The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, November 9, 1902, Page 1

. rereabouts d @ few m.onths the HE recent sad and sudden Frank Norris marks the loss to the English speaking world of oue of the sreatest writers of the day. As an wthor he was just in h His last movel, “The Octopu lished last year, b been recox- Bised Both here and sbroad as the Slosest mpproximation to the great of mmything that As & Oaliforzian Mr. Norris made & mame that brings the greatest eredit to his State; and as the au- thor of “The Octopus,” Mr. Norris wrote the stromgest book Cali- formis ever published. This mevel, under the author's primal idea—so disastrously imter- rupted by his death—vwas intended te be the first in & series of three books devoted to that greatest of mll world forces, wheat. This story eoncerns itself with the growing of the wheat. It was Mr. Norris’ idéa te have the second book & movel with Chicage as & center and the motif of the book was the hand- ling of wheat by the brokers in the pity while the third book of the irilogy should tell of the final dis- iribution of wheat in Europe. Fortunately “The somplete in itself, and ot taot would maturally be the most interesting of the trilogy for us of Oalifornia; for Mr. Norris chose the scene for this book the most im- muédmse wheat fields known the world ever—our owr plains of the fan Joaguim Valley. The story poncerns itself with the life of the rmers of the great plains and heir struggles t only with wsoll and against the mishaps of weather, also the ravemoums world who away the to profits from the tiller of the land. As & novel this is the nearest hover around tear sapproach to the great American fpovel so long sought for by critics £nd public. As & story, it will keep ¥you sitting up nights until you have finished it. The character studies in this book sre peculiarly Califor- mian, and particularly accorate and convineing. Immediately upon the death of Mr. Norris, remlising the great inm. terest that would mnaturally be awakened im bis last movel, “The us,"——a masterplece of fiction Sunday Call forthwith made mrrangements at great expense with Mr. Norris’ publishers for the gx- clusive rights of “The Octop: for the Pacific Const. Therefore the publication of “The Leopard’s Spots” has beem tempo- rarily postpomed and mow “The Oc- topus” will be published in as large installments as is compatible with the importance of the other many features of The Sun- e Section. ” will be followed by “The Gospel of Judas Iscariot,” by Asrom Dwight Baldwin, which has created a tremengous furor both in Europe and America. It throws a mew light on the strange life, the character and motives of this, the most bitterly execrated man in either the biblical or profane his- tory of all ages it shows the splemdors, the vices and follies, the wars and the feasts, and the sports and pleasures of Rome as they have mever been shown before, and tells of the com- ing of Christ and his long aud glori- ous struggle to establish his king- dom of heaven omn earth, and the remarkable part Judas played in his erucifixion. Then will come “The Leopard’s Spots,” By Thomas Dixon Jr.; “When Kuighthood Was in Flower,” by Charles Major; “The Gentieman From Indiana,” by Booth Tarking- ten; “Tainted Gold,” by Mrs. C. N. Williamson, whose “Mystery Box,” published o few weeks ago In The Sunday Oall, was one of the best stories in this remarkable series; “The Turapike House,” by Fergus Hume, ete., ete. Just ponder over .that list of books, as well as the names of the writers, and remember you get all those stories free with The Sun- day Call. Other announcements will be made later. Copyright, 1901, by Doubleday, Page & Co. BOOK L L Just after passing Caraher’s saloon, on he county road that ran south from Bonneville, and that divided the Broder- #.n ranch from that of Los Muertos, Presiey was suddenly aware of the faint sné prolonged blowing of a steam whistle that he knew must _come from the rail- goad ehops near the depot at Bonneville, In starting out from the ranchhouse that #orning he had forgotten his watch, and Was now perplexed to know whether the Whistle blowing for 12 or 1 o'clock. He hoped the former. Early that morn- ing be had decided to make a long ex- cursion through the neighboring country, partly on foot and partly on his bicycle, end now noon was come already, and as yer be had hardly started. As he was jeaving the house after breakfast Mrs. Derrick bad asked him to go for the mail &t Bonneville, and he bad pot been able to refuse. He took a firmer hold of the cork grips of his bandlebars—the road being in a wretched condition after the récent hauil- ing of the crop—and quickened his pace. Je told himself that, no matter what the time was, be would not stop for luncheon &t the ranchhouse, but wouid push on to Guadalajara and have a Span- fsh dinner at Solotari’s, as he bad orgi- npally planned. There had not been much of a crop to baul that year. Half of the wheat on the Broderson ranch had falled entirely, end