The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, January 28, 1906, Page 2

THE SA N, FRANCISCO, SUNDAY CHAPTER 1L The Gracey Beoys. supper down Under the from the ade a species 1 rod saluta as K son paced through the saved up for ‘I guess I t she with ve burg, the with rike tter things up.” of course,” sald the the Gracey boys this time. I heard ore I came up. The report downsbelow was that it was a pretty good thing. “You bet,” said the young woman with & knowing air. ‘Nearly & year g0 one of the gentlemen connected wit it sald to me, “We've got a mine ere; bed-rock’s pitchin’ and there's W to the pe o I wasn't sur- It ey'd struck ey're goir 2 twent ] next thing you know." Good for said the colonel The Gracey ve been mining o yo country and in 1d this is_the 've got. How far up on the other side of the They have to come here Sullivan, the of thelr buy- She looked e colonel with a e-eyed, stolid e as she gave this significant pie f on. The . ggested t hat the for WaS N t to Barney Sullivan,” he said, “I remem- m. He's been with them for some years, was in Virginia City when they He's a good-looking fel- you say?" ex- E h key of scornful - s morn I can see Just a red-haired Irish tarrier, wit the freckles on him as big as It's a good thing all the world ke scorn the same kind of face.” was tinctured with the cence of one who knows herself from similar charges. Mitty, in the knowledge that her own patronymic wes Bruce, affected a high disdain of the Irish. She also pos- sessed a natural pride on the score of her Christiar name, which in its unique unabbreviated completeness was Sum- mit, commemoration of the fact that upon that lofty elevation of the Sierra site_hed first seen the light “You'll be able to see all the Buckeye Belle crowd to-nig.t.” she continued; “they'll be in now anw time. “There’s going to be a party here.” The colonel looked up from his plate with the thrust-out lips and taiged brows of inquiring astonishment. ‘The devil you say!” he ejaculated “I arrived just at the right moment, didn’t 1?7 1 suppose T'll have to stand round looking at the men knifing éach other for a chance to dance with Miss Br wriggled with delight and as pink as her dress. ‘Well, not quite's bad as that,” she said with bridling modesty, “but I can ¥] pick.” rlend had finished the first part r, and placing his knife and fork together, leaned back, looking at her and smiling fo himself. She saw the empty plate, and rising, bent across the table and Swept it and the other es on to her tray with'an air of al expertness. As She came rt the last diner the wooden floor in that she set before the displayed a large slab of ple. akfast 1ip of coffee went with He looked at them with an'undis- eye, remarking: Who's coming to the party? I'll bet w hat Barney Sullivan will be here or THE DUSTEER JNOUVIEEP OF BN ~—the first man on deck, and the last to quit the pumps. But I don’t suppose the Gracey boys will show up.” “Yes, they will—both of “em.” ‘What. Black Dan? Black Dan Gracey doesn't go to parties.” “Well, he don’t generally. But he's goin’ to this oné His daughter, Mer- cedes, is here, that sort er. spidery Spanish girl, and he's goin’ for her.” Mitty, hawng seen that her guest had all that in Foleys made up the last course of a complete and satis- factory supper, went round and took her seat at the opposite side of the table. As she spoke he noticed a change in her voice. Now, as he saw her face, he noticed a change in it, too. There was a withdratwal of joy and sparkle. She looked sullen, almost mourntul. “Black Dan Gracey's dafighter here?” he queried. “What's she doing so far afield? The last I heard of her she was in school in San Francisco.” 3o she was until two days ago. Then some kind er sickness broke out in the school and her paw went down to bring her up here. She was so precious she couldn’t come up from San Francisco alone. She had to be brung all the way like she was made of gold and people was tryin’ to steal her. They stopped here for dinner on their way up. I seen her.” g “She promises to be. very pretty,” said the colonel absently. . “They say Gracey worships her.” “Pretty!” echoed Mitty in-a very flat . “I don't see what makes her so Little black thing. And voice. dreadful pretty. anybody’'d be pretty all togged up that BETWEEN SWEEPS ON. THE BUENING- QUESTION OF THE SQUATTEE bt | .1 know ’em real well. way. She'd diamond earrings on, real ones, big diamonds like that.” She held out the tip of her little finger, nipped between her third amnd