sed into history, and nothing remained but the tradition, a sort of a myth of the mountains, like Captain Kidd's treasures, the amount only being increased by time. I believe that the last time I heard the story, it was calmly stated that thirty million dollars was taken.

When I was out West, last time, I got off the train at Santa Fe, and when gunning through the baggage for my _kiester_, I saw a trunk, bearing on its end this legend:

"MRS. JOS. HOGG."

While I was "gopping" at it, as they say down East, and wondering if it could be my Joe Hogg, a very nice-looking lady came in, leading a little girl, glanced along the lines of trunks, put her hand on the one I was looking at, and said:

"That's the one; yes; the little one. I want it checked to New York."

Just then, a little fellow with whiskers on his chin and a twinkle in his eye came in and took charge of the trunk, the woman and the child, and with the little one's arms around his neck, bid them good-by, and got them into their seats in the sleeper.

I watched this individual with a great deal of interest; he looked like my old friend, "Mormon Joe," only for the whiskers and the stockman clothes.

Finally he jumped off the moving train, waved his hand and stood watching it out of sight, to catch the last glimpse of (to him) precious burden-bearer; he raised his hand to shade his eyes, and as he did so, I saw that it was minus one thumb, and I remembered that "Mormon Joe" left one of his under an engine up in Colorado--I was sure of him.

There was a tear in his eye, as he turned to go away, so I stepped up to him and asked:

"Any new wives wanted down your way, Elder?"

He glanced up, half angry, looked me straight in the eye, and a smile started at the southeast corner of his phiz and ran around to his port ear.

"Well, John, old man, I don't mind being _sealed_ to one about your size, right now. I've just sent away the best one in the wide world. Old man, you're looking plump; by the Holy Joe Smith, a sight of you is good for sore eyes!"

Well, we started, and--but there ain't no use in telling you all about it--I went home with Joe, went up a creek with a jaw-breaking Spanish name, for miles, to a very good cattle ranch, that was the property of "Mormon Joe."

Joe only quit running some three or four years ago, and the ranch and its neat little home represented the savings of Joe Hogg's life.

His wife and only child had just started for a visit to England where she was born.