Derrick himself had hardly raised more than enough to supply seed for the winter's sowing. But such little hauling &s there been had reduced the roads to a lamentable condition, ng the dry season of the past layer of dust had deep- ened and thickened lo €uch an extent that more than once Presley was obliged to dismount and trudge ajong on foot, push- ing his bicycle in frong of bim. 1t was the last half; of September, the . wyery end of the dry season, and all Tu- fare County, all the vast reaches of the San Joaquir Valley—in fact, all South Central California was bone dry, parched &nd baked and crisped after four months of cloudless weather, when the day seemed always at noon, and the sun blazed white hot over. the valiey from the Coast Range In the west to the foot- hills of the Sierras in the east. As Presley -drew near to the point where what wes known as the lower road struck off through the Rancho de los Muertos, leading on to Guadalajara, he came upon one of the county watering ta great, iron-hooped tower of wood, straddling clumsily on its four up- rights by the roadside. Since the day of its_completion the storekeepers and re- taflers of Bonneville had painted their advertisements upon it. It was a land- mark. In that reach of level fields the white letters upon it could be read for miles. A watering trough stood near by and, as he was very thirsty, Presley re- solved to stop for a moment to get a drink. He drew abreast of the tank and halted there, leaning his bicycle against the fence. A couple of men in white over- alis were repainting the surface of the tank, seated on swinging platforms that hung by hooks from the roof. They were painting a sign—an advertisement. It was all but finished and read: *“S. Behrman, Real Estate, Mortgages, Bonneville, Opposite the Postoffice.” Main Street, on the horse trough that stood in the shad- ow of the tank was another freshly pain ed inscription: “S. Behrman Has Some- thing To Say To You.” As Presley straightened up after drink- ing from the faucet at one end of the horse trough, the waterfng cart itseif la- bored into view around the turn of the lower road. Two mules and two horses, white with dust, strained leisurely in the traces, moving at a snail’'s pace, their limp ears marking the time; while perc ed high upon the seat, under a yellow cotton wagon umbrelia, Presley recog- nized Hooven, one of Derrick’s tenants, a German, whom every one called *Bis- marck,” an excitable little man with a perpetual grievance and an endless flow of broken English. “Hello, Bismarck,” sald Presley, as Hooven brought his team to a standsdil by the tank; preparatory to refllling. “Yoost der men look for, . Mist'r Praicely,” cried the other, twisting the reins around the brake, “Yoost one min- ute, you wait, hey? I wanta talk mit you. Presley was fmpatient to be on his-way again. A little more time wasted dnd the day would be lost. He had nothing to do with the management of the ranch, and if Hooven wanted any advice from him 1t was so much breaih wasted. These uncouth brutes of farmhands and petty ranchers, grimed:-with the soll they work- ed ‘upon, were odious to him ‘beyond words. Never could he feel in sympatihy with them, nor wijth their lives, their waye, their marriages; deaths, bickerings, and ail the monotonous round of their sordid existence. " “Well, you must be quick @506 marck,” he answered sharply. for dinner, as it is.” “Soh, now. Two minuten. und L be mit you. He drew down the overbanging &pout of the tank to the vent in the c cumference of the cart.and pulled the chain that Jet out the water. Then - he climbed” ‘down . {rom the seaf, jumpiug from ihe tire of the wheel, und taking Presley by the arm led him a few steps down the road. “Say,” he began; “say some converzations mit you. men I want to see. Say, Caraher, he tole me dis morgen—say, he tole me Mist'r Derrick gowun to farm der whole demn rench hisseluf der next vahr. No more tenants. Say. Caraher, be tole me gll der tenants get der sach; Mist'r Der- rick gowun to work der whole d=mn rench hisseluf, hey? Me, I get der sach alzoh, hey? You hefjhear about dose ting? Say, me, I hef on der ranch been sieben yahr— seven yahr. Do I alzoh—" “You'll have to see Derrick himself or Harran about that, Bismarck.” inter- rupted Presley. trying to draw aw: **That’s something outside of me tirely But Hooven was not to be put off. No doubt he had been meditating his speech all the morning, formulating his words, preparing his phrases. I want to hef Yoost der en- “Say. no, n he continued. “Me, I wanta stay bel der place; seven yahr I hef stay. Mist'r Derrick, he doa want dot I should be ge-sacked. Who. den, will der ditch ge-tend? Say. you teil 'um Bismarck hef gotta sure stay bei der place. Say, you hef der pull mit der Gov ernor. You speak der gut word for me.” “Harran fs the man that has the pull sA-h his father, Blsmarck,” answered Presley. “You Eet Harran to speak for you, and you're all right.” “Sieben yahr I hef stay protested Hooven, “‘and who will der ditch