THE STORY OF A MINE

By Bret Har

UDO BRACHVOGEL, Esq. , Whose clever translations of my writings have helped to introduce meto the favor of his countrymen, both here and in Germany, this littlevolume is heartily dedicated. 

BRET HARTE. 

New York, December, 1877. 

THE STORY OF A MINE

PART--I. 

CHAPTER I

WHO SOUGHT IT

It was a steep trail leading over the Monterey Coast Range. Concho wasvery tired, Concho was very dusty, Concho was very much disgusted. To Concho's mind there was but one relief for these insurmountabledifficulties, and that lay in a leathern bottle slung over the machillasof his saddle. Concho raised the bottle to his lips, took a longdraught, made a wry face, and ejaculated:

"Carajo!"

It appeared that the bottle did not contain aguardiente, but had latelybeen filled in a tavern near Tres Pinos by an Irishman who sold hadAmerican whisky under that pleasing Castilian title. Nevertheless Conchohad already nearly emptied the bottle, and it fell back against thesaddle as yellow and flaccid as his own cheeks. Thus reinforced Conchoturned to look at the valley behind him, from which he had climbed sincenoon. It was a sterile waste bordered here and there by arable fringesand valdas of meadow land, but in the main, dusty, dry, and forbidding. His eye rested for a moment on a low white cloud line on the easternhorizon, but so mocking and unsubstantial that it seemed to come and goas he gazed. Concho struck his forehead and winked his hot eyelids. Wasit the Sierras or the cursed American whisky?

Again he recommenced the ascent. At times the half-worn, half-visibletrail became utterly lost in the bare black outcrop of the ridge, buthis sagacious mule soon found it again, until, stepping upon a looseboulder, she slipped and fell. In vain Concho tried to lift her fromout the ruin of camp kettles, prospecting pans, and picks; sheremained quietly recumbent, occasionally raising her head as if tocontemplatively glance over the arid plain below. Then he had recourseto useless blows. Then he essayed profanity of a secular kind, such as"Assassin, " "Thief, " "Beast with a pig's head, " "Food for the Bull'sHorns, " but with no effect. 

Then he had recourse to the curse ecclesiastic:

"Ah, Judas Iscariot! is it thus, renegade and traitor, thou leavestme, thy master, a league from camp and supper waiting? Stealer of theSacrament, get up!"

Still no effect. Concho began to feel uneasy; never before had a mule ofpious lineage failed to respond to this kind of exhortation. He made onemore desperate attempt:

"Ah, defiler of the altar! lie not there! Look!" he threw his hand intothe air, extending the fingers suddenly. "Behold, fiend! I exorcisethee! Ha! tremblest! Look but a little now, --see! Apostate!I--I--excommunicate thee, --Mula!"

"What are you kicking up such a devil of row down there for?" said agruff voice from the rocks above. 

Concho shuddered. Could it be that the devil was really going to flyaway with his mule? He dared not look up. 

"Come now, " continued the voice, "you just let up on that mule, youd----d old Greaser. Don't you see she's slipped her shoulder?"

Alarmed as Concho was at the information, he could not help feeling to acertain extent relieved. She was lamed, but had not lost her standing asa good Catholic. 

He ventured to lift his eyes. A stranger--an Americano from his dressand accent--was descending the rocks toward him. He was a slight-builtman with a dark, smooth face, that would have been quite commonplace andinexpressive but for his left eye, in which all that was villainous inhim apparently centered. Shut that eye, and you had the features andexpression of an ordinary man; cover up those features, and the eyeshone out like Eblis's own. Nature had apparently observed this too, andhad, by a paralysis of the nerve, ironically dropped the corner of theupper lid over it like a curtain, laughed at her handiwork, and turnedhim loose to prey upon a credulous world. 

"What are you doing here?" said the stranger after he had assistedConcho in bringing the mule to her feet, and a helpless halt. 

"Prospecting, Senor. "

The stranger turned his respectable right eye toward Concho, while hisleft looked unutterable scorn and wickedness over the landscape. 

"Prospecting, what for?"

"Gold and silver, Senor, --yet for silver most. "

"Alone?"

"Of us there are four. "

The stranger looked around. 

"In camp, --a league beyond, " explained the Mexican. 

"Found anything?"

"Of this--much. " Concho took from his saddle bags a lump of greyish ironore, studded here and there with star points of pyrites. The strangersaid nothing, but his eye looked a diabolical suggestion. 

"You are lucky, friend Greaser. "

"Eh?"

"It IS silver. "

"How know you this?"

"It is my business. I'm a metallurgist. "

"And you can say what shall be silver and what is not. "

"Yes, --see here!" The stranger took from his saddle bags a littleleather case containing some half dozen phials. One, enwrapped indark-blue paper, he held up to Concho. 

"This contains a preparation of silver. "

Concho's eyes sparkled, but he looked doubtingly at the stranger. 

"Get me some water in your pan. "

Concho emptied his water bottle in his prospecting pan and handed it tothe stranger. He dipped a dried blade of grass in the bottle and thenlet a drop fall from its tip in the water. The water remained unchanged. 

"Now throw a little salt in the water, " said the stranger. 

Concho did so. Instantly a white film appeared on the surface, andpresently the whole mass assumed a milky hue. 

Concho crossed himself hastily, "Mother of God, it is magic!"

"It is chloride of silver, you darned fool. "

Not content with this cheap experiment, the stranger then took Concho'sbreath away by reddening some litmus paper with the nitrate, and thencompletely knocked over the simple Mexican by restoring its color bydipping it in the salt water. 

"You shall try me this, " said Concho, offering his iron ore to thestranger;--"you shall use the silver and the salt. "

"Not so fast my friend, " answered the stranger; "in the first placethis ore must be melted, and then a chip taken and put in shape likethis, --and that is worth something, my Greaser cherub. No, sir, a mandon't spend all his youth at Freiburg and Heidelburg to throw away hisscience gratuitously on the first Greaser he meets. "

"It will cost--eh--how much?" said the Mexican eagerly. 

"Well, I should say it would take about a hundred dollars and expensesto--to--find silver in that ore. But once you've got it there--you'reall right for tons of it. "

"You shall have it, " said the now excited Mexican. "You shall have it ofus, --the four! You shall come to our camp and shall melt it, --and showthe silver, and--enough! Come!" and in his feverishness he clutched thehand of his companion as if to lead him forth at once. 

"What are you going to do with your mule?" said the stranger. 

"True, Holy Mother, --what, indeed?"

"Look yer, " said the stranger, with a grim smile, "she won't stray far, I'll be bound. I've an extra pack mule above here; you can ride on her, and lead me into camp, and to-morrow come back for your beast. "

Poor honest Concho's heart sickened at the prospect of leaving behindthe tired servant he had objurgated so strongly a moment before, butthe love of gold was uppermost. "I will come back to thee, littleone, to-morrow, a rich man. Meanwhile, wait thou here, patientone, --Adios!--thou smallest of mules, --Adios!"

And, seizing the stranger's hand, he clambered up the rocky ledge untilthey reached the summit. Then the stranger turned and gave one sweep ofhis malevolent eye over the valley. 

Wherefore, in after years, when their story was related, with thedevotion of true Catholic pioneers, they named the mountain "La Canadade la Visitacion del Diablo, " "The Gulch of the Visitation of theDevil, " the same being now the boundary lines of one of the famousMexican land grants. 

CHAPTER II

WHO FOUND IT

Concho was so impatient to reach the camp and deliver his good news tohis companions that more than once the stranger was obliged to commandhim to slacken his pace. "Is it not enough, you infernal Greaser, thatyou lame your own mule, but you must try your hand on mine? Or am I toput Jinny down among the expenses?" he added with a grin and a slightlifting of his baleful eyelid. 

When they had ridden a mile along the ridge, they began to descend againtoward the valley. Vegetation now sparingly bordered the trail, clumpsof chemisal, an occasional manzanita bush, and one or two dwarfed"buckeyes" rooted their way between the interstices of the black-grayrock. Now and then, in crossing some dry gully, worn by the overflow ofwinter torrents from above, the grayish rock gloom was relieved by dullred and brown masses of color, and almost every overhanging rock borethe mark of a miner's pick. Presently, as they rounded the curving flankof the mountain, from a rocky bench below them, a thin ghost-likestream of smoke seemed to be steadily drawn by invisible hands intothe invisible ether. "It is the camp, " said Concho, gleefully; "Iwill myself forward to prepare them for the stranger, " and before hiscompanion could detain him, he had disappeared at a sharp canter aroundthe curve of the trail. 

Left to himself, the stranger took a more leisurely pace, which left himample time for reflection. Scamp as he was, there was something in thesimple credulity of poor Concho that made him uneasy. Not that his moralconsciousness was touched, but he feared that Concho's companions might, knowing Concho's simplicity, instantly suspect him of trading upon it. He rode on in a deep study. Was he reviewing his past life? A vagabondby birth and education, a swindler by profession, an outcast byreputation, without absolutely turning his back upon respectability, hehad trembled on the perilous edge of criminality ever since his boyhood. He did not scruple to cheat these Mexicans, --they were a degradedrace, --and for a moment he felt almost an accredited agent ofprogress and civilization. We never really understand the meaning ofenlightenment until we begin to use it aggressively. 

A few paces further on four figures appeared in the now gatheringdarkness of the trail. The stranger quickly recognized the beaming smileof Concho, foremost of the party. A quick glance at the faces of theothers satisfied him that while they lacked Concho's good humor, theycertainly did not surpass him in intellect. "Pedro" was a stout vaquero. "Manuel" was a slim half-breed and ex-convert of the Mission of SanCarmel, and "Miguel" a recent butcher of Monterey. Under the benigninfluences of Concho that suspicion with which the ignorant regardstrangers died away, and the whole party escorted the stranger--who hadgiven his name as Mr. Joseph Wiles--to their camp-fire. So anxious werethey to begin their experiments that even the instincts of hospitalitywere forgotten, and it was not until Mr. Wiles--now known as "DonJose"--sharply reminded them that he wanted some "grub, " that they cameto their senses. When the frugal meal of tortillas, frijoles, salt pork, and chocolate was over, an oven was built of the dark-red rock broughtfrom the ledge before them, and an earthenware jar, glazed by somepeculiar local process, tightly fitted over it, and packed with clay andsods. A fire was speedily built of pine boughs continually brought froma wooded ravine below, and in a few moments the furnace was in fullblast. Mr. Wiles did not participate in these active preparations, except to give occasional directions between his teeth, which werecontemplatively fixed over a clay pipe as he lay comfortably on hisback on the ground. Whatever enjoyment the rascal may have had in theiruseless labors he did not show it, but it was observed that his lefteye often followed the broad figure of the ex-vaquero, Pedro, and oftendwelt on that worthy's beetling brows and half-savage face. Meeting thatbaleful glance once, Pedro growled out an oath, but could not resist ahideous fascination that caused him again and again to seek it. 

The scene was weird enough without Wiles's eye to add to its wildpicturesqueness. The mountain towered above, --a heavy Rembrandtishmass of black shadow, --sharply cut here and there against a sky soinconceivably remote that the world-sick soul must have despaired ofever reaching so far, or of climbing its steel-blue walls. The starswere large, keen, and brilliant, but cold and steadfast. They did notdance nor twinkle in their adamantine setting. The furnace fire paintedthe faces of the men an Indian red, glanced on brightly colored blanketand serape, but was eventually caught and absorbed in the waitingshadows of the black mountain, scarcely twenty feet from the furnacedoor. The low, half-sung, half-whispered foreign speech of the group, the roaring of the furnace, and the quick, sharp yelp of a coyote onthe plain below were the only sounds that broke the awful silence of thehills. 

It was almost dawn when it was announced that the ore had fused. And itwas high time, for the pot was slowly sinking into the fast-crumblingoven. Concho uttered a jubilant "God and Liberty, " but Don Jose Wilesbade him be silent and bring stakes to support the pot. Then Don Josebent over the seething mass. It was for a moment only. But in thatmoment this accomplished metallurgist, Mr. Joseph Wiles, had quietlydropped a silver half dollar into the pot!