thumb. “I guess'that makes a difference,’. she saif emphatieaily, looking at him with a pair. of eyes’ which tried to be defiant, but ‘were really full of forlérn appeal. *Of course it makes a difference,” said the colonel cheeringly, without knowing in the least what he meant, “al great difference.”” “They was all staring at her here at dinner. There was four men in the kitchen trying to get a squint through the door, until the Chinaman threw ’'em out. And she knew jest as well as any one, and liked it. But you oughter have seen her pretend she didn’t notlce it. Jest eat her dinner sort er slow and careless as if they was no one round more important than g yaller dog. Only now and then she’d throw back her head so’s her curls 'ud fall back an. the diamond earrings ‘ud show. I said to paw flat-footed, ‘Go and wait on her yourself, since you think she’'s so dreadful handsome. I don't do no walting on that stuck-up thing.” ‘Mitty turned away to the window. Her recital of the sensation ereated by the proud Miss Gracey seemed o affect her. There was a tremulous undernote in her voice; her bosom, under {ts tight-dfawn pink calico covering, heaved as if she were about to weep. The colonel noted with surprise these signs of storm, and was wondering what would be best to say to divert the conc versation into less disturbing channels, when Mitty, looking out of the window. craned her neck and evidently followed with her eyes a passing figure. - “There goes June . Allen,” she sald, “don't ske look shabby :' The name caused the colonel to stop eating. He raised his eyes to his com- panion. She was looking 'at him with re- viving animation in her glance. ““That’s the daughter of old man Allen what's squatted on your land,” she ex- plained. “You ain't ever seéen the girls, have you?" The colonel, who had finished, laid his napkin on the tgble. “No,” he answered, ‘are they children?" “Children!” echoed Mitty, “I guess not. June's twenty and Rosamund’s nineteen. They're friends of mine.” . # He raised his eyebrows, surprised and relieved at the information. It would be less hard to oust the squatter if his chil- dren were of this age than if they were helpless infants. “What sort of girls aré they?’ he asked. . “Oh, they're real lovely girls. And they've got a wonderful education. They know lots. They're learned. Thelr mother léarned it to them—" $ Mitty stopped, a sound outside strik- ing her ear. The colonel was' looking at her with quizzical inquiry. The pie- ture of the squatter’s children, as edu- cated, much iess “learned,” filled him with amused astonishment. He was_ Just about to ask his informant for a fuller explanation when she rose to her feet, her face fuffused with color, her eyes fastened in a sudden concen- tration of attention on something out- side the window. i ¥ “Here they are,” she said in a low, hyrried voice. them.” | He obeyed, not knowing whom she. meant. In the bright light of the after- glow he saw four figures on horseback —three m: and a girl—approaching down the deserted street. Behind them “Get up and look at - a pack burro, his back laden with bags and vallses, plodded meekly _through the dust. The colonel recogaized the men as the Gracey®brothers and their superintendent, Barney Sullivan. The girl he had not seen for a year or two, and she was at the age when a year or two makes vast changes. [He knew, however. that she was Black Dan Gracey's daughter, Mercedes, who was expected at the dance. The cavaleade: came to a stop out- side the window. From the plazza the front legs of the loungers’ chairs strik- ing-the floor produced a series of thuds, and the thuds were followed by a series, of hafls such as had greeted the colonel. But the loungers made no attempt to go forward, a§ they had done in his case, An access of bashfulness in the presence of beauty held them sheep- jshly spellbound. It remained for For- sythe to dash out with his duster and welcome the new arrivals with the ‘ effusion of a mining camp Boniface. The colonel, unseen, locked at them with perhaps not as avid a curiosity ag Mitty, but with undisguised interest. He had long known the Gracey boys, as they were called, though Dan was forty-three "and Rion twelye years younger. He had often heard of their mining viclssitudes, not only from men similarly engaged, but from themselves on thelr occasional visits to San Fran- cisco. The society of that city had not yet expanded to the size when it fell apart into separate sets. Its members not only had a bowing acquaintance, but