ge-tend, und alle dem cettles drive?” , Harran’s your man.” answered preparing to mount his bicycle Say, you nef hear about dose ting? 1 don’t hear about anything, Bismarck. I don’t know the first thing about how the ranch is run.” “Und der pipe line ge-mend,” Hooven burst out, suddenly remembering a for- gotten argument. He waved an arm. “Ach, der pipe line bei der Mission Greek, und der water hole for dose cettles. Say, he doand doo ut himseluf, berhaps, [ doand tink.” “Well, talk to Harran sbout it.”” “Say, he doand farm der whole demn renth bel higseluf. Me, I gotta stay.” But on a sudden the water in the cart gushed over the sides from the vent in the top with a smart sound of splashing. Hooven was forced to turn his attention to it Presley got his wheel under wasy “I hef some converzations mit Herran Hooven called after him. *He doand doo ut bel hisseluf, den, Mist'r Derrick; ach, 10. I stay bei der rench to drive dose cettles.” He climbed back to his seat under the wagon umbrella, and as he started his leam again with great cracks of his long whip, turned to the painters still at work upon’ the sign and declared with some defiance: “Sieben yahr; yals, sir, sieben yahr I hef been on dis rench. Git ovp, you mule you. hoop Meanwhile Presley had turned into the lower road. He was now on Derrick’s lard, division No. 1,,as it was called, the home ranth of the great Los Muertos Rancho. The road was better_ here, the dust laid after the passage of Hooven’s watering cart and, in@a few minutes, he had come to the ranchhouse itself, with its white picket fence, its few flower beds and grove of eucalyptus trees. On Ahe Jawn,at .the.side of. the house he saw Hdrran in the act pf setting out the au- tomatic eprinkler. In the shade. of the shoure, by. the porch. were two, or three of the greyhounds. part .of the pack. that were used to hunt down jackrabbits, ahd Godfrey, Harran's prize deerhound. Presley wheeled up the driveway and ’ met Harran by the horse-biack. * Harran was Magnus Derrick’s youngest -son, a very well lookirg young fellow of 23 or 25 "He had the fine carriage that marked hLis father, and still further resembled im in that he had-the Derrick nose— hawk.ike and prominent, such one sees in the later partraits of the Duke of Wellington. He was blonde, and inces- sant ex;whsurebm the sun h‘ul, instead of tarning bhim brown. merely . -h ;_rggd colorng( hhychukul."flly- e a had @ tendenty to curl in a forward di- rection. just insfrant of the ears.- -+ g Beside him,"Presiey made the sharpest - of .contrasts, Pregley. seemed .to.; gl;m of a mixed orl i appeared””to ellow hair , e nati & mnature more composile, a tem-* perament more complex. Unlike Harran Derrick, he seemed more of a character than a type. The sun had browned his face till it was almost swarthy. His eyes were a dark brown, and his forehead was the forehead of the intellectual, wide and high, with a certain unmistakable lift about it that argued education. not only of himself, but of his people before him. The impression conveyed by his mouth and chin was that of a delicate and high- ly sensitive nature, the lips thin and loosely shut together, the chin small and rather receding. One guessed that Pres- ley’s refinement had been gained only certain loss of strength. One expect 0°find him nervou: lnltroipecuvs; to dis- cover” that his tal 4ife was 'not at all the resiiit. of “tmpressions and sensa- tions that came t6"him from without, but rather of thoughts.and reflections; germi- Irom - within. - Though. morbidly, sensitive to changes in his physieal sur- roundings, he - would be -slow to o act upon such seusations, would not prove impulsive, not because he was siuggish, but use he was merely irresolute. It could be foreseen that morally he was of that sort who ayold evil through good taste, lack of decision and want' of’ opportunity, His temperament was that of 2 poet: when he told himself he had bzen thinking, he deceived himself. He had, on such occa- sions, been only brooding. BSome eighteen months hefore this time he had been threatened with consumption, and, taking advantage of a standing in- us Derrick, come to:stay in the dry, even cli- of the San J'i“q“m for an indefinite length of time: .Heé was trirty years old, sand had graduated and post-graduated Wwith high honors. trom an Eastern col- 'lege. where he had devoted himself to a g4 «gtudy+of-literature, and, more especially, of poetry. It was his insatiable ambiticn to write vitation on ‘the part of M ihag: madt, yerse. But up to this time his work had been fugitive, ephemeral, a note here and there, heard, appreciated and forgotten. He was in search of a subject; some- thing magnificent; he did not know ex- actly ~what; some vast, tremendous theme. heroic, terrible, to be unrolled in all the thundering progression of hexame- ters. But _whatever he wrote, and in what- ever fashion, Presley was determined that his poem should be of the West, that world's frontier of Rdmance, where a new race. a new people—hsrdy, brave and