Then he charged them to keep up the fires and went to sleep--all but oneeye. 

Dawn came with dull beacon fires on the near hill tops, and, far in theEast, roses over the Sierran snow. Birds twittering in the alder fringesa mile below, and the creaking of wagon wheels, --the wagon itself amere cloud of dust in the distant road, --were heard distinctly. Thenthe melting pot was solemnly broken by Don Jose, and the glowingincandescent mass turned into the road to cool. 

And then the metallurgist chipped a small fragment from the mass andpounded it, and chipped another smaller piece and pounded that, and thensubjected it to acid, and then treated it to a salt bath which becameat once milky, --and at last produced a white something, --mirabiledictu!--two cents' worth of silver!

Concho shouted with joy; the rest gazed at each other doubtingly anddistrustfully; companions in poverty, they began to diverge and suspecteach other in prosperity. Wiles's left eye glanced ironically from theone to the other. 

"Here is the hundred dollars, Don Jose, " said Pedro, handing the gold toWiles with a decidedly brusque intimation that the services and presenceof a stranger were no longer required. 

Wiles took the money with a gracious smile and a wink that sent Pedro'sheart into his boots, and was turning away, when a cry from Manuelstopped him. "The pot, --the pot, --it has leaked! look! behold! see!"

He had been cleaning away the crumbled fragments of the furnace to getready for breakfast, and had disclosed a shining pool of QUICKSILVER!

Wiles started, cast a rapid glance around the group, saw in a flash thatthe metal was unknown to them, --and then said quietly:

"It is not silver. "

"Pardon, Senor, it is, and still molten. " Wiles stooped and ran hisfingers through the shining metal. 

"Mother of God, --what is it then?--magic?"

"No, only base metal. " But here, Concho, emboldened by Wiles'sexperiment, attempted to seize a handful of the glistening mass, thatinstantly broke through his fingers in a thousand tiny spherules, andeven sent a few globules up his shirt sleeves, until he danced around inmingled fear and childish pleasure. 

"And it is not worth the taking?" queried Pedro of Wiles. 

Wiles's right eye and bland face were turned toward the speaker, buthis malevolent left was glancing at the dull red-brown rock on the hillside. 

"No!"--and turning abruptly away, he proceeded to saddle his mule. 

Manuel, Miguel, and Pedro, left to themselves, began talking earnestlytogether, while Concho, now mindful of his crippled mule, made his wayback to the trail where he had left her. But she was no longer there. Constant to her master through beatings and bullyings, she could notstand incivility and inattention. There are certain qualities of the sexthat belong to all animated nature. 

Inconsolable, footsore, and remorseful, Concho returned to the campand furnace, three miles across the rocky ridge. But what was hisastonishment on arriving to find the place deserted of man, mule, and camp equipage. Concho called aloud. Only the echoing rocks grimlyanswered him. Was it a trick? Concho tried to laugh. Ah--yes--a goodone, --a joke, --no--no--they HAD deserted him. And then poor Concho bowedhis head to the ground, and falling on his face, cried as if his honestheart would break. 

The tempest passed in a moment; it was not Concho's nature to sufferlong nor brood over an injury. As he raised his head again his eyecaught the shimmer of the quicksilver, --that pool of merry antic metalthat had so delighted him an hour before. In a few moments Concho wasagain disporting with it; chasing it here and there, rolling it in hispalms and laughing with boy-like glee at its elusive freaks and fancies. "Ah, sprightly one, --skipjack, --there thou goest, --come here. Thisway, --now I have thee, little one, --come, muchacha, --come and kiss me, "until he had quite forgotten the defection of his companions. And evenwhen he shouldered his sorry pack, he was fain to carry his playmateaway with him in his empty leathern flask. 

And yet I fancy the sun looked kindly on him as he strode cheerily downthe black mountain side, and his step was none the less free nor lightthat he carried with him neither the brilliant prospects nor the crimeof his late comrades. 

CHAPTER III

WHO CLAIMED IT

The fog had already closed in on Monterey, and was now rolling, a white, billowy sea above, that soon shut out the blue breakers below. Onceor twice in descending the mountain Concho had overhung the cliff andlooked down upon the curving horse-shoe of a bay below him, --distant yetmany miles. Earlier in the afternoon he had seen the gilt cross on thewhite-faced Mission flare in the sunlight, but now all was gone. Bythe time he reached the highway of the town it was quite dark, and heplunged into the first fonda at the wayside, and endeavored to forgethis woes and his weariness in aguardiente. But Concho's head ached, andhis back ached, and he was so generally distressed that he bethought himof a medico, --an American doctor, --lately come into the town, who hadonce treated Concho and his mule with apparently the same medicine, andafter the same heroic fashion. Concho reasoned, not illogically, that ifhe were to be physicked at all he ought to get the worth of hismoney. The grotesque extravagance of life, of fruit and vegetables, in California was inconsistent with infinitesimal doses. In Concho'sprevious illness the doctor had given him a dozen 4 grain quininepowders. 

The following day the grateful Mexican walked into the Doctor'soffice--cured. The Doctor was gratified until, on examination, itappeared that to save trouble, and because his memory was poor, Conchohad taken all the powders in one dose. The Doctor shrugged his shouldersand--altered his practice. 

"Well, " said Dr. Guild, as Concho sank down exhaustedly in one of theDoctor's two chairs, "what now? Have you been sleeping again in the tulemarshes, or are you upset with commissary whisky? Come, have it out. "

But Concho declared that the devil was in his stomach, that JudasIscariot had possessed himself of his spine, that imps were in hisforehead, and that his feet had been scourged by Pontius Pilate. 

"That means 'blue mass, '" said the Doctor. And gave it to him, --a bolusas large as a musket ball, and as heavy. 

Concho took it on the spot, and turned to go. 

"I have no money, Senor Medico. "

"Never mind. It's only a dollar, the price of the medicine. "

Concho looked guilty at having gulped down so much cash. Then he saidtimidly:

"I have no money, but I have got here what is fine and jolly. It isyours. " And he handed over the contents of the precious tin can he hadbrought with him. 

The Doctor took it, looked at the shivering volatile mass and said, "Whythis is quicksilver!"

Concho laughed, "Yes, very quick silver, so!" and he snapped his fingersto show its sprightliness. 

The Doctor's face grew earnest; "Where did you get this, Concho?" hefinally asked. 

"It ran from the pot in the mountains beyond. "

The Doctor looked incredulous. Then Concho related the whole story. 

"Could you find that spot again?"

"Madre de Dios, yes, --I have a mule there; may the devil fly away withher!"

"And you say your comrades saw this?"

"Why not?"

"And you say they afterwards left you, --deserted you?"

"They did, ingrates!"

The Doctor arose and shut his office door. "Hark ye, Concho, " he said, "that bit of medicine I gave you just now was worth a dollar, it wasworth a dollar because the material of which it was composed was madefrom the stuff you have in that can, --quicksilver or mercury. It is oneof the most valuable of metals, especially in a gold-mining country. My good fellow, if you know where to find enough of it, your fortune ismade. "

Concho rose to his feet. 

"Tell me, was the rock you built your furnace of red?"

"Si, Senor. "

"And brown?"

"Si, Senor. "

"And crumbled under the heat?"

"As to nothing. "

"And did you see much of this red rock?"

"The mountain mother is in travail with it. "

"Are you sure that your comrades have not taken possession of themountain mother?"

"As how?"

"By claiming its discovery under the mining laws, or by pre-emption?"

"They shall not. "

"But how will you, single-handed, fight the four; for I doubt not yourscientific friend has a hand in it?"

"I will fight. "

"Yes, my Concho, but suppose I take the fight off your hands. Now, here's a proposition: I will get half a dozen Americanos to go in withyou. You will have to get money to work the mine, --you will need funds. You shall share half with them. They will take the risk, raise themoney, and protect you. "

"I see, " said Concho, nodding his head and winking his eyes rapidly. "Bueno!"

"I will return in ten minutes, " said the Doctor, taking his hat. 

He was as good as his word. In ten minutes he returned with six originallocaters, a board of directors, a president, secretary, and a deed ofincorporation of the 'Blue Mass Quicksilver Mining Co. ' This latterwas a delicate compliment to the Doctor, who was popular. The Presidentadded to these necessary articles a revolver. 

"Take it, " he said, handing over the weapon to Concho. "Take it; myhorse is outside; take that, ride like h--l and hang on to the claimuntil we come!"

In another moment Concho was in the saddle. Then the mining directorlapsed into the physician. 

"I hardly know, " said Dr. Guild, doubtfully, "if in your presentcondition you ought to travel. You have just taken a powerful medicine, "and the Doctor looked hypocritically concerned. 

"Ah, --the devil!" laughed Concho, "what is the quicksilver that is INto that which is OUT? Hoopa, la Mula!" and, with a clatter of hoofs andjingle of spurs, was presently lost in the darkness. 

"You were none too soon, gentlemen, " said the American Alcalde, ashe drew up before the Doctor's door. "Another company has just beenincorporated for the same location, I reckon. "

"Who are they?"

"Three Mexicans, --Pedro, Manuel, and Miguel, headed by that d----dcock-eyed Sydney Duck, Wiles. "

"Are they here?"

"Manuel and Miguel, only. The others are over at Tres Pinos lally-gagingRoscommon and trying to rope him in to pay off their whisky bills at hisgrocery. "

"If that's so we needn't start before sunrise, for they're sure to getroaring drunk. "

And this legitimate successor of the grave Mexican Alcaldes, having thusdelivered his impartial opinion, rode away. 

Meanwhile, Concho the redoubtable, Concho the fortunate, spared neitherriata nor spur. The way was dark, the trail obscure and at timeseven dangerous, and Concho, familiar as he was with these mountainfastnesses, often regretted his sure-footed Francisquita. "Care not, O Concho, " he would say to himself, "'tis but a little while, only alittle while, and thou shalt have another Francisquita to bless thee. Eh, skipjack, there was a fine music to thy dancing. A dollar for anounce, --'tis as good as silver, and merrier. " Yet for all his goodspirits he kept a sharp lookout at certain bends of the mountain trail;not for assassins or brigands, for Concho was physically courageous, butfor the Evil One, who, in various forms, was said to lurk in the SantaCruz Range, to the great discomfort of all true Catholics. He recalledthe incident of Ignacio, a muleteer of the Franciscan Friars, who, stopping at the Angelus to repeat the Credo, saw Luzbel plainly in thelikeness of a monstrous grizzly bear, mocking him by sitting on hishaunches and lifting his paws, clasped together, as if in prayer. Nevertheless, with one hand grasping his reins and his rosary, and theother clutching his whisky flask and revolver, he fared on so rapidlythat he reached the summit as the earlier streaks of dawn were outliningthe far-off Sierran peaks. Tethering his horse on a strip of tableland, he descended cautiously afoot until he reached the bench, the wall ofred rock and the crumbled and dismantled furnace. It was as he had leftit that morning; there was no trace of recent human visitation. Revolverin hand, Concho examined every cave, gully, and recess, peered behindtrees, penetrated copses of buckeye and manzanita, and listened. Therewas no sound but the faint soughing of the wind over the pines belowhim. For a while he paced backward and forward with a vague sense ofbeing a sentinel, but his mercurial nature soon rebelled against thismonotony, and soon the fatigues of the day began to tell upon him. Recourse to his whisky flask only made him the drowsier, until at lasthe was fain to lie down and roll himself up tightly in his blanket. Thenext moment he was sound asleep. 

His horse neighed twice from the summit, but Concho heard him not. Thenthe brush crackled on the ledge above him, a small fragment of rockrolled near his feet, but he stirred not. And then two black figureswere outlined on the crags beyond. 

"St-t-t!" whispered a voice. "There is one lying beside the furnace. "The speech was Spanish, but the voice was Wiles's. 

The other figure crept cautiously to the edge of the crag and lookedover. "It is Concho, the imbecile, " said Pedro, contemptuously. 

"But if he should not be alone, or if he should waken?"

