The Mascot of Sweet Briar Gulch.

by Henry Wallace Phillips.

The gulch ran in a trough of beauty to the foot of Jones's Hill, which rose in a sweeping curve into the clouds.

Wild flowers, trees in profuse leaf, and mats of vines covered the scarred earth, and the sky was as limpid as spring water; the air carried a weight of heart-stirring odors, yet Jim Felton, sitting on the door-step of his cabin in the brilliant sunshine, was not a happy man.

He looked at the hollow of the gulch and cursed it manfully and bitterly.

The gold should be there--Jim had figured it all out. The old wash cut at right angles to the creek, and at the turn was where its freight of yellow metal should have been deposited, but when you got down to the bed-rock, the blasted stuff was either slanted so nothing could stay on it, or was rotten--crumbling in your fingers, and that kind of bed will hold nothing.

Therefore Jim had sunk about fifty prospect holes; got colors under the gra.s.s-roots, as evidence that pay should be there--and nothing but ashy wash beneath it.

When a man is alone, and thinks things are wrong, optimism comes down on the run, the shades of pessimism gather fast and furious--more especially if a man does his own cooking, and the raw material is limited, at that.

The sun had not moved the shadows three inches before Jim had reached the conclusion that this world was all a practical joke, of so low an order that no sensible man would even laugh at it, and he drew a letter from his pocket in proof thereof. It was a thin letter, written on delicate paper in a delicate hand, and it showed much wear. He read for the thousandth time:

Dearest Jim--And again I must say "no." Of course you will not understand, for which foolish reason I like you all the better, but you must try to take my point of view. You say that we can be married on nothing and take our chances.

So we can, old simple-heart--but aren't those chances all against us? Would you like to be forced to work in some office for just enough to live on? You know you would not, and you know how you would suffer in such slavery.

Nevertheless we can not live on air, and I doubt if I would stand transplanting to the wild life you love, better than you to a clerk's desk. You have that fancy which gilds the tin cans in the back yard; I have that unfortunate eye which would multiply their number by three, and their unsightliness by ten. I don't want riches, dear; I only want a modest a.s.surance that I can have enough to live on.

Really, is your way of doing a guarantee of even bread and b.u.t.ter? In the Garden of Eden you would be the most delightful of companions, but in this world as it is, you will not fight for your own. You would risk your life to save a dog, but you couldn't stay at a continued grind--I mean it would kill you, actually, physically, dead, dead--to save all of us. At first I thought that a fault in you, but now, being older, having compared you to other men, I see it is merely a missing faculty.

I could stick to the desk, and would gladly, if you would let me, yet I could not even fancy behaving as you did at the factory fire, which is still the symbol in the town for manly courage and presence of mind.

They talk now of the way you laughed and joked with those poor frightened girls (who had such good cause to be frightened) and brought them back to sanity with a jest. I feel that if I had the least atom of heroism in me I would marry you for that feat alone, and let cold facts go hang; but, ah, Jim! magnificent as you are on the grand occasions, they come but seldom, and in the meantime, Jim--I'll leave that to your own honesty.

I'm plebeian, Jim, and you're a n.o.bleman, with a beautiful but embarra.s.sing disregard for vulgar necessities.

However, I can say this for myself--for surely I may brag a little to my lover--I can try to match your splendid physical bravery by my own moral courage.

You may rest your soul in peace on one point. If I am not for you, I'm for no man, no, not so much as a half-glance of the eye. I wouldn't hold myself a bit more straitly if I were your wife.

You'll be angry at this letter. Well, I'll stand your anger. I have caused it, and I'll bear the blame. I know that we could not be happy without some visible means of support, yet I do not blame you in the least for thinking otherwise.

Be as kind to me as you can, Jim, for I love you very much in my commonplace way. I'll admit, too, that I had rather have your fire than my refrigerator--oh, if you could only make some money--not a great deal, but enough for a little house of our own, and enough in the bank to buy groceries!

With my best love, and an aching lump in my throat,

Your mother, sister, and sweetheart,

Anne.