were, for the most part, intimate. The Gracey boys had, as tHe news- papers say, “the entree everywhere,” though they did not, it is true, profit by it to the extent that San Francisco would have liked. They were not only educated men, who had come from Michigan in their boyhood, but Black Dan Gracey was a figure distinguished—at any fate, to the’ usual feminine imagination—by an un flavor of romance. Seventeen years be- fore the present date he had met, while mh;ln: in Mexico, a young BSpanish girl of fourteen, had fallen madly 'in love with her, and when her parents placed her in a convent to remove her forever from the hated Gringo, with six of his men had broken into the con- vent and carried her off. It was part of the romance year later his child wife, as pas that a 4 1y loving as he, should have died, leav~ ing him a baby. It was said that Black Dan Gracey had never recovered this sudden severing of tfie dearest tle of his life. He -certalnly was proof against the ‘wiles that many siréns in San Franecisco and elsewhere Had dis- played for his Subjugation. It was af- ter thid, anyway, that the adjective Black had been prefixed to his name. Most people 'safd ‘it had arisen be- cause of his swarthy coloring—he was of an almost Indian darknesg of tint —but there were those who declared it was a tribute to his moody taciturn- ity, for Black Dan Gracey was a man of few words and rare smiles. Now, standing in the brilifant even-- a3 Mitty had, ing light, the ~watcher could - not but bhe impressed by the appearance of the two brothers. A fine palr of men, the Gracey boys, muscular, broad shoul- dered ;and tall; outdoor men whose eyes were far-seeing and quiet, who felt cramped In cities, and returned from . them- with a freshened zest to ithe stream-bed and the canon. Rion was obviously many years his broth- er's junfor, He was a moré normal looking persom, not so darkly bearded and heavily browed, more full of the joys and interests of life. ‘As he slid from his saddle to the ground he was laughing, while his elder, the lower part of his face clothed in a piratical growth of black hair, lowered somberly from under a gray sombrero. In -thefr rough and dust-grimed clothes, they still showed the Indefinable aif of the well-born and educated man, which curlously dis- ‘tinguished them from Barney Sulli- van, their companion. Barney was as tall and well set up as either of them, but beyond a doubt he was what Mitty had called a “tarrier,” in other words an TIrish laborer. He, too, was laugh- ing, a Mugh that showed strong white teeth under a short red ntustache. His hat, pushed back from his «forehead. revealed the same colored hair, thick and wiry. He had a broad, turned-up . nose, plenteously freckled as were his hands, raised now to assist Miss Gra- cey from her horse. Upon the one feminine member of ;);:&M“r the o&lonol':‘ eyes had been were those e man | the Vi . He ulnfiudm t: ‘was nearly 18 For a girl with Span- ish blood that would mean a young ‘woman, full grown and marriageable, She still, howeyer, retained a look of, childhood that was extremely charm- ing, and in some vague, indistinct way, pathetic, he thpught. 3 pathos lay in the fact that she had never had a mothér, and that the best care ::r ad s ut:tlot could lavish n her was ‘e expensive n i-.’.ju- childhood. snd send her to - % 3 the. more expensive boarding schiools when she grew older. She was undoubtedly fulfilling the promise she had always given of being pretty. She sat sidewise on her sad- dle, looking down at Barney's raised bands:. Her hair, which was as black s her father's, ‘was arranged in loose- 1y’ flowing curls that fell over her shoulders and brushed her chest. In this position, her chin down, her eye- lashes on her cheeks, her lips curved in a slow, coquettish smile, she pre- sented a truly bewitching appearance. Under her childish demeanor, the wo- man, conscious of unusual charms, was alrcady awake. The colonel felt that though her entire attention seemed concentra- ted on Barney, she was acutely aware of the staring men on the plazza, and was rejoicing in their bashful admiration. He could not help smiling, her indifference was so coolly complete. His smile died when he felt Mitty give him a vicious dig in the back. “Did you see the earrings?”’ she said in a hissing undertone. “Yes, I think I aid.” “Do you suppose monds?" Mitty gave forth a sound that seemed a cross between a snort and a groan. “And a pack burro! exclaimed with fuming scorn. “Did you get on to the pack burro, all-loaded up with bags? She has to have her pArty rig brought along on a pack burro!" “Well, what's wreng with that?” he said goothingly. *‘She couldn’t go to the party in her riding habit all grimed up with dust. Nobody ever saw a girl at a party In a riding habit.”” ““Well, the Phillips girl can go all right in a pink flannel skirt and miners’ boots,’ declared his companion with combative heat, overlooking the fact that the fest array of the Phillips girl had been a sub- ject of her special derision. ‘T guess she don't have to have a pack burro to carry her duds.” 3 The colonel realized that the moment for gentle reasoning was oyer. Ounly the girl's burning curiosity kept down the wrathful tears evoked by a newly stirred jealousy. When she saw Black Dan's daughter slide from her saddle into Bar- ney Sullivan’s arms an ejaculation of mingled pain and rage escaped her that had a nete of suffering in it. The colonel, in Pbis time, had known such pangs, a thousand times deeper and more terrible than Mitty had ever experi- enced. He turned to her smiling, not teasingly. but almost tenderly, and saw her face blighted like a rose dashed by rafn, pititul and a little ludicrous. The pitiful side of it was all that struck him “Did you see how mighty easy Barney ts with her?’ she stammered, making = desperate feminine attempt to speak lightly. “A gentleman has to help a lady off her horse; he can’t let her climb down all by herself. Barney's not that kind of a chump. You run along now and get ready. You haven't got such a lat of time, for you've got to help set the tables for supper. And don't you fret. I just feel that you're going to look as nice as any gitl in the place. That dress of yours is going to be just about right. Hurry up! Here they are.” Mitty heard the advancing footfalls in the passage and the sound of apyroach- ing voices. As the tail of her pink calico skirt disappeared tbrough the Kkitchen door, the Gracey party entered through the one that led to the office. There were greetings with the colonel, and he sat down at their table to exchange the latest San Francisco. gossip with the mining dews of the district, ‘and especially to hear the details of the strike In the Buckeye Belle. CHAPTER L they're real dia- The Name of Allen. An hour later as the colonel was leaving bis room, the voices of Forsythe and a newcomer ascending the stairs struck on his ea.. He leaned over the baluster and lookéd down at the tops of their approaching heads. Forsythe's bald pate was followed by another, evidently ‘a- younger ome, by the curly brown hafr that covered it. A palr of shoulders in a dusty coat was beneath the head, and, as they mount- €d, the colomel heard a voice of that cultured intonation which the far West scornfully regards as an outgrowth of effete civilizations. In short, the own- er of the voice spoke like an Easterner who has had ¢ collegé education. The colonel, If he was doubtful about the top of the lhead, knew the voice directly. “Jerry Barclay, by thunder!” he ex- claimed over the railing. “What the devil are you doing up here?” The newcomer started and lifted a hancsome face, which, in clean-cut dis- tinction of feature, seemed to match the voice. He cleared the last steps at a bound and stretched out a sinewy brown hand to the older man. There was something delightfully frank and boyish in his manner. “Well, old son,” he said, “that comes well from you! About the last person in California I expected to see at Foleys. What's up?”’ In the light of the kerosene lamps which illuminated the hallway he was shown to be some thirty years of age, tall, slender, upright, with upon him and about him that indescribable air of the man of clubs and cities. His looge sack-coat and flannel shirt set upon his frame with a suggestion of conscious masquerade. He did not be- long to the present rough setting, al- beit he was so easy of manner and movement that it could not be sald of him he was awkwardly out of place anywhere. The genial frankness of his address was the Western touch about him, which made him acceptable in a society where his manner of speech might have been resented as a personal reflection. It even outwelghed the im- pression produced by the seal ring he wore. That it was not the outward and visible expression of & mellow friepdliness of nature did not matter. What did matter was that It made life much simpler and more agreeable for Jerry Barclay. “What am I doing up here?” he sald n answer to the older man's question. “Looking after