"I will watch and wait. Go you and affix the notification. "

Wiles disappeared. Pedro began to creep down the face of the rockyledge, supporting himself by chemisal and brush-wood. 

The next moment Pedro stood beside the unconscious man. Then he lookedcautiously around. The figure of his companion was lost in the shadowof the rocks above; only a slight crackle of brush betrayed hiswhereabouts. Suddenly Pedro flung his serape over the sleeper's head, and then threw his powerful frame and tremendous weight fullupon Concho's upturned face, while his strong arms clasped theblanket-pinioned limbs of his victim. There was a momentary upheaval, a spasm, and a struggle; but the tightly-rolled blanket clung to theunfortunate man like cerements. 

There was no noise, no outcry, no sound of struggle. There was nothingto be seen but the peaceful, prostrate figures of the two men darklyoutlined on the ledge. They might have been sleeping in each other'sarms. In the black silence the stealthy tread of Wiles in the brushabove was distinctly audible. 

Gradually the struggles grew fainter. Then a whisper from the crags:

"I can't see you. What are you doing?"

"Watching!"

"Sleeps he?"

"He sleeps!"

"Soundly?"

"Soundly. "

"After the manner of the dead?"

"After the fashion of the dead!"

The last tremor had ceased. Pedro rose as Wiles descended. 

"All is ready, " said Wiles; "you are a witness of my placing thenotifications?"

"I am a witness. "

"But of this one?" pointing to Concho. "Shall we leave him here?"

"A drunken imbecile, --why not?"

Wiles turned his left eye on the speaker. They chanced to be standingnearly in the same attitude they had stood the preceding night. Pedrouttered a cry and an imprecation, "Carramba! Take your devil's eye fromme! What see you? Eh, --what?"

"Nothing, good Pedro, " said Wiles, turning his bland right cheek toPedro. The infuriated and half-frightened ex-vaquero returned the longknife he had half-drawn from its sheath, and growled surlily: "Go onthen! But keep thou on that side, and I will on this. " And so, side byside, listening, watching, distrustful of all things, but mainly of eachother, they stole back and up into those shadows from which they mightlike evil spirits have been poetically evoked. 

A half hour passed, in which the east brightened, flashed, and againmelted into gold. And then the sun came up haughtily, and a fog thathad stolen across the summit in the night arose and fled up the mountainside, tearing its white robes in its guilty haste, and leaving themfluttering from tree and crag and scar. A thousand tiny blades, nestlingin the crevices of rocks, nurtured in storms and rocked by the tradewinds, stretched their wan and feeble arms toward Him; but Conchothe strong, Concho the brave, Concho the light-hearted spake not norstirred. 

CHAPTER IV

WHO TOOK IT

There was persistent neighing on the summit. Concho's horse wanted hisbreakfast. 

This protestation reached the ears of a party ascending the mountainfrom its western face. To one of the party it was familiar. 

"Why, blank it all, that's Chiquita. That d----d Mexican's lying drunksomewhere, " said the President of the B. M. Co. 

"I don't like the look of this at all, " said Dr. Guild, as they rode upbeside the indignant animal. "If it had been an American, it might havebeen carelessness, but no Mexican ever forgets his beast. Drive ahead, boys; we may be too late. "

In half an hour they came in sight of the ledge below, the crumbledfurnace, and the motionless figure of Concho, wrapped in a blanket, lying prone in the sunlight. 

"I told you so, --drunk!" said the President. 

The Doctor looked grave, but did not speak. They dismounted and picketedtheir horses. Then crept on all fours to the ledge above the furnace. There was a cry from Secretary Gibbs, "Look yer. Some fellar has beenjumping us, boys. See these notices. "

There were two notices on canvas affixed to the rock, claiming theground, and signed by Pedro, Manuel, Miguel, Wiles, and Roscommon. 

"This was done, Doctor, while your trustworthy Greaser locater, --d--nhim, --lay there drunk. What's to be done now?"

But the Doctor was making his way to the unfortunate cause of theirdefeat, lying there quite mute to their reproaches. The others followedhim. 

The Doctor knelt beside Concho, unrolled him, placed his hand upon hiswrist, his ear over his heart, and then said:

"Dead. "

"Of course. He got medicine of you last night. This comes of your d----dheroic practice. "

But the Doctor was too much occupied to heed the speaker's raillery. Hehad peered into Concho's protuberant eye, opened his mouth, and gazed atthe swollen tongue, and then suddenly rose to his feet. 

"Tear down those notices, boys, but keep them. Put up your own. Don'tbe alarmed, you will not be interfered with, for here is murder added torobbery. "

"Murder?"

"Yes, " said the Doctor, excitedly, "I'll take my oath on any inquestthat this man was strangled to death. He was surprised while asleep. Look here. " He pointed to the revolver still in Concho's stiffeninghand, which the murdered man had instantly cocked, but could not use inthe struggle. 

"That's so, " said the President, "no man goes to sleep with a cockedrevolver. What's to be done?"

"Everything, " said the Doctor. "This deed was committed within the lasttwo hours; the body is still warm. The murderer did not come our way, or we should have met him on the trail. He is, if anywhere, between hereand Tres Pinos. "

"Gentlemen, " said the President, with a slight preparatory and halfjudicial cough, "two of you will stay here and stick! The others willfollow me to Tres Pinos. The law has been outraged. You understand theCourt!"

By some odd influence the little group of half-cynical, half-trifling, and wholly reckless men had become suddenly sober, earnest citizens. They said, "Go on, " nodded their heads, and betook themselves to theirhorses. 

"Had we not better wait for the inquest and swear out a warrant?" saidthe Secretary, cautiously. 

"How many men have we?"

"Five!"

"Then, " said the President, summing up the Revised Statutes of the Stateof California in one strong sentence; "then we don't want no d----dwarrant. "

CHAPTER V

WHO HAD A LIEN ON IT

It was high noon at Tres Pinos. The three pines from which it gained itsname, in the dusty road and hot air, seemed to smoke from their balsamicspires. There was a glare from the road, a glare from the sky, a glarefrom the rocks, a glare from the white canvas roofs of the few shantiesand cabins which made up the village. There was even a glare from theunpainted red-wood boards of Roscommon's grocery and tavern, and atendency of the warping floor of the veranda to curl up beneath thefeet of the intruder. A few mules, near the watering trough, had shrunkwithin the scant shadow of the corral. 

The grocery business of Mr. Roscommon, although adequate and sufficientfor the village, was not exhausting nor overtaxing to the proprietor;the refilling of the pork and flour barrel of the average miner was thework of a brief hour on Saturday nights, but the daily replenishment ofthe average miner with whisky was arduous and incessant. Roscommon spentmore time behind his bar than his grocer's counter. Add to this the factthat a long shed-like extension or wing bore the legend, "CosmopolitanHotel, Board or Lodging by the Day or Week. M. Roscommon, " and yougot an idea of the variety of the proprietor's functions. The "hotel, "however, was more directly under the charge of Mrs. Roscommon, a lady ofthirty years, strong, truculent, and good-hearted. 

Mr. Roscommon had early adopted the theory that most of his customerswere insane, and were to be alternately bullied or placated, as the casemight be. Nothing that occurred, no extravagance of speech nor act, ever ruffled his equilibrium, which was as dogged and stubborn as it wasoutwardly calm. When not serving liquor, or in the interval while it wasbeing drank, he was always wiping his counter with an exceedingly dirtytowel, --or indeed anything that came handy. Miners, noticing thispurely perfunctory habit, occasionally supplied him slily with articlesinconsistent with their service, --fragments of their shirts andunderclothing, flour sacking, tow, and once with a flannel petticoatof his wife's, stolen from the line in the back-yard. Roscommon wouldcontinue his wiping without looking up, but yet conscious of thepresence of each customer. "And it's not another dhrop ye'll git, JackBrown, until ye've wiped out the black score that stands agin ye. ""And it's there ye are, darlint, and it's here's the bottle that's beenlukin' for ye sins Saturday. " "And fwhot hev you done with the lastI sent ye, ye divil of a McCorkle, and here's me back that's brukentoirely wid dipping intil the pork barl to giv ye the best sides, andye spending yur last cint on a tare into Gilroy. Whist! and if it'sfer foighting ye are, boys, there's an illigant bit of sod beyant thecorral, and it may be meself'll come out with a shtick and be sociable. "

On this particular day, however, Mr. Roscommon was not in his usualspirits, and when the clatter of horses' hoofs before the door announcedthe approach of strangers, he absolutely ceased wiping his counter andlooked up as Dr. Guild, the President, and Secretary of the new Companystrode into the shop. 

"We are looking, " said the President, "for a man by the name of Wiles, and three Mexicans known as Pedro, Manuel, and Miguel. "

"Ye are?"

"We are!"

"Faix, and I hope ye'll foind 'em. And if ye'll git from 'em the scoreI've got agin 'em, darlint, I'll add a blessing to it. "

There was a laugh at this from the bystanders, who, somehow, resentedthe intrusion of these strangers. 

"I fear you will find it no laughing matter, gentlemen, " said Dr. Guild, a little stiffly, "when I tell you that a murder has been committed, andthe men I am seeking within an hour of that murder put up that noticesigned by their names, " and Dr. Guild displayed the paper. 

There was a breathless silence among the crowd as they eagerly pressedaround the Doctor. Only Roscommon kept on wiping his counter. 

"You will observe, gentlemen, that the name of Roscommon also appears onthis paper as one of the original beaters. "

"And sure, darlint, " said Roscommon, without looking up, "if ye've nobetter ividince agin them boys then you have forninst me, it's home ye'dbether be riding to wanst. For it's meself as hasn't sturred fut out ofthe store the day and noight, --more betoken as the boys I've sarved kintestify. "

"That's so, Ross, right, " chorused the crowd, "We've been running theold man all night. "

"Then how comes your name on this paper?"

"O murdher! will ye listen to him, boys? As if every felly that owedme a whisky bill didn't come to me and say, 'Ah, Misther Roscommon, ' or'Moike, ' as the case moight be, sure it's an illigant sthrike I've madethis day, and it's meself that has put down your name as an originallocater, and yer fortune's made, Mr. Roscommon, and will yer fill meup another quart for the good luck betune you and me. Ah, but ask JackBrown over yar if it isn't sick that I am of his original locations. "

The laugh that followed this speech, and its practical application, convinced the party that they had blundered, that they could obtain noclue to the real culprits here, and that any attempt by threats wouldmeet violent opposition. Nevertheless the Doctor was persistent:

"When did you see these men last?"

"When did I see them, is it? Bedad, what with sarvin up the liquor andkeeping me counters dry and swate, I never see them at all. "

"That's so, Ross, " chorused the crowd again, to whom the wholeproceeding was delightfully farcical. 

"Then I can tell you, gentlemen, " said the Doctor, stiffly, "that theywere in Monterey last night, that they did not return on that trail thismorning, and that they must have passed here at daybreak. "

With these words, which the Doctor regretted as soon as delivered, theparty rode away. 

Mr. Roscommon resumed his service and counter wiping. But late thatnight, when the bar was closed and the last loiterer was summarilyejected, Mr. Roscommon, in the conjugal privacy of his chamber, produceda legal-looking paper. "Read it, Maggie, darlint, for it's meself neverhad the larning nor the parts. "

Mistress Roscommon took the paper:

"Shure, it's law papers, making over some property to yis. O Moike! yehavn't been spekilating!"

"Whist! and fwhotz that durty gray paper wid the sales and flourishes?"

"Faix, it bothers me intoirely. Shure it oin't in English. "

"Whist! Maggie, it's a Spanish grant!"

"A Spanish grant? O Moike, and what did ye giv for it?"

Mr. Roscommon laid his finger beside his nose and said softly, "Whishky!"