passionate—were building - an _empire; where the tumultuous life ran like fire from dawn to dark, and from dark to dawn again, primitive, brutal, honest and without fear. Something (to his idea not much) had been done to catch at that life in passing. but its poet had not yet risen. The few sporadic attempts, thus he told himself, had only touched the keynote. He strove for a_diapason, the great song that should embrace in itself & whole epoch, a complete era, the voice of an entire -people, wherein all people should be included—they and their le- gends, their folk lore, their fightings, their Toves and their lusis, their biunt, grim humor, their stoicism under stress. their adventures, their treasures found in a day mnd gambled in a night, théir di- rect, crude speech, their generosity and crueity, ~their heroism and bestiality, their religion and profanity, their self- sacrifice and obscenity—a true and fear- I setting forth of a passing phase of history. uncompromising. sincere: each ground in its proper environment; the val- ley, the plain and the mountain; the ranch, the range and the mine—ail this, all the traits and types of every commu! nity from the Dakotas to the Mexicos, from Winnipeg to Guadalupe, gathered together, swept together, wedded and riven together in one single, mighty song, the Song of the West. That was what he dreamed, ‘while things without names thoughts for 'Which no man had yet in- vented words, terrible ‘formless shapes, vague figures, colossal. monstrous, dis- torted—whirled at a gallop lhrough his imagination. As~Harran came up, Presley reached down into the pouches of the sun- bleacHed shooting coat he wore and drew " out and handed him the packet of letters {and papers. 3 “Here's the mall. I thini shall go.on.” “But. dinnner_is ready,” ‘aid Harran; ‘e are ‘just sitting down.' Presley ‘shook his: head. '“No; I'n in a hurry. Perbaps I sball’ have ‘some- thing to_eat at.Guadalajara. I shall be gone all day.” 7 He delayed a féw moments longer, tightenéd a loose nut on , his forward wheel, while Harran, recognizing his father's handwriting on one of the en- velopes, slit it open and cast his eye rapidiy’over IS pages. ‘?Tha governor is coming home,” he exclaimed, ‘‘to-morrow morning on the early train; wants me to meet him with the team at Guadalajara; and.” he cried, between his_ clenched teeth, &s he cr{ntlnued to read, “we've lost the case. “What case? Oh, in the matter of rates?” Harran nodded, his eyes flashing, his face growing suddenly scarlet. “Ulsteen gave his decision yesterday,” he continued, reading from his father's fetter. ‘He holds, Ulsteen does, that ‘grain rates as low as the new ' figure would amount to confiscation of prop- erty, and that, on such a basis, the rafl- road could not be operated at a legitimate profit. As he is powerless to legislate in the matter, he can only put the rates / L back at what they originally were before ihe commisioners made the cut, and it is so ordered.” That's our friend S. Behr- man again,” added Harran, grinding his teeth. “He was up in the city the whole time the new schedule was being drawn, and he and Ulsteen and the.' Railroad Commission were as thick.as thieves. He bas been up there all this last week, too, doing the railroad’s dirty work, and back- ing Ulsteen up. ‘Legitimate proit, legiti- mate profit, " he broke out. “Can we raise wheat at a legitimate profit with a tariff of four dollars a ton for moving it_two hundred miles to tidewater, with wheat at eighty-seven cents? Why not hold us up with a gun In our faces and say ‘Hands up,” and be done with it?” He dug his bootheel into the ground and turned away.to the house abruptly, curs- ing beneath his breath. “By the way,” Presley called after him, “Hooven wants to see you. He asked me about this idea of the governor's of getting_along without the tenants this year. Hooven wants to stay to tend the ditch and look after ths stock. I told him to see you.” Harran, his mind full of other things, nodaed to say he understood. Presiey oniy waited till he had disappeared in- doors, so that he might not seem 100 in- different to his trouble; then, remounting, struck at once into a brisk pace, and, turning out from the carriage gate, held on swiftiy down the Lower Road, going in the direction of Guadalajara. ‘hese matters, these eternal e bickerings between the farmers of the San Joaqun and the Pacific and Seuthwestern Eail- road irritated him and wearied him. He cared for ,none of these things. They did not beiong to his wurld. In the pic- ture of that huge romantic West that he saw in his imagination, these dissensions made the one note of harsk color that Tefused to enter into the great scheme of harmony. It was materixl, sordid, dead- Jy commonplace. But, howeyer he’ strove to shut his eves to it or his ears to_it, the thing persisted and persisted. - The romance seemed complete to that pofmt. There it broke, there it failed, there it became realism, grim, unlovely, ‘unyielg- ing. . To be true—and it was-the first arti- cle of_ his creed to be unflinchingly trife— he . could not ignore it. All - the “noble Getry. of the ranch, the valley, secmed n his‘mind to be marred and disfigured by, the presence of certain immovable~ facts. gust what he wanted, Presle bardly knew. 