Pierre broke in fiercely:

"She shall not! Sixtin year? Sixtin year she know honly me, Pierre, her daddy, and you, her mammy. What you tink, heh? elise go school in one beeg city, heh? She mek herself choke wiz ze brick house and ze stone street. She get sick and lonesome for ze mountain, for her hol' daddy and her hol' mammy, for ze gra.s.s and ze flower."

"That is for her to say. Send her away as you promised. Then"--Madame's heavy eyes grew deep, almost beautiful--"then, if she comes back to us!"

Pierre turned sullenly.

"She is mine. Mine and yours. She shall stay."

Madame's tears ceased flowing.

"She shall go." Her temerity frightened her. "I will tell her all if you don't send her away."

Pierre did not explode, as she expected. Instead, there was the calm of invincible purpose. He held up one finger impressively.

"I settle hall zis. _ecoutez!_ She shall marry. Right away. Queek. Da's hall." He left the room before Madame had time to reply.

Madame was too terrified to think. The possibility conveyed in her husband's declaration had never suggested itself to her. elise was still the little baby nestling in her arms, the little girl prattling and playing indoors and out, on the wide ranch, and later, Madame shuddered, when Pierre had abandoned the ranch for the Blue Goose, waiting at the bar, keeping Pierre's books, redeeming checks at the desk, moving out and in among the throng of coa.r.s.e, uncouth men, but through it all the same beautiful, wilful, loving little girl, so dear to Madame's heart, so much of her life. What did it matter that profanity died on the lips of the men in her presence, that at her bidding they ceased to drink to intoxication, that hopeless wives came to her for counsel, that their dull faces lighted at her words, that in sickness or death she was to them a comfort and a refuge?

What if Pierre had fiercely protected her from the knowledge of the more loathsome vices of a mining camp? It was no more than right. Pierre loved her. She knew that. Pierre was h.o.a.rding every shining dollar that came to his hand. Was he lavish in his garnishment of the Blue Goose? It was only for the more effective luring of other gold from the pockets of the careless, unthinking men who worked in mines or mills, or roamed among the mountains or washed the sands of every stream, spending all they found, hoping for and talking of the wealth which, if it came, would only smite them with more rapid destruction. And all these little rivulets, small each one alone, united at the Blue Goose into a growing stream that went no farther. For what end? Madame knew. For Pierre, life began and ended in elise. Madame knew, and sympathized with this; but her purpose was not changed. She knew little of life beyond the monotonous desolation of a western ranch, the revolting glamour of a gambling resort, where men revelled in the fierce excitement of shuffling cards and clicking chips, returning to squalid homes and to spiritless women, weighed down and broken with the bearing of many children, and the merciless, unbroken torture of thankless, thoughtless demands upon their lives. Madame saw all this. She saw and felt the dreary hopelessness of it all. Much as she loved elise, if it parted her from all that made life endurable she would not shrink from the sacrifice. She knew nothing of life beyond her restricted circle, but anything outside this circle was a change, and any change must be for the better.

"She shall marry. Right away." Pierre's words came to her again with overwhelming terror. Overwhelming, because she saw no way of averting the threatened blow.

From behind, Madame felt two soft hands close on her straining eyes, and a sympathetic voice:

"Has daddy been scolding you again? What was it about this time? Was it because I ran away this morning? I did run away, you know."

For reply Madame only bowed her head from between the clasping hands that for the first time had distress instead of comfort for her groping soul. She did not pray for guidance. She never thought of praying. Why should she? The prisoned seed, buried in the dank and quickening soil, struggles instinctively toward the source of light and strength. But what instinct is there to guide the human soul that, quickened by unselfish love, is yet walled in by the Stygian darkness of an ignorant life?

Madame's hands were clinched. Her hot eyes were dry and hard. No light!

No help! Only a fierce spirit of resistance. At length she was conscious of elise standing before her, half terrified, but wholly determined. Her eyes moistened, then grew soft. Her outstretched arms sought the girl and drew her within their convulsive grasp.

"My poor elise! My poor little girl, with no one to help her but me!"

"What is it, mammy? What is it?"

Madame only moaned.

"My poor little elise! My poor little girl!"

elise freed herself from the resisting arms.

"Tell me at once!" She stamped her foot impatiently.

Madame sprang to her feet.

"You shall not marry that man. You shall not!" Her voice rose. "I will tell you all--everything. I will, if he kills me. I will! I will!"

The door from the saloon was violently opened, and Pierre strode in. He pushed elise aside, and, with narrowed eyes and uplifted hand, approached his wife.