PART II. --IN THE COURTS

CHAPTER VI

HOW A GRANT WAS GOT FOR IT

While the Blue Mass Company, with more zeal than discretion, wereactively pursuing Pedro and Wiles over the road to Tres Pinos, SenorsMiguel and Manuel were comfortably seated in a fonda at Monterey, smoking cigarritos and discussing their late discovery. But they werein no better mood than their late companions, and it appeared from theirconversation that in an evil moment they had sold out their interestin the alleged silver mine to Wiles and Pedro for a few hundreddollars, --succumbing to what they were assured would be an activeopposition on the part of the Americanos. The astute reader will easilyunderstand that the accomplished Mr. Wiles did not inform them of itsvalue as a quicksilver mine, although he was obliged to impart hissecret to Pedro as a necessary accomplice and reckless coadjutor. ThatPedro felt no qualms of conscience in thus betraying his two comradesmay be inferred from his recent direct and sincere treatment of Concho, and that he would, if occasion offered or policy made it expedient, ascalmly obliterate Mr. Wiles, that gentleman himself never for a momentdoubted. 

"If we had waited but a little he would have given more, --thiscock-eye!" regretted Manuel querulously. 

"Not a peso, " said Miguel, firmly. 

"And why, my Miguel? Thou knowest we could have worked the mineourselves. "

"Good, and lost even that labor. Look you, little brother. Show to menow the Mexican that has ever made a real of a mine in California. Howmany, eh? None! Not a one. Who owns the Mexican's mine, eh? Americanos!Who takes the money from the Mexican's mine? Americanos! Thourememberest Briones, who spent a gold mine to make a silver one? Whohas the lands and house of Briones? Americanos! Who has the cattle ofBriones? Americanos! Who has the mine of Briones? Americanos! Who hasthe silver Briones never found? Americanos! Always the same! Forever!Ah! carramba!"

Then the Evil One evidently took it into his head and horns to worry andtoss these men--comparatively innocent as they were--still further, fora purpose. For presently to them appeared one Victor Garcia, whilom aclerk of the Ayuntamiento, who rallied them over aguardiente, and toldthem the story of the quicksilver discovery, and the two mining claimstaken out that night by Concho and Wiles. Whereat Manuel exploded withprofanity and burnt blue with sulphurous malediction; but Miguel, therecent ecclesiastic, sat livid and thoughtful. 

Finally came a pause in Manuel's bombardment, and something like thisconversation took place between the cooler actors:

Miguel (thoughtfully). "When was it thou didst petition for lands in thevalley, friend Victor?"

Victor (amazedly). "Never! It is a sterile waste. Am I a fool?"

Miguel (softly). "Thou didst. Of thy Governor, Micheltorena. I have seenthe application. "

Victor (beginning to appreciate a rodential odor). "Si! I had forgotten. Art thou sure it was in the valley?"

Miguel (persuasively). "In the valley and up the falda. "*

 * Falda, or valda, i. E. , that part of the skirt of a woman's robe that breaks upon the ground, and is also applied to the final slope of a hill, from the angle that it makes upon the level plain. 

Victor (with decision). "Certainly. Of a verity, --the falda likewise. "

Miguel (eying Victor). "And yet thou hadst not the grant. Painful isit that it should have been burned with the destruction of the otherarchives, by the Americanos at Monterey. "

Victor (cautiously feeling his way). "Possiblemente. "

Miguel. "It might be wise to look into it. "

Victor (bluntly). "As why?"

Miguel. "For our good and thine, friend Victor. We bring thee adiscovery; thou bringest us thy skill, thy experience, thy governmentknowledge, --thy Custom House paper. "*

 * Grants, applications, and official notifications, under the Spanish Government, were drawn on a stamped paper known as custom House paper. 

Manuel (breaking in drunkenly). "But for what? We are Mexicans. Are wenot fated? We shall lose. Who shall keep the Americanos off?"

Miguel. "We shall take ONE American in! Ha! seest thou? This Americancomrade shall bribe his courts, his corregidores. After a little heshall supply the men who invent the machine of steam, the mill, thefurnace, eh?"

Victor. "But who is he, --not to steal?"

Miguel. "He is that man of Ireland, a good Catholic, at Tres Pinos. "

Victor and Manuel (omnes). "Roscommon?"

Miguel. "Of the same. We shall give him a share for the provisions, forthe tools, for the aguardiente. It is of the Irish that the Americanoshave great fear. It is of them that the votes are made, --that thePresident is chosen. It is of him that they make the Alcalde in SanFrancisco. And we are of the Church like him. "

They said "Bueno" altogether, and for the moment appeared to be upheldby a religious enthusiasm, --a joint confession of faith that meantdeath, destruction, and possibly forgery, as against the men who thoughtotherwise. 

This spiritual harmony did away with all practical consideration anddoubt. "I have a little niece, " said Victor, "whose work with the penis marvellous. If one says to her, 'Carmen, copy me this, or the otherone, '--even if it be copper-plate, --look you it is done, and you cannotknow of which is the original. Madre de Dios! the other day she makes mea rubric* of the Governor, Pio Pico, the same, identical. Thou knowesther, Miguel. She asked concerning thee yesterday. "

 * The Spanish "rubric" is the complicated flourish attached to a signature, and is as individual and characteristic as the handwriting. 

With the embarrassment of an underbred man, Miguel tried to appearunconcerned, but failed dismally. Indeed, I fear that the black eyes ofCarmen had already done their perfect and accepted work, and had partlyinduced the application for Victor's aid. He, however, dissembled so faras to ask:

"But will she not know?"

"She is a child. "

"But will she not talk?"

"Not if I say nay, and if thou--eh, Miguel?"

This bit of flattery (which, by the way, was a lie, for Victor's niecedid not incline favorably to Miguel), had its effect. They shook handsover the table. "But, " said Miguel, "what is to be done must be donenow. " "At the moment, " said Victor, "and thou shalt see it done. Eh?Does it content thee? then come!"

Miguel nodded to Manuel. "We will return in an hour; wait thou here. "

They filed out into the dark, irregular street. Fate led them to passthe office of Dr. Guild at the moment that Concho mounted his horse. The shadows concealed them from their rival, but they overheard the lastinjunctions of the President to the unlucky Concho. 

"Thou hearest?" said Miguel, clutching his companion's arm. 

"Yes, " said Victor. "But let him ride, my friend; in one hour we shallhave that that shall arrive YEARS before him, " and with a complacentchuckle they passed unseen and unheard until, abruptly turning a corner, they stopped before a low adobe house. 

It had once been a somewhat pretentious dwelling, but had evidentlyfollowed the fortunes of its late owner, Don Juan Briones, who hadoffered it as a last sop to the three-headed Cerberus that guarded theEl Refugio Plutonean treasures, and who had swallowed it in a singlegulp. It was in very bad case. The furrows of its red-tiled roof lookedas if they were the results of age and decrepitude. Its best room had amusty smell; there was the dampness of deliquescence in its slow decay, but the Spanish Californians were sensible architects, and its massivewalls and partitions defied the earthquake thrill, and all the yearround kept an even temperature within. 

Victor led Miguel through a low anteroom into a plainly-furnishedchamber, where Carmen sat painting. 

Now Mistress Carmen was a bit of a painter, in a pretty little way, withall the vague longings of an artist, but without, I fear, the artist'ssteadfast soul. She recognized beauty and form as a child might, withoutunderstanding their meaning, and somehow failed to make them eveninterpret her woman's moods, which surely were nature's too. So shepainted everything with this innocent lust of the eye, --flowers, birds, insects, landscapes, and figures, --with a joyous fidelity, but noparticular poetry. The bird never sang to her but one song, the flowersor trees spake but one language, and her skies never brightened exceptin color. She came out strong on the Catholic saints, and would tossyou up a cleanly-shaven Aloysius, sweetly destitute of expression, ora dropsical, lethargic Madonna that you couldn't have told from an oldmaster, so bad it was. Her faculty of faithful reproduction even showeditself in fanciful lettering, --and latterly in the imitation of fabricsand signatures. Indeed, with her eye for beauty of form, she had alwaysexcelled in penmanship at the Convent, --an accomplishment which the goodsisters held in great repute. 

In person she was petite, with a still unformed girlish figure, perhapsa little too flat across the back, and with possibly a too greattendency to a boyish stride in walking. Her brow, covered by blue-blackhair, was low and frank and honest; her eyes, a very dark hazel, werenot particularly large, but rather heavily freighted in their melancholylids with sleeping passion; her nose was of that unimportant characterwhich no man remembers; her mouth was small and straight; her teeth, white and regular. The whole expression of her face was piquancy thatmight be subdued by tenderness or made malevolent by anger. At presentit was a salad in which the oil and vinegar were deftly combined. The astute feminine reader will of course understand that this is theordinary superficial masculine criticism, and at once make up her mindboth as to the character of the young lady and the competency of thecritic. I only know that I rather liked her. And her functions aresomewhat important in this veracious history. 

She looked up, started to her feet, leveled her black brows at theintruder, but, at a sign from her uncle, showed her white teeth andspake. 

It was only a sentence, and a rather common-place one at that; but ifshe could have put her voice upon her canvas, she might have retrievedthe Garcia fortunes. For it was so musical, so tender, so sympathizing, so melodious, so replete with the graciousness of womanhood, that sheseemed to have invented the language. And yet that sentence was onlyan exaggerated form of the 'How d'ye do, ' whined out, doled out, lispedout, or shot out from the pretty mouths of my fair countrywomen. 

Miguel admired the paintings. He was struck particularly with a crayondrawing of a mule. "Mother of God, it is the mule itself! observe how itwill not go. " Then the crafty Victor broke in with, "But it is nothingto her writing; look, you shall tell to me which is the handwritingof Pio Pico;" and, from a drawer in the secretary, he drew forth twosignatures. One was affixed to a yellowish paper, the other drawn onplain white foolscap. Of course Miguel took the more modern onewith lover-like gallantry. "It is this is genuine!" Victor laughedtriumphantly; Carmen echoed the laugh melodiously in child-like glee, and added, with a slight toss of her piquant head, "It is mine!" Thebest of the sex will not refuse a just and overdue compliment fromeven the man they dislike. It's the principle they're after, not thesentiment. 

But Victor was not satisfied with this proof of his niece's skill. "Sayto her, " he demanded of Miguel, "what name thou likest, and it shall bedone before thee here. " Miguel was not so much in love but he perceivedthe drift of Victor's suggestion, and remarked that the rubric ofGovernor Micheltorena was exceedingly complicated and difficult. "Sheshall do it!" responded Victor, with decision. 

From a file of old departmental papers the Governor's signature and thatinvolved rubric, which must have cost his late Excellency many youthfuldays of anxiety, was produced and laid before Carmen. 

Carmen took her pen in her hand, looked at the brownish-lookingdocument, and then at the virgin whiteness of the foolscap before her. "But, " she said, pouting prettily, "I should have to first paint thiswhite paper brown. And it will absorb the ink more quickly than that. When I painted the San Antonio of the Mission San Gabriel for FatherAcolti, I had to put the decay in with my oils and brushes before thegood Padre would accept it. "

The two scamps looked at each other. It was their supreme moment. "Ithink I have, " said Victor, with assumed carelessness, "I think I havesome of the old Custom-House paper. " He produced from the secretary asheet of brown paper with a stamp. "Try it on that. "

Carmen smiled with childish delight, tried it, and produced a marvel!"It is as magic, " said Miguel, feigning to cross himself. 

Victor's role was more serious. He affected to be deeply touched, tookthe paper, folded it, and placed it in his breast. "I shall make a goodfool of Don Jose Castro, " he said; "he will declare it is the Governor'sown signature, for he was his friend; but have a care, Carmen! that youspoil it not by the opening of your red lips. When he is fooled, Iwill tell him of this marvel, --this niece of mine, and he shall buy herpictures. Eh, little one?" and he gave her the avuncular caress, i. E. , a pat of the hand on either cheek, and a kiss. Miguel envied him, butcupidity outgeneraled Cupid, and presently the conversation flagged, until a convenient recollection of Victor's--that himself andcomrade were due at the Posada del Toros at 10 o'clock--gave them theopportunity to retire. But not without a chance shot from Carmen. "Tellto me, " she said, half to Victor and half to Miguel, "what has chancedwith Concho? He was ever ready to bring to me flowers from the mountain, and insects and birds. Thou knowest how he would sit, oh, my uncle, andtalk to me of the rare rocks he had seen, and the bears and the evilspirits, and now he comes no longer, my Concho! How is this?Nothing evil has befallen him, surely?" and her drooping lids closedhalf-pathetically. 