Jim dropped the letter, and his lips trembled a little. Parts of it touched him deeply, and he was the more enraged and hurt at the rest because of that.

He could not call her mercenary. He knew better. More than one very comfortable income was at her disposal.

Poor fellow! He could only grind his teeth and curse Sweet Briar gulch from the deepest pot-hole in the bed-rock to the top of its loftiest pine. He drew out her photograph, and obtained much sweet consolation by thinking how happy they two would be in Sweet Briar gulch together, even if there wasn't a cent of pay in the gravel.

Sick of this ingenious torture, he lit his pipe and drew savagely upon it. With a mocking gurgle, about a dram of "slumgullion" pa.s.sed into his mouth. It was the last touch. He spat out the biting, nauseating stuff, hurled the pipe upon the rocks and danced on it.

And yet the colors frolicked in the gulch; the pines toned the air with healthy breath.

From afar came the th-r-r-up! th-r-r-up! th-r-r-up of a galloping horse.

It was Bud, the mail-carrier, coming, modestly and quietly, at a decent gait, down a trail where most would prefer to walk, and to "hang on" to something at that.

At first Jim felt irritated by the interruption. He wanted to luxuriate in misery: still he was a vigorous, healthy man, and the cheery good-fellowship of Bud soon made away with that feeling.

"Well, how they coming, Jimmy?" queried the young giant. "Hit her yet?"

"Hit--well, much caloric,"--replied Jim. "I've begun to believe there ain't a durned thing here."

"You're looking kind of owly, old man--what's up? Don't you feel well?"

"Oh, Bud I I'm sick of everything this day--I don't believe in the const.i.tution of the United States, including the thirteenth amendment, nor the ten commandments, nor the attraction of gravitation, nor anything else--it's all a d.a.m.ned lie."

"No wonder you get like that, mousing around here without a chance to yappi with a feller critter. 'Nough to make you locoed.

"Jump it for a spell. Go up town. Get loaded. Get horribly loaded. Break somebody's window, and tell the folks you're a Sweet Briar zephyr come to blow out their lights. Go ahead and do it. When your hair stops pulling you'll feel like a new man."

Jim thought the advice sound, yet a strange feeling had developed in him, in his isolation; it was that the eye of Anne was always on him. He had fallen into a habit, which becomes a superst.i.tion when a man is alone, of acting as though she were there in person.

However, he didn't feel called upon to offer Bud that explanation of his refusal. He conveyed the idea in one brief word.

"Busted," said he.

"Busted?" retorted Bud warmly. "Busted? Not much, you ain't busted whilst that little package is there, bet cher life! You call for what you want, and the cashier will make good."

"Ah, Bud! How'll I ever pay you back? Keep it, man, keep it," replied Jim in a disheartened voice.

"Say, you ain't got no call to worry about that part of it--there's where my troubles begin," returned Bud. "Now, you take these two bucks and jab 'em in your jeans--Go on, now! Do as I tell you, or d.a.m.ned if I don't lick you and make you take 'em! What's the good of money if it ain't to help a friend out with? I don't care who gets drunk on it, just so long as they have a good time.

"Boy, you'll be sailing up the track regardless of orders, with your boiler full of suds, if you don't get out in the scramble for a while."

"Lord! I'd like to see a railroad train! Haven't heard a whistle for two years! How far is it to the nearest station, Bud?"

"Plattsburg--fifty mile--due south."

"Christmas! Little far to walk."

"Say, you take this horse, Jim,--go ahead! I can walk just as well as not, I'm getting too fat, anyhow. Go on, you take the horse and have a ride to Plattsburg!"

"Yes, take the shirt off your back, and never mind if a bit of the skin goes with it. I'll see you far away first. Tell you what you could do for me, Buddy; the herd of burros is around now, if you'd round up one of them for me?"

"Sure thing! You sit on the mail sack till I come back. There's a heap of registered stuff in it this trip. Oh say! What do you think? I was held up t'other side of the Bulldog. Bang! Zipp! says a little popper from the bushes. I climbed for them bushes, and out goes a beggar like a rabbit. I was after him like a coyote, bet cher life. Who do you suppose it was, Jim?"