"You will? You will, heh?"

The threatening blow fell heavily, but upon elise. She thrust forth her hands. Pierre stumbled backward before the unexpected a.s.sault. His eyes, blazing with ungoverned fury, swept around the room. They rested upon a stick. He grasped it, and turned once more toward Madame.

"You will! You will! I teach you bettaire. I teach you say 'I will' to me! I teach you!" Then he stopped. He was looking squarely into the muzzle of a silver-mounted revolver held in a steady hand and levelled by a steady eye.

Pierre was like a statue. Another look came into his eyes. Youth toyed with death, and was not afraid. Pierre knew that. At threatening weapons in the hands of drink-crazed men Pierre smiled with scorn. The bad man stood in terror of the law as well as of Pierre. But when determined youth laid hold on death and shook it in his face Pierre knew enough to stand aside.

elise broke the tense silence.

"Don't you ever dare to strike mammy again. Don't you dare!"

Without a word Pierre left the room. He had loved elise before with as unselfish a love as he could know. But hitherto he had not admired her.

Now he rubbed his hands and chuckled softly, baring his teeth with unsmiling lips.

"A-a-ah!" he breathed forth. "_Magnifique! Superb! La pet.i.te diable!_ She mek ze shoot in her eye! In ze fingaire! She bin shoot her hol' man, her hol' daddy, _moi!_ Pierre." Pierre thoughtfully rubbed his smooth chin. "_La pet.i.te diable!_"

Poor Madame! Poor Pierre! The dog chases his tail with undiminished zest, and is blissfully rewarded if a straggling hair but occasionally brushes his nose. He licks his accessible paws, impelled alone by a sense of duty.

CHAPTER VII

_Mr. Morrison Tackles a Man with a Mind of His Own and a Man without One_

Mr. Morrison was a slick bird--in fact, a very slick bird. It was his soul's delight to preen his unctuous feathers and to shiver them into the most effective and comfortable position, to settle his head between his shoulders, and, with moistened lips, to view his little world from dreamy, half-closed eyes. This, however, only happened in restful moments of complacent self-contemplation. He never allowed these moods to interfere with business. He had broached the subject of marriage to Pierre, and Pierre had of course fallen in with his views. The fact that elise evidently loathed him disturbed no whit his placid mind. He was in no hurry. He a.s.sumed elise as his own whenever he chose to say the word.

He regarded her in much the same way as a half-hungered epicure a toothsome dinner, holding himself aloof until his craving stomach should give the utmost zest to his viands without curtailing the pleasure of his palate by ravenous haste. He served Pierre with diligence and fidelity. The Blue Goose would sooner or later come to him with elise.

He had ambitions, political especially, not acquired, but instinctive.

Not that he felt inspired with a mission to do good unto others, but that others should do good unto him, and also that the particular kind of good should be of his own choosing. He knew very well the temperaments of his chosen const.i.tuency, and he adapted himself to their impressionable peculiarities. To this end he dispensed heavily padded gratuities with much ostentation on selected occasions, but gathered his tolls in merciless silence. He did this without fear, for he knew that the blare of the mult.i.tude would drown the cries of the stricken few.

Mr. Morrison had long meditated upon the proper course to take in order best to compa.s.s his ends. The unrest among the employees of the Rainbow Company came to him unsought, and he at once grasped the opportunity.

The organisation of a miners' and millmen's union would be an obvious benefit to the rank and file; their manifestation of grat.i.tude would naturally take the very form he most desired. To this end before the many he displayed the pyrotechnics of meaningless oratory, in much the same manner as a strutting peac.o.c.k his brilliant tail; but individuals he hunted with nickel bullets and high-power guns. On various occasions he had displayed the peac.o.c.k tail; this particular afternoon he took down his flat-trajectoried weapon and went forth to gun for Bennie.

Bennie had washed the dinner dishes, reset his table, prepared for the coming meal, and now, as was his custom, was lying in his bunk, with an open book in his hands, prepared to read or doze, as the spirit moved him.

Mr. Morrison appeared before him.

"Howdy, Bennie! Taking a nap?"

"I'm taking nothing but what's my own." Bennie looked meaningly at Morrison.

Morrison slipped into what he mistook for Bennie's mood.

"You're wise, if you get it all. Many's the ignorant devil that takes only what's given him and asks no questions, worse luck to him!"

"You'll do well to go on," remarked Bennie, placidly. "There's many that gets more, and then d.a.m.ns the gift and the giver."