Miguel's jealousy took fire. "He is drunk, Senorita, doubtless, andhas forgotten not only thee but, mayhap, his mule and pack! It is hiscustom, ha! ha!"

The red died out of Carmen's ripe lips, and she shut them together witha snap like a steel purse. The dove had suddenly changed to a hawk; thechild-girl into an antique virago; the spirit hitherto dimly outlinedin her face, of some shrewish Garcia ancestress, came to the fore. Shedarted a quick look at her uncle, and then, with her little hands on herrigid lips, strode with two steps up to Miguel. 

"Possibly, O Senor Miguel Dominguez Perez (a profound courtesy here), itis as thou sayest. Drunkard Concho may be; but, drunk or sober, he neverturned his back on his friend--or--(the words grated a little here)--hisenemy. "

Miguel would have replied, but Victor was ready. "Fool, " he said, pinching his arm, "'tis an old friend. And--and--the application isstill to be filled up. Are you crazy?"

But on this point Miguel was not, and with the revenge of a rival addedto his other instincts, he permitted Victor to lead him away. 

On their return to the fonda, they found Master Manuel too far gone withaguardiente, and a general animosity to the average Americano, to beof any service. So they worked alone, with pen, ink, and paper, in thestuffy, cigarrito-clouded back room of the fonda. It was midnight, twohours after Concho had started, that Miguel clapped spurs to hishorse for the village of Tres Pinos, with an application to GovernorMicheltorena for a grant to the "Rancho of the Red Rocks" comfortablybestowed in his pocket. 

CHAPTER VII

WHO PLEAD FOR IT

There can be little doubt the coroner's jury of Fresno would havereturned a verdict of "death from alcoholism, " as the result of theirinquest into the cause of Concho's death, had not Dr. Guild fought noblyin support of the law and his own convictions. A majority of the juryobjected to there being any inquest at all. A sincere juryman thoughtit hard that whenever a Greaser pegged out in a sneakin' kind o' way, American citizens should be taken from their business to find out whatailed him. "S'pose he was killed, " said another, "thar ain't no timethis thirty year he weren't, so to speak, just sufferin' for it, ez hisnat'ral right ez a Mexican. " The jury at last compromised by bringingin a verdict of homicide against certain parties unknown. Yet it wasunderstood tacitly that these unknown parties were severally Wiles andPedro; Manuel, Miguel, and Roscommon proving an unmistakable alibi. Wiles and Pedro had fled to lower California, and Manuel, Miguel, andRoscommon deemed it advisable, in the then excited state of the publicmind, to withhold the forged application and claim from the courts andthe public comment. So that for a year after the murder of Concho andthe flight of his assassins "The Blue Mass Mining Company" remainedin undisturbed and actual possession of the mine, and reigned in theirstead. 

But the spirit of the murdered Concho would not down any more thanthat of the murdered Banquo, and so wrought, no doubt, in a quiet, Concho-like way, sore trouble with the "Blue Mass Company. " For a greatCapitalist and Master of Avarice came down to the mine and found itfair, and taking one of the Company aside, offered to lend his name anda certain amount of coin for a controlling interest, accompanying thegenerous offer with a suggestion that if it were not acceded to he wouldbe compelled to buy up various Mexican mines and flood the market withquicksilver to the great detriment of the "Blue Mass Company, " whichthoughtful suggestion, offered by a man frequently alluded to as one of"California's great mining princes, " and as one who had "done much todevelop the resources of the State, " was not to be lightly considered;and so, after a cautious non-consultation with the Company, and acommendable secrecy, the stockholder sold out. Whereat it was speedilyspread abroad that the great Capitalist had taken hold of "Blue Mass, "and the stock went up, and the other stockholders rejoiced--until thegreat Capitalist found that it was necessary to put up expensive mills, to employ a high salaried Superintendent, in fact, to develop the mineby the spending of its earnings, so that the stock quoted at 112 wasfinally saddled with an assessment of $50 per share. Another assessmentof $50 to enable the Superintendent to proceed to Russia and Spain andexamine into the workings of the quicksilver mines there, and also ageneral commission to the gifted and scientific Pillageman to examineinto the various component parts of quicksilver, and report if it couldnot be manufactured from ordinary sand-stone by steam or electricity, speedily brought the other stockholders to their senses. It was atthis time the good fellow "Tom, " the serious-minded "Dick, " and thespeculative but fortunate "Harry, " brokers of the Great Capitalist, found it convenient to buy up, for the Great Capitalist aforesaid, thevarious other shares at great sacrifice. 

I fear that I have bored my readers in thus giving the tiresome detailsof that ingenuous American pastime which my countrymen dismiss in theirepigrammatic way as the "freezing-out process. " And lest any readershould question the ethics of the proceeding, I beg him to remember thatone gentleman accomplished in this art was always a sincere and directopponent of the late Mr. John Oakhurst, gambler. 

But for once the Great Master of Avarice had not taken into sufficientaccount the avarice of others, and was suddenly and virtuously shockedto learn that an application for a patent for certain lands, known asthe "Red-Rock Rancho, " was about to be offered before the UnitedStates Land Commission. This claim covered his mining property. Butthe information came quietly and secretly, as all of the Great Master'sinformation was obtained, and he took the opportunity to sell out hisclouded title and his proprietorship to the only remaining member ofthe original "Blue Mass Company, " a young fellow of pith, beforemany-tongued rumor had voiced the news far and wide. The blow was aheavy one to the party left in possession. Saddled by the enormous debtsand expenses of the Great Capitalist, with a credit now further injuredby the defection of this lucky magnate, who was admired for his skill inanticipating a loss, and whose relinquishment of any project meant ruinto it, the single-handed, impoverished possessor of the mine, whosetitle was contested, and whose reputation was yet to be made, --poorBiggs, first secretary and only remaining officer of the "Blue MassCompany, " looked ruefully over his books and his last transfer, andsighed. But I have before intimated that he was built of good stuff, andthat he believed in his work, --which was well, --and in himself, whichwas better; and so, having faith even as a grain of mustard seed, Idoubt not he would have been able to remove that mountain ofquicksilver beyond the overlapping of fraudulent grants. And, again, Providence--having disposed of these several scamps--raised up to hima friend. But that friend is of sufficient importance to this veracioushistory to deserve a paragraph to himself. 

The Pylades of this Orestes was known of ordinary mortals as RoyalThatcher. His genealogy, birth, and education are, I take it, of littleaccount to this chronicle, which is only concerned with his friendshipfor Biggs and the result thereof. He had known Biggs a year or twopreviously; they had shared each other's purses, bunks, cabins, provisions, and often friends, with that perfect freedom from obligationwhich belonged to the pioneer life. The varying tide of fortune had justthen stranded Thatcher on a desert sand hill in San Francisco, withan uninsured cargo of Expectations, while to Thatcher's active but notcurious fancy it had apparently lifted his friend's bark over the barin the Monterey mountains into an open quicksilver sea. So that he wasconsiderably surprised on receiving a note from Biggs to this purport:

"DEAR ROY--Run down here and help a fellow. I've too much of a load forone. Maybe we can make a team and pull 'Blue Mass' out yet. BIGGSEY. "

Thatcher, sitting in his scantily furnished lodgings, doubtful of hisnext meal and in arrears for rent, heard this Macedonian cry as St. Paul did. He wrote a promissory and soothing note to his landlady, butfearing the "sweet sorrow" of personal parting, let his collapsedvalise down from his window by a cord, and, by means of an economicalcombination of stage riding and pedestrianism, he presented himself, atthe close of the third day, at Biggs's door. In a few moments he was inpossession of the story; half an hour later in possession of half themine, its infelix past and its doubtful future, equally with his friend. 

Business over, Biggs turned to look at his partner. "You've aged somesince I saw you last, " he said. "Starvation luck, I s'pose. I'd knowyour eyes, old fellow, if I saw them among ten thousand; but your lipsare parched, and your mouth's grimmer than it used to be. " Thatchersmiled to show that he could still do so, but did not say, as he mighthave said, that self-control, suppressed resentment, disappointment, andoccasional hunger had done something in the way of correcting Nature'sobvious mistakes, and shutting up a kindly mouth. He only took off histhreadbare coat, rolled up his sleeves, and saying, "We've got lots ofwork and some fighting before us, " pitched into the "affairs" of the"Blue Mass Company" on the instant. 

CHAPTER VIII

OF COUNSEL FOR IT

Meanwhile Roscommon had waited. Then, in Garcia's name, and backedby him, he laid his case before the Land Commissioner, filing theapplication (with forged indorsements) to Governor Micheltorena, andalleging that the original grant was destroyed by fire. And why?

It seemed there was a limit to Miss Carmen's imitative talent. Admirableas it was, it did not reach to the reproduction of that official seal, which would have been a necessary appendage to the Governor's grant. Butthere were letters written on stamped paper by Governor Micheltorenato himself, Garcia, and to Miguel, and to Manuel's father, all ofwhich were duly signed by the sign manual and rubric ofMrs. -Governor-Micheltorena-Carmen-de-Haro. And then there was "parol"evidence, and plenty of it; witnesses who remembered everything aboutit, --namely, Manuel, Miguel, and the all-recollecting De Haro; here weredetails, poetical and suggestive; and Dame-Quicklyish, as when his lateExcellency, sitting not "by a sea-coal fire, " but with aguardiente andcigarros, had sworn to him, the ex-ecclesiastic Miguel, that heshould grant, and had granted, Garcia's request. There were clouds ofwitnesses, conversations, letters, and records, glib and pat to theoccasion. In brief, there was nothing wanted but the seal of hisExcellency. The only copy of that was in the possession of a rivalschool of renaissant art and the restoration of antiques, then doingbusiness before the Land Commission. 

And yet the claim was rejected! Having lately recommended two separateclaimants to a patent for the same land, the Land Commission becamecautious and conservative. 

Roscommon was at first astounded, then indignant, and then warlike, --hewas for an "appale to onst!"

With the reader's previous knowledge of Roscommon's disposition thismay seem somewhat inconsistent; but there are certain natures to whomlitigation has all the excitement of gambling, and it should be bornein mind that this was his first lawsuit. So that his lawyer, Mr. Saponaceous Wood, found him in that belligerent mood to which counselare obliged to hypocritically bring all the sophistries of theirprofession. 

"Of course you have your right to an appeal, but calm yourself, mydear sir, and consider. The case was presented strongly, the evidenceoverwhelming on our side, but we happened to be fighting previousdecisions of the Land Commission that had brought them into trouble; sothat if Micheltorena had himself appeared in Court and testified tohis giving you the grant, it would have made no difference, --no Spanishgrant had a show then, nor will it have for the next six months. Yousee, my dear sir, the Government sent out one of its big Washingtonlawyers to look into this business, and he reported frauds, sir, frauds, in a majority of the Spanish claims. And why, sir? why? He was bought, sir, bought--body and soul--by the Ring!"

"And fwhot's the Ring?" asked his client sharply. 

"The Ring is--ahem! a combination of unprincipled but wealthy persons todefeat the ends of justice. "

"And sure, fwhot's the Ring to do wid me grant as that thaving Mexicangave me as the collatherals for the bourd he was owin' me? Eh, mind thatnow!"

"The Ring, my dear sir, is the other side. It is--ahem! always the OtherSide. "

"And why the divel haven't we a Ring too? And ain't I payin' ye fivehundred dollars, --and the divel of Ring ye have, at all, at all? Fwhotam I payin' ye fur, eh?"

"That a judicious expenditure of money, " began Mr. Wood, "outside ofactual disbursements, may not be of infinite service to you I am notprepared to deny, --but--"

"Look ye, Mr. Sappy Wood, it's the 'appale' I want, and the grant I'llhave, more betoken as the old woman's har-rut and me own is set on itentoirely. Get me the land and I'll give ye the half of it, --and it's abargain!"