'On.one hand, it was ambition to portray life as he saw ft— directly, frankly, and through a rose- colored mist—a mist that dulled all narsh outlines, all crude and violent colors. - He told himself that, as.a part of the people; | he loved the people and sympathized with their hopes and fears and joys and griefs; and yet Hoover, grimy and perspiring. with his perpetual grievance and his-con- - tracted horizon, only revolted him. “He had set himsglf the task of giving true, absolutely true, poetical expression to, the . life sof the ranch, and = yet, agaih and again, he brought up against the railroad, that stubbern iron barriers against which his romance shattered it- Seif to froth and disintegrated, flying spume. His heart went out to the people, and his gmgng hand met that of a slov- enly little Dutchman, whom it was im- possible to _consider _ seriously. He searched for the True Romance, and, in the end. found grain rates and unjust freight fariffs. 8 “But the stuff is here,” he muttered, as he sent his wheel rumbling across the ‘bridge over Broderson Creek. ““The ro- mance, the real romance, is here some- where. I'll get hold of it yet.” He shot a glance about him as if In ; routes. azine eclion NOVEMBER_ 9™ 190 search of the inspiration. By now he was not quite half way acrogs the northern and narrowest corner of Los Muertos, at this point some eight miles wide. He was still on the Home ranch. A few miles to the south he could just make out the line of wire fence that separated it from a third division; and to the north, seen faint and blue through the haze and shimmer of the noon sun, a long file of telegraph poles showed the line of the railroad and marked Derrick’s northeast boundary. The road over which Presley was_traveling ran almost diametrically straight. In front of him, but at a great distance, he could make out the glant live oak and the red roof of Hoven's barn that stood near it. All_about him the country was flat. In all directions he could see for miles. The harvest was just over. Nothing but stubble remained on the ground. With the one ‘exception of Hooven's place, there was nothing gresn in sight. The wheat stubble was of a dirty yehow; the ground, parched, cracked and dry, of a cheerless brown. By the roadside the dust lay thick and ~ gray, and, on either ' hand, stretching on toward theé horizon, losing itself in a mere smudge in the distance, ran the iilimitable parallels o fence. And that was all; that and the burnt-out blue of the sky and the steady shimmer of the heat. ‘The silence was infinite. After the har- vest, small though that harvest had been, the ranches seemed asicep. It was as though the earth, after its period of re- production, its pains of labor, had been delivered of the fruit of its loins, and now slept the sleep of exhaustion. It was the period between _seasons, when nothing was being done, when the patural forces seemed to hang suspended. There was no rain, there was no wind, there was no growth, no life; the very stubble had no force even to rot. The sun alone moved. Toward two o'clock Presley reached Hooven's place, two or three grimy frame buildings, infested with a swarm of dogs. + A.-hag-or two wandered aimlessly about. Under a shed by the bara a broken-down seeder lay rusting to its ruin. But ever- head- a mammoth live cak, the larzest treg in ali the countryside, towered sugierb and magnificent. Gray bunches of tietoe and festoons of trailing muss hung from its bark. From its lowes branches hung EHooven's meat-safe, & re box, faced with wire screens. gave a special interest to Hooven's was the fact that here was the intersection of the Lower Road and Der- rick's main rrigating ditch, a vast trench not yet completéd, which he and Annix- ter, who worked the Quien Sabe ranech, were jointly constructing. It ran directly across:the road and at right angles to it, and ‘lay a deep groove in the field be- tween #Hooven's and the town of Guad- alajara, some three miles further on. Be- sides this, the ditch was a natural bound- ary between two divisions of the Los Muertos ranch, the first and fourth. Presley_now had the choice of His objective ooint was spring “at the headwaters of son Creek, In the hills on the eastern side of the Quien Sabe ranch The trafl af- fordegd him a short cut thitherward As he passed the house. Mrs. Hooven came to the door, her little ughter Hilda, dressed in a boy's overalls and clumsy boots, at her skirts. Minna, her ldest daughter, a very pretty girl, whose iove affairs were continually :he talk of all Los Muertos, was ible through the window of the house, busy at the weck s washing. Mrs Hooven was a faded, col- orless woman, middle-aged and commun= place, and offering not tie least charae- teristic that would distinguish her froms