my interests. ~What else would bring a man into these tralls? There's an old claim of my father’s out Thompson's Flat way that they've beer getting up a fairy tale ahout. Ever since the Buckeye Belle's panned out so' well they keep inventing yarns down below that sound Illke forty-nine. But the Buckeye Belle has made a strike, Forsythe tell me. “The Gracey boys are hers to-night. They'll tell you all about it. Black Dan won't have anything else to do.” The younger man pursed his lips for a whistle of surprise. “That's luck,” he said. ‘“What's Black Dan Gracey doing in a center of civiliza- tion lke this?" “Bringing his daughter in for a dance. ‘We've got a party on here to-night. Go into your room and primp up the best you know how. Dancing men are short.” The young man laughed, a deep, jolly laugh. ““Timed it just right, didn’t I? Do you suppose the belles of Foleys will take me this way, travel-stained and weary? I'd like to see Black Dan's daughter. They say she promises to be a beauty.” “Promise!” echoed the colonel; “she kept that promise some time ago. She's years old, miy boy, and she can take your pelt and nail it to the barn door whenever she’s a mind to.” The other turned away to the open door of the room Forsythe had Ut up for him. “Sixteen!” he said. “Oh, that's too young! No, colonel, I've not got to the age when sixteen attracts. But you ought _to be just about there. So long! You'll see me later looking on at your gambols with the sixteen-year-older.” His bayish laugh issued from the room. ‘right and as the colonel went down stairs he could hear it above the swishing of water and the sound of smitten crockery. From below the first tentative whinings of the violins rose, and as he reached the lower hall he heard the rattling of vehicles .and the sound of voices as the earlier guests began to arrive. To- tH of the hall he discovered Black Damn, decluded in a small room reserved by Forsythe for honored patrons, smok- Ing tranquiliy as be tiited back in a wood- en arm-chair. The colonel joined him, and for ah hour the smoke of their cigars mingled amicably as they talked over the mining prospects of the distriet, and the caolonel’s scheme for the development of Ris mineral spring. It was near nine and the dapce had passed its fmidal stage of bashful gayety, when they strolled down the baleony to where the windows of the dining-room cast elongated sauares of light Into the darkness. This room, built on the angle of the house, had a door in the fremt, flanked by two windows, and down the long side a line of four more windows. Be- fore each aperture there was a gathering of shadowy shapes, the light gilding star- ing faces. At the first window the two men stopped and looked fn. The dining-room, with its wooden wall: g and board floor, g shell the simple revel, Its bareness had been decorated with lopg strands of colored paper, de- pending from points in the-celling and caught up in the pers. At intervals along the walls kerosene lamps, backed by large tin refleetors, used a raw, bright light, each concave tin throwing a shadow like a stream of ink down the boards helow it In a corner the three musici th furious energy, on: ornet and two scraping violins iare dance was in progress, and rvals the man who played ¢ in, his chin dug pertinaciou end of his yell dent tones: nent, Instru rig t Black by the first glance that was pro- vided with @ partner, retraced his steps and took a seat at the deserted end of the balcony, whence the red tip of his cigar canie and went a st a screen of darkn co much in- terested, ned looking -in. It was an innocently spirited scene, every participant seeming bent on ex- acting his full 'share of ‘enjoyment from the fdeeting hour. There Wwere girls whd had driven in fifteen and twenty from the camps and T hes 3 1 through je distre and who, fushed : excited, were ing through the measure with an ade the floor vibrate. , also drawn from a ra- ty milés about Foleys, ? varieties, from the few mining superintendents of the neigh- borhood to some of the underground workers he Buckeye Belle. M . ad in maidenly white mus- lin fined by a blue sash, was ev dently much in demand. Her dancing, which was marked by,a romping vigor, had lgosened her hair, and.a half- looped brown braid sent & ‘scattering of hairping along the floor. Her part- ner, the or.of the local livery stable, was conducting her through the mazes of ‘the dancé with many fancy steps. An occasional haughty glane a.loudly deflant quality in her laug and. the pert .air with which she flounced through,the figures, indicated, to the watcher that she was acut consclous of Barney Sullivan, leaning against the wall opposite and eyir her with jealous, hang-dog adoration. In this assemblage of rustic beau red, overheated and somewhaf blows. Mercedes Gracey looked smaller, finer and more del ly finished than she had in the afternoon glow, with natu for a background. That she should b participating with obvious pleasure in such a humble entertainment did not surprise the.colonel, used to the demo- cratic. leveling of ranks’that obtained in foothill,California. It @fd not strike him as any more remarkable than that she should be.enjo¥ing .the so £ ety of Joe Mosely, who kept thé~Sumset loon at Thompson's Flat, & twe years before, in the, days Jf his ow and the State’s uncontrolled yogth, b “killed his man” and narrowly escap: lynching in Hangtown. The watcher's eye left her with re- luctance, for a man at any age, even with a heart cold to the appeal of woman, will linger on the spectacle of youthful beauty.” Then his glance swept the wall behind her, where the opened windowsiwere filled with men's heads, and along upper end of which a bench ran. On this bench sat a young woman, alone, her head, In profile toward him, thrown out like a painting against the wooden back- ground. The colonel's gaze stopped with a sud- denness which suggested the snapping of an internal spring. A fixed, rigid gravity of observation swept all humer from his face, leaving it staring, absorbed, marked with lines. There was nothing about & girl to warrant this access of motionk interest. No better proof could be given of the fact that she was not in any way beautiful or pretty than that, at the very beight of the dance, she was evidently partnerless. 3 Dejection marked her attitude and the youthful profile which she presented to the watcher. Her body had settled back against the wall in a pose of apathetic acquiescence, her hands in her lap, her small feet, which her sBort skirt revealed, limply crossed. Her dress, of a soft yel- lowish material, spotted at intervals with a crimson flower, set with some degres of grace and accuracy over the lines of her slightly developed, childish figure, Her feet and hands, the latter showing red against the white forearm. that her half-sleeve left bare, were in keeping with the air of fragile smallness which seemed to add a touch of extra pathos to her- neglected condition. She did not look like the country girls about her. The colonel noticed that her halr was cut short as a boy’s. Round the ear and tem- ple that he could see longer- hairs curled slightly. His immovable scrutiny lasted for some minutes. Then he threw his cigar into the darknéss and pushing by the loung- ers at the door entered tNe room and threaded his way through the dancers to where she sat. In the nolse about her she did not hear his approach or kpow that any one was near till he sat down on the bench beside her and said: “You don’t seem to be dancing?” She started and turned a face upon him, the surprise of wbich was partly dispersed oy hope of cheer. It was a charming face, if not & pretty one; the skin of a soft, warm pallor, the chin pointed, the mouth small, the middle of the upper lip drooping in a slight point on the low er. Her eyes, of a clear greenish-brown, showed an unusually straight lne of un- der lid. A smile born of relief and the desire to be ingratfating hoversd on her lips and brought into being a dimple in one cheek. In the first moment of encounter the colonel saw all these details. The profile had struck him into a trance-like fixity of observation. Now at the full face, the smile with which he had aceompanied his words died away. He stared at her for a moment, speechless and motionless. And then, with a muttered ejaculation, he half-turned from her and looked at the dancers. The' girl was amazed, for she had never seen him before. Her hopes of a partner were forgotten in her alatmed surprise at the demeanor of the personm she thought had come to succor her in a dreary hour. She sat looking at him, wondering what to say ‘and mervously rolling the wad of handkerchief she held from hand to hand. , The next moment he had turned back tq her, commanding his features into the conventional smile of young acq e ance. “T must beg your pardon,” he said, speaking to you withont an introduction, but I thought you'd let an old fellow lke me come over here and have a fow mo- ments’ talk. I don’t dance. you see, and Ladies to 3PN \ ~ »