"But my dear sir, there are some rules in our profession, --technicalthough they may be--"

"The divel fly away wid yer profession. Sure is it better nor me own?If I've risked me provisions and me whisky, that cost me solid goold inFrisco, on that thafe Garcia's claim, bedad! the loikes of ye can riskyer law. "

"Well, " said Wood, with an awkward smile, "I suppose that a deed for onehalf, on the consideration of friendship, my dear sir, and a dollar inhand paid by me, might be reconcilable. "

"Now it's talkin' ye are. But who's the felly we're foighten, that's gotthe Ring?"

"Ah, my dear sir, it's the United States, " said the lawyer with gravity. 

"The States! the Government is it? And is't that ye're afeared of?Sure it's the Government that I fought in me own counthree, it was theGovernment that druv me to Ameriky, and is it now that I'm going back onme principles?"

"Your political sentiments do you great credit, " began Mr. Wood. 

"But fwhot's the Government to do wid the appale?"

"The Government, " said Mr. Wood significantly, "will be represented bythe District Attorney. "

"And who's the spalpeen?"

"It is rumored, " said Mr. Wood, slowly, "that a new one is to beappointed. I, myself, have had some ambition that way. "

His client bent a pair of cunning but not over-wise grey eyes on hisAmerican lawyer. But he only said, "Ye have, eh?"

"Yes, " said Wood, answering the look boldly; "and if I had the supportof a number of your prominent countrymen, who are so powerful with ALLparties, --men like YOU, my dear sir, --why, I think you might in timebecome a conservative, at least more resigned to the Government. "

Then the lesser and the greater scamp looked at each other, and for amoment or two felt a warm, sympathetic, friendly emotion for each other, and quietly shook hands. 

Depend upon it there is a great deal more kindly human sympathy betweentwo openly-confessed scamps than there is in that calm, respectablerecognition that you and I, dear reader, exhibit when we happen tooppose each other with our respective virtues. 

"And ye'll get the appale?"

"I will. "

And he DID! And by a singular coincidence got the District Attorneyshipalso. And with a deed for one half of the "Red-Rock Rancho" in hispocket, sent a brother lawyer in court to appear for his client, theUnited States, as against HIMSELF, Roscommon, Garcia, et al. Wildhorses could not have torn him from this noble resolution. There is anindescribable delicacy in the legal profession which we literary folkought to imitate. 

The United States lost! Which meant ruin and destruction to the "BlueMass Company, " who had bought from a paternal and beneficent Governmentlands which didn't belong to it. The Mexican grant, of course, antedatedthe occupation of the mine by Concho, Wiles, Pedro, et al. , as wellas by the "Blue Mass Company, " and the solitary partners, Biggs andThatcher. More than that, it swallowed up their improvements. It madeBiggs and Thatcher responsible to Garcia for all the money the GrandMaster of Avarice had made out of it. Mr. District Attorney wasapparently distressed, but resigned. Messrs. Biggs and Thatcher werereally distressed and combative. 

And then, to advance a few years in this chronicle, began reallitigation with earnestness, vigor, courage, zeal, and belief on thepart of Biggs and Thatcher, and technicalities, delay, equivocation, anda general Fabian-like policy on the part of Garcia, Roscommon, et al. Of all these tedious processes I note but one, which for originality andaudacity of conception appears to me to indicate more clearly the temperand civilization of the epoch. A subordinate officer of the DistrictCourt refused to obey the mandate ordering a transcript of the recordto be sent up to the United States Supreme Court. It is to be regrettedthat the name of this Ephesian youth, who thus fired the dome of ourconstitutional liberties, should have been otherwise so unimportant asto be confined to the dusty records of that doubtful court of which hewas a doubtful servitor, and that his claim to immortality ceased withhis double-feed service. But there still stands on record a letter bythis young gentleman, arraigning the legal wisdom of the land, whichis not entirely devoid of amusement or even instruction to young mendesirous of obtaining publicity and capital. Howbeit, the SupremeCourt was obliged to protect itself by procuring the legislation ofhis functions out of his local fingers into the larger palm of its ownattorney. 

These various processes of law and equity, which, when exercisedpractically in the affairs of ordinary business, might have occupied afew months' time, dragged, clung, retrograded, or advanced slowlyduring a period of eight or nine years. But the strong arms of Biggs andThatcher held POSSESSION, and possibly, by the same tactics employedon the other side, arrested or delayed ejectment, and so made and soldquicksilver, while their opponents were spending gold, until Biggs, sorely hit in the interlacings of his armor, fell in the lists, hischeek growing waxen and his strong arm feeble, and finding himself inthis sore condition, and passing, as it were, made over his share intrust to his comrade, and died. Whereat, from that time henceforward, Royal Thatcher reigned in his stead. 

And so, having anticipated the legal record, we will go back to thevarious human interests that helped to make it up. 

To begin with Roscommon: To do justice to his later conduct andexpressions, it must be remembered that when he accepted the claim forthe "Red-Rock Rancho, " yet unquestioned, from the hands of Garcia, hewas careless, or at least unsuspicious of fraud. It was not until he hadexperienced the intoxication of litigation that he felt, somehow, thathe was a wronged and defrauded man, but with the obstinacy of defraudedmen, preferred to arraign some one fact or individual as the impellingcause of his wrong, rather than the various circumstances that led toit. To his simple mind it was made patent that the "Blue Mass Company"were making money out of a mine which he claimed, and which was not yetadjudged to them. Every dollar they took out was a fresh count inthis general indictment. Every delay towards this adjustment ofrights--although made by his own lawyer--was a personal wrong. The merefact that there never was nor had been any quid pro quo for this immenseproperty--that it had fallen to him for a mere song--only added zestto his struggle. The possibility of his losing this mere speculationaffected him more strongly than if he had already paid down the millionhe expected to get from the mine. I don't know that I have indicated asplainly as I might that universal preference on the part of mankind toget something from nothing, and to acquire the largest return forthe least possible expenditure, but I question my right to say thatRoscommon was much more reprehensible than his fellows. 

But it told upon him as it did upon all over whom the spirit of themurdered Concho brooded, --upon all whom avarice alternately flatteredand tortured. From his quiet gains in his legitimate business, from thelittle capital accumulated through industry and economy, he lavishedthousands on this chimera of his fancy. He grew grizzled and worn overhis self-imposed delusion; he no longer jested with his customers, regardless of quality or station or importance; he had cliques tomollify, enemies to placate, friends to reward. The grocery suffered;through giving food and lodgment to clouds of unimpeachable witnessesbefore the Land Commission and the District Court, "Mrs. Ros. " foundherself losing money. Even the bar failed; there was a party of"Blue Mass" employees who drank at the opposite fonda, and cursed theRoscommon claim over the liquor. The calm, mechanical indifference withwhich Roscommon had served his customers was gone. The towel was nolonger used after its perfunctory fashion; the counter remained unwiped;the disks of countless glasses marked its surface, and indicated otherpreoccupation on the part of the proprietor. The keen grey eyes of theclaimant of the "Red-Rock Rancho" were always on the lookout for friendor enemy. 

Garcia comes next. That gentleman's inborn talent for historicmisrepresentation culminated unpleasantly through a defective memory;a year or two after he had sworn in his application for the "Rancho, "being engaged in another case, some trifling inconsistency wasdiscovered in his statements, which had the effect of throwing theweight of evidence to the party who had paid him most, but was instantlydetected by the weaker party. Garcia's preeminence as a witness, anexpert and general historian began to decline. He was obliged to becorroborated, and this required a liberal outlay of his fee. With theloss of his credibility as a witness bad habits supervened. He wasfrequently drunk, he lost his position, he lost his house, and Carmen, removed to San Francisco, supported him with her brush. 

And this brings us once more to that pretty painter and innocent forgerwhose unconscious act bore such baleful fruit on the barren hill-sidesof the "Red-Rock Rancho, " and also to a later blossom of her life, thatopened, however, in kindlier sunshine. 

CHAPTER IX

WHAT THE FAIR HAD TO DO ABOUT IT

The house that Royal Thatcher so informally quitted in his exodus tothe promised land of Biggs was one of those oversized, under-calculateddwellings conceived and erected in the extravagance of the SanFrancisco builder's hopes, and occupied finally in his despair. Intendedoriginally as the palace of some inchoate California Aladdin, it usuallyended as a lodging house in which some helpless widow or hopelessspinster managed to combine respectability with the hard task of breadgetting. 

Thatcher's landlady was one of the former class. She had unfortunatelysurvived not only her husband but his property, and, living in somedeserted chamber, had, after the fashion of the Italian nobility, letout the rest of the ruin. A tendency to dwell upon these facts gaveher conversation a peculiar significance on the first of each month. Thatcher had noticed this with the sensitiveness of an impoverishedgentleman. But when, a few days after her lodger's sudden disappearance, a note came from him containing a draft in noble excess of all arrearsand charges, the widow's heart was lifted, and the rock smitten with thegolden wand gushed beneficence that shone in a new gown for the widowand a new suit for "Johnny, " her son, a new oil cloth in the hall, better service to the lodgers, and, let us be thankful, a kindlierconsideration for the poor little black-eyed painter from Monterey, thendreadfully behind in her room rent. For, to tell the truth, the callsupon Miss De Haro's scant purse by her uncle had lately been frequent, perjury having declined in the Monterey market, through excessiveand injudicious supply, until the line of demarcation between it andabsolute verity was so finely drawn that Victor Garcia had remarked that"he might as well tell the truth at once and save his soul, since thedevil was in the market. "

Mistress Plodgitt, the landlady, could not resist the desire to acquaintCarmen De Haro with her good fortune. "He was always a friend of yours, my dear, --and I know him to be a gentleman that would never let apoor widow suffer; and see what he says about you!" Here she producedThatcher's note and read: "Tell my little neighbor that I shall comeback soon to carry her and her sketching tools off by force, and I shallnot let her return until she has caught the black mountains and thered rocks she used to talk about, and put the 'Blue Mass' mill in theforeground of the picture I shall order. "

What is this, little one? Surely, Carmen, thou needst not blush atthis, thy first grand offer. Holy Virgin! is it of a necessity that thoushouldst stick the wrong end of thy brush in thy mouth, and then drop itin thy lap? Or was it taught thee by the good Sisters at the convent tostride in that boyish fashion to the side of thy elders and snatch fromtheir hands the missive thou wouldst read? More of this we would know, O Carmen, --smallest of brunettes, --speak, little one, even in thine ownmelodious speech, that I may commend thee and thy rare discretion to myown fair countrywomen. 

Alas, neither the present chronicler nor Mistress Plodgitt got anyfurther information from the prudent Carmen, and must fain speculateupon certain facts that were already known. 

Mistress Carmen's little room was opposite to Thatcher's, and once ortwice, the doors being open, Thatcher had a glimpse across the passageof a black-haired and a sturdy, boyish little figure in a great blueapron, perched on a stool before an easel, and on the other hand, Carmenhad often been conscious of the fumes of a tobacco pipe penetrating hercloistered seclusion, and had seen across the passage, vaguely envelopedin the same nicotine cloud, an American Olympian, in a rocking chair, with his feet on the mantel shelf. They had once or twice met on thestaircase, on which occasion Thatcher had greeted her with a word or twoof respectful yet half-humorous courtesy, --a courtesy which never reallyoffends a true woman, although it often piques her self-aplomb by theslight assumption of superiority in the humorist. A woman is quick torecognize the fact that the great and more dangerous passions are alwaysSERIOUS, and may be excused if in self-respect she is often induced totry if there be not somewhere under the skin of this laughing Mercutiothe flesh and blood of a Romeo. Thatcher was by nature a defender andprotector; weakness, and weakness alone, stirred the depths of histenderness, --often, I fear, only through its half-humorous aspects, --andon this plane he was pleased to place women and children. I mention thisfact for the benefit of the more youthful members of my species, and amsatisfied that an unconditional surrender and the complete laying downat the feet of Beauty of all strong masculinity is a cheap Gallicismthat is untranslatable to most women worthy the winning. For a womanMUST always look up to the man she truly loves, --even if she has to godown on her knees to do it. 

Only the masculine reader will infer from this that Carmen was in lovewith Thatcher; the more critical and analytical feminine eye willsee nothing herein that might not have happened consistently withfriendship. For Thatcher was no sentimentalist; he had hardly paid acompliment to the girl, --even in the unspoken but most delicate formof attention. There were days when his room door was closed; there weredays succeeding these blanks when he met her as frankly and naturally asif he had seen her yesterday. Indeed, on those days following his flightthe simple-minded Carmen, being aware--heaven knows how--that he had notopened his door during that period, and fearing sickness, sudden death, or perhaps suicide, by her appeals to the landlady, assisted unwittinglyin discovering his flight and defection. As she was for a few momentsas indignant as Mrs. Plodgitt, it is evident that she had but littlesympathy with the delinquent. And besides, hitherto she had known onlyConcho, her earliest friend, and was true to his memory, as against allAmericanos, whom she firmly believed to be his murderers. 

So she dismissed the offer and the man from her mind, and went backto her painting, --a fancy portrait of the good Padre Junipero Serra, a great missionary, who, haply for the integrity of his bones andcharacter, died some hundred years before the Americans took possessionof California. The picture was fair but unsaleable, and she began tothink seriously of sign painting, which was then much more popular andmarketable. An unfinished head of San Juan de Bautista, artificiallyframed in clouds, she disposed of to a prominent druggist for $50, whereit did good service as exhibiting the effect of four bottles of "Jones'sFreckle Eradicator, " and in a pleasant and unobtrusive way revived thememory of the saint. Still, she felt weary and was growing despondent, and had a longing for the good Sisters and the blameless lethargy ofconventual life, and then--

He came!

But not as the Prince should come, on a white charger, to carry awaythis cruelly-abused and enchanted damsel. He was sunburned, he wasbearded like "the pard"; he was a little careless as to his dress, andpre-occupied in his ways. But his mouth and eyes were the same; and whenhe repeated in his old frank, half-mischievous way the invitation of hisletter, poor little Carmen could only hesitate and blush. 

A thought struck him and sent the color to his face. Your gentlemanborn is always as modest as a woman. He ran down stairs, and seizing thewidowed Plodgitt, said hastily:

"You're just killing yourself here. Take a change. Come down to Montereyfor a day or two with me, and bring miss De Haro with you for company. "

The old lady recognized the situation. Thatcher was now a man of vastpossibilities. In all maternal daughters of Eve there is the slightestbit of the chaperone and match-maker. It is the last way of reviving thepast. 

She consented, and Carmen De Haro could not well refuse. 

The ladies found the "Blue Mass" mills very much as Thatcher hadpreviously delivered it to them, "a trifle rough and mannish. " But hemade over to them the one tenement reserved for himself, and slept withhis men, or more likely under the trees. At first Mrs. Plodgitt missedgas and running water, and these several conveniences of civilization, among which I fear may be mentioned sheets and pillow cases; but thebalsam of the mountain air soothed her neuralgia and her temper. As forCarmen, she rioted in the unlimited license of her absolute freedom fromconventional restraint and the indulgence of her child-like impulses. She scoured the ledges far and wide alone; she dipped into dark copses, and scrambled over sterile patches of chemisal, and came back laden withthe spoil of buckeye blossoms, manzanita berries and laurel. Butshe would not make a sketch of the "Blue Mass Company's" mills on aMercator's projection--something that could be afterwards lithographedor chromoed, with the mills turning out tons of quicksilver through theenergies of a happy and picturesque assemblage of miners--even to pleaseher padrone, Don Royal Thatcher. On the contrary, she made a study ofthe ruins of the crumbled and decayed red-rock furnace, with the blackmountain above it, and the light of a dying camp fire shining upon it, and the dull-red excavations in the ledge. But even this did not satisfyher until she had made some alterations; and when she finally broughther finished study to Don Royal, she looked at him a little defiantly. Thatcher admired honestly, and then criticised a little humorously anddishonestly. "But couldn't you, for a consideration, put up a sign-boardon that rock with the inscription, 'Road to the Blue Mass Company's newmills to the right, ' and combine business with art? That's the fault ofyou geniuses. But what's this blanketed figure doing here, lying beforethe furnace? You never saw one of my miners there, --and a Mexican, too, by his serape. " "That, " quoth Mistress Carmen, coolly, "was put into fill up the foreground, --I wanted something there to balancethe picture. " "But, " continued Thatcher, dropping into unconsciousadmiration again, "it's drawn to the life. Tell me, Miss De Haro, beforeI ask the aid and counsel of Mrs. Plodgitt, who is my hated rival, andyour lay figure and model?" "Oh, " said Carmen, with a little sigh, "It'sonly poor Coucho. " "And where is Concho?" (a little impatiently. ) "He'sdead, Don Royal. " "Dead?" "Of a verity, --very dead, --murdered by yourcountrymen. " "I see, --and you know him?" "He was my friend. "

"Oh!"

"Truly. "

"But" (wickedly), "isn't this a rather ghastly advertisement--outside ofan illustrated newspaper--of my property?"

"Ghastly, Don Royal. Look you, he sleeps. "

"Ay" (in Spanish), "as the dead. "

Carmen (crossing herself hastily), "After the fashion of the dead. "

They were both feeling uncomfortable. Carmen was shivering. But, beinga woman, and tactful, she recovered her head first. "It is a study formyself, Don Royal; I shall make you another. "

And she slipped away, as she thought, out of the subject and hispresence. 

But she was mistaken; in the evening he renewed the conversation. Carmenbegan to fence, not from cowardice or deceit, as the masculine readerwould readily infer, but from some wonderful feminine instinct that toldher to be cautious. But he got from her the fact, to him before unknown, that she was the niece of his main antagonist, and, being a gentleman, so redoubled his attentions and his courtesy that Mrs. Plodgitt made upher mind that it was a foregone conclusion, and seriously reflected asto what she should wear on the momentous occasion. But that night poorCarmen cried herself to sleep, resolving that she would hereafter castaside her wicked uncle for this good-hearted Americano, yet never onceconnected her innocent penmanship with the deadly feud between them. Women--the best of them--are strong as to collateral facts, swiftof deduction, but vague as children are to the exact statement orrecognition of premises. It is hardly necessary to say that Carmenhad never thought of connecting any act of hers with the claims of heruncle, and the circumstance of the signature she had totally forgotten. 

The masculine reader will now understand Carmen's confusion and blushes, and believe himself an ass to have thought them a confession of originalaffection. The feminine reader will, by this time, become satisfied thatthe deceitful minx's sole idea was to gain the affections of Thatcher. And really I don't know who is right. 

Nevertheless she painted a sketch of Thatcher, --which now adorns theCompany's office in San Francisco, --in which the property is laid out inpleasing geometrical lines, and the rosy promise of the future instinctin every touch of the brush. Then, having earned her "wage, " as shebelieved, she became somewhat cold and shy to Thatcher. Whereat thatgentleman redoubled his attentions, seeing only in her presence acertain meprise, which concerned her more than himself. The niece ofhis enemy meant nothing more to him than an interesting girl, --tobe protected always, --to be feared, never. But even suspicion may beinsidiously placed in noble minds. 

Mistress Plodgitt, thus early estopped of matchmaking, of course put theblame on her own sex, and went over to the stronger side--the man's. 

"It's a great pity gals should be so curious, " she said, sotto voce, toThatcher, when Carmen was in one of her sullen moods. "Yet I s'poseit's in her blood. Them Spaniards is always revengeful, --like theEyetalians. "

Thatcher honestly looked his surprise. 

"Why, don't you see, she's thinking how all these lands might have beenher uncle's but for you. And instead of trying to be sweet and--" hereshe stopped to cough. 

"Good God!" said Thatcher in great concern, "I never thought of that. "He stopped for a moment, and then added with decision, "I can't believeit; it isn't like her. "

Mrs. P. Was piqued. She walked away, delivering, however, this Parthianarrow: "Well, I hope 'TAINT NOTHING WORSE. "

Thatcher chuckled, then felt uneasy. When he next met Carmen, she foundhis grey eyes fixed on hers with a curious, half-inquisitorial look shehad never noticed before. This only added fuel to the fire. Forgettingtheir relations of host and guest, she was absolutely rude. Thatcher wasquiet but watchful; got the Plodgitt to bed early, and, under cover ofshowing a moonlight view of the "Lost Chance Mill, " decoyed Carmen outof ear-shot, as far as the dismantled furnace. 

"What is the matter, Miss De Haro; have I offended you?"

Miss Carmen was not aware that anything was the matter. If Don Royalpreferred old friends, whose loyalty of course he knew, and who wereabove speaking ill against a gentleman in his adversity--(oh, Carmen!fie!) if he preferred THEIR company to LATER FRIENDS--why--(themasculine reader will observe this tremendous climax and tremble)--whyshe didn't know why HE should blame HER. 

They turned and faced each other. The conditions for a perfectmisunderstanding could not have been better arranged between two people. Thatcher was a masculine reasoner, Carmen a feminine feeler, --if I maybe pardoned the expression. Thatcher wanted to get at certain facts, andargue therefrom. Carmen wanted to get at certain feelings, and then fitthe facts to THEM. 

"But I am NOT blaming you, Miss Carmen, " he said gravely. "It WAS stupidin me to confront you here with the property claimed by your uncle andoccupied by me, but it was a mistake, --no!" he added hastily, "it wasnot a mistake. You knew it, and I didn't. You overlooked it before youcame, and I was too glad to overlook it after you were here. "

"Of course, " said Carmen pettishly, "I am the only one to be blamed. It's like you MEN!" (Mem. She was just fifteen, and uttered this awful'resume' of experience just as if it hadn't been taught to her in hercradle. )

Feminine generalities always stagger a man. Thatcher said nothing. Carmen became more enraged. 

"Why did you want to take Uncle Victor's property, then?" she askedtriumphantly. 

"I don't know that it is your uncle's property. "

"You--don't--know? Have you seen the application with GovernorMicheltorena's indorsement? Have you heard the witnesses?" she saidpassionately. 

"Signatures may be forged and witnesses lie, " said Thatcher quietly. 

"What is it you call 'forged'?"

Thatcher instantly recalled the fact that the Spanish language held nosynonym for "forgery. " The act was apparently an invention of el DiabloAmericano. So he said, with a slight smile in his kindly eyes:

"Anybody wicked enough and dexterous enough can imitate another'shandwriting. When this is used to benefit fraud, we call it 'forgery. ' Ibeg your pardon, --Miss De Haro, Miss Carmen, --what is the matter?"

She had suddenly lapsed against a tree, quite helpless, nerveless, andwith staring eyes fixed on his. As yet an embryo woman, inexperiencedand ignorant, the sex's instinct was potential; she had in one plungefathomed all that his reason had been years groping for. 

Thatcher saw only that she was pained, that she was helpless: that wasenough. "It is possible that your uncle may have been deceived, "he began; "many honest men have been fooled by clever but deceitfultricksters, men and women--"

"Stop! Madre de Dios! WILL YOU STOP?"

Thatcher for an instant recoiled from the flashing eyes and white faceof the little figure that had, with menacing and clenched baby fingers, strode to his side. He stopped. "Where is this application, --thisforgery?" she asked. "Show it to me!"

Thatcher felt relieved, and smiled the superior smile of our sex overfeminine ignorance. "You could hardly expect me to be trusted with youruncle's vouchers. His papers of course are in the hands of his counsel. "

"And when can I leave this place?" she asked passionately. 

"If you consult my wishes you will stay, if only long enough to forgiveme. But if I have offended you unknowingly, and you are implacable--"

"I can go to-morrow at sunrise if I like?"

"As you will, " returned Thatcher gravely. 

"Gracias, Senor. "

They walked slowly back to the house, Thatcher with a masculine senseof being unreasonably afflicted, Carmen with a woman's instinct of beinghopelessly crushed. No word was spoken until they reached the door. ThenCarmen suddenly, in her old, impulsive way, and in a childlike treble, sang out merrily, "Good night, O Don Royal, and pleasant dreams. Hastamanana. "

Thatcher stood dumb and astounded at this capricious girl. She saw hismystification instantly. "It is for the old Cat!" she whispered, jerkingher thumb over her shoulder in the direction of the sleeping Mrs. P. "Good night, --go!"

He went to give orders for a peon to attend the ladies and theirequipage the next day. He awoke to find Miss De Haro gone, with herescort, towards Monterey. And without the Plodgitt. 

He could not conceal his surprise from the latter lady. She, leftalone, --a not altogether unavailable victim to the wiles of oursex, --was embarrassed. But not so much that she could not say toThatcher: "I told you so, --gone to her uncle. . . . To tell him ALL!"

"All. D--n it, WHAT can she tell him?" roared Thatcher, stung out of hisself-control. 

"Nothing, I hope, that she should not, " said Mrs. P. , and chastelyretired. 

She was right. Miss Carmen posted to Monterey, running her horse nearlyoff its legs to do it, and then sent back her beast and escort, sayingshe would rejoin Mrs. Plodgitt by steamer at San Francisco. Then shewent boldly to the law office of Saponaceous Wood, District Attorney andwhilom solicitor of her uncle. 

With the majority of masculine Monterey Miss Carmen was known andrespectfully admired, despite the infelix reputation of her kinsman. Mr. Wood was glad to see her, and awkwardly gallant. Miss Carmen was cooland business-like; she had come from her uncle to "regard" the papers inthe "Red-Rock Rancho" case. They were instantly produced. Carmen turnedto the application for the grant. Her cheek paled slightly. With herclear memory and wonderful fidelity of perception she could not bemistaken. THE SIGNATURE OF MICHELTORENA WAS IN HER OWN HANDWRITING!

Yet she looked up to the lawyer with a smile: "May I take these papersfor an hour to my uncle?"

Even an older and better man than the District Attorney could not haveresisted those drooping lids and that gentle voice. 

"Certainly. "

"I will return them in an hour. "

She was as good as her word, and within the hour dropped the papers anda little courtesy to her uncle's legal advocate, and that night took thesteamer to San Francisco. 

The next morning Victor Garcia, a little the worse for the previousnight's dissipation, reeled into Wood's office. "I have fears for myniece Carmen. She is with the enemy, " he said thickly. "Look you atthis. "

It was an anonymous letter (in Mrs. Plodgitt's own awkward fist)advising him of the fact that his niece was bought by the enemy, andcautioning him against her. 

"Impossible, " said the lawyer; "it was only last week she sent thee$50. "

Victor blushed, even through his ensanguined cheeks, and made animpatient gesture with his hand. 

"Besides, " added the lawyer coolly, "she has been here to examine thepapers at thy request, and returned them of yesterday. "

Victor gasped: "And-you-you-gave them to her?"

"Of course!"

"All? Even the application and the signature?"

"Certainly, --you sent her. "

"Sent her? The devil's own daughter?" shrieked Garcia. "No! A hundredmillion times, no! Quick, before it is too late. Give to me the papers. "

Mr. Wood reproduced the file. Garcia ran over it with trembling fingersuntil at last he clutched the fateful document. Not content with openingit and glancing at its text and signature, he took it to the window. 

"It is the same, " he muttered with a sigh of relief. 

"Of course it is, " said Mr. Wood sharply. "The papers are all there. You're a fool, Victor Garcia!"

And so he was. And, for the matter of that, so was Mr. Saponaceous Wood, of counsel. 

Meanwhile Miss De Haro returned to San Francisco and resumed her work. Aday or two later she was joined by her landlady. Mrs. P. Had too large anature to permit an anonymous letter, written by her own hand, to standbetween her and her demeanor to her little lodger. So she coddled herand flattered her and depicted in slightly exaggerated colors the griefof Don Royal at her sudden departure. All of which Miss Carmen receivedin a demure, kitten-like way, but still kept quietly at her work. Indue time Don Royal's order was completed; still she had leisure andinclination enough to add certain touches to her ghastly sketch of thecrumbling furnace. 

Nevertheless, as Don Royal did not return, through excess of business, Mrs. Plodgitt turned an honest penny by letting his room, temporarily, to two quiet Mexicans, who, but for a beastly habit of cigarrito smokingwhich tainted the whole house, were fair enough lodgers. If they failedin making the acquaintance of their fair countrywoman, Miss De Haro, itwas through the lady's pre-occupation in her own work, and not throughtheir ostentatious endeavors. 

"Miss De Haro is peculiar, " explained the politic Mrs. Plodgitt toher guests; "she makes no acquaintances, which I consider bad for herbusiness. If it had not been for me, she would not have known RoyalThatcher, the great quicksilver miner, --and had his order for a pictureof his mine!"

The two foreign gentlemen exchanged glances. One said, "Ah, God! this isbad, " and the other, "It is not possible;" and then, when the landlady'sback was turned, introduced themselves with a skeleton key into the thenvacant bedroom and studio of their fair countrywoman, who was absentsketching. "Thou observest, " said Mr. Pedro, refugee, to Miguel, ex-ecclesiastic, "that this Americano is all-powerful, and that thisVictor, drunkard as he is, is right in his suspicions. "

"Of a verity, yes, " replied Miguel, "thou dost remember it was JovitaCastro who, for her Americano lover, betrayed the Sobriente claim. Itis only with us, my Pedro, that the Mexican spirit, the real God andLiberty, yet lives!"

They shook hands nobly and with sentimental fervor, and then went towork, i. E. , the rummaging over the trunks, drawers, and portmanteaus ofthe poor little painter, Carmen de Haro, and even ripped up the mattressof her virginal cot. But they found not what they sought. 

"What is that yonder on the easel, covered with a cloth?" said Miguel:"it is a trick of these artists to put their valuables together. "

Pedro strode to the easel and tore away the muslin curtain that veiledit; then uttered a shriek that appalled his comrade and brought him tohis side. 

"In the name of God, " said Miguel hastily, "are you trying to alarm thehouse?"

The ex-vaquero was trembling like a child. "Look, " he said hoarsely, "look, do you see? It is the hand of God, " and fainted on the floor!

Miguel looked. It was Carmen's partly-finished sketch of the desertedfurnace. The figure of Concho, thrown out strongly by the camp fire, occupied the left foreground. But to balance her picture she hadevidently been obliged to introduce another, --the face and figure ofPedro, on all fours, creeping towards the sleeping man. 

PART III. --IN CONGRESS

CHAPTER X

WHO LOBBIED FOR IT

It was a midsummer's day in Washington. Even at early morning, while thesun was yet level with the faces of pedestrians in its broad, shadelessavenues, it was insufferably hot. Later the avenues themselves shonelike the diverging rays of another sun, --the Capitol, --a thing to befeared by the naked eye. Later yet it grew hotter, and then a mist arosefrom the Potomac, and blotted out the blazing arch above, and presentlypiled up along the horizon delusive thunder clouds, that spent theirstrength and substance elsewhere, and left it hotter than before. Towards evening the sun came out invigorated, having cleared theheavenly brow of perspiration, but leaving its fever unabated. 

The city was deserted. The few who remained apparently buried themselvesfrom the garish light of day in some dim, cloistered recess of shop, hotel, or restaurant; and the perspiring stranger, dazed by the outerglare, who broke in upon their quiet, sequestered repose, confrontedcollarless and coatless specters of the past, with fans in their hands, who, after dreamily going through some perfunctory business, immediatelyretired to sleep after the stranger had gone. Congressmen and Senatorshad long since returned to their several constituencies with the variousinformation that the country was going to ruin, or that the outlooknever was more hopeful and cheering, as the tastes of their constituencyindicated. A few Cabinet officers still lingered, having by this timebecome convinced that they could do nothing their own way, or indeedin any way but the old way, and getting gloomily resigned to theirsituation. A body of learned, cultivated men, representing the highestlegal tribunal in the land, still lingered in a vague idea of earningthe scant salary bestowed upon them by the economical founders of theGovernment, and listened patiently to the arguments of counsel, whosefees for advocacy of claims before them would have paid the life incomeof half the bench. There was Mr. Attorney-General and his assistantsstill protecting the Government's millions from rapacious hands, and drawing the yearly public pittance that their wealthier privateantagonists would have scarce given as a retainer to their juniorcounsel. The little standing army of departmental employes, --thehelpless victims of the most senseless and idiotic form of disciplinethe world has known, --a discipline so made up of caprice, expediency, cowardice, and tyranny that its reform meant revolution, not to betolerated by legislators and lawgivers, or a despotism in which halfa dozen accidentally-chosen men interpreted their prejudices orpreferences as being that Reform. Administration after administrationand Party after Party had persisted in their desperate attempts to fitthe youthful colonial garments, made by our Fathers after a by-gonefashion, over the expanded limits and generous outline of a maturednation. There were patches here and there; there were grievous rentsand holes here and there; there were ludicrous and painful exposures ofgrowing limbs everywhere; and the Party in Power and the Party out ofPower could do nothing but mend and patch, and revamp and cleanse andscour, and occasionally, in the wildness of despair, suggest even thecutting off the rebellious limbs that persisted in growing beyond theswaddling clothes of its infancy. 

It was a capital of Contradictions and Inconsistencies. At one end ofthe Avenue sat the responsible High Keeper of the military honor, valor, and war-like prestige of a great nation, without the power to pay hisown troops their legal dues until some selfish quarrel between Partyand Party was settled. Hard by sat another Secretary, whose establishedfunctions seemed to be the misrepresentation of the nation abroad bythe least characteristic of its classes, the politicians, --and only thenwhen they had been defeated as politicians, and when their constituentshad declared them no longer worthy to be even THEIR representatives. This National Absurdity was only equaled by another, wherein anex-Politician was for four years expected to uphold the honor of a flagof a great nation over an ocean he had never tempted, with a disciplinethe rudiments of which he could scarcely acquire before he was removed, or his term of office expired, receiving his orders from a superiorofficer as ignorant of his special duties as himself, and subjected tothe revision of a Congress cognizant of him only as a politician. At thefarther end of the Avenue was another department so vast in its extentand so varied in its functions that few of the really great practicalworkers of the land would have accepted its responsibility for ten timesits salary, but which the most perfect constitution in the world handedover to men who were obliged to make it a stepping stone to futurepreferment. There was another department, more suggestive of itsfinancial functions from the occasional extravagances or economiesexhibited in its payrolls, --successive Congresses having taken othermatters out of its hands, --presided over by an official who bore thetitle and responsibility of the Custodian and Disburser of the Nation'sPurse, and received a salary that a bank-President would havesniffed at. For it was part of this Constitutional Inconsistency andAdministrative Absurdity that in the matter of honor, justice, fidelityto trust, and even business integrity, the official was always expectedto be the superior of the Government he represented. Yet the crowningInconsistency was that, from time to time, it was submitted to thesovereign people to declare if these various Inconsistencies were notreally the perfect expression of the most perfect Government theworld had known. And it is to be recorded that the unanimous voices ofRepresentative, Orator, and Unfettered Poetry were that it was!

Even the public press lent itself to the Great Inconsistency. It wasas clear as crystal to the journal on one side of the Avenue that thecountry was going to the dogs unless the SPIRIT of the Fathers once morereanimated the public; it was equally clear to the journal on the otherside of the Avenue that only a rigid adherence to the LETTER of theFathers would save the nation from decline. It was obvious to thefirst-named journal that the "letter" meant Government patronage tothe other journal; it was patent to that journal that the "shekels" ofSenator X really animated the spirit of the Fathers. Yet all agreedit was a great and good and perfect government, --subject only to thepredatory incursions of a Hydra-headed monster known as a "Ring. " TheRing's origin was wrapped in secrecy, its fecundity was alarming; butalthough its rapacity was preternatural, its digestion was perfectand easy. It circumvolved all affairs in an atmosphere of mystery;it clouded all things with the dust and ashes of distrust. Alldisappointment of place, of avarice, of incompetency or ambition, wasclearly attributable to it. It even permeated private and social life;there were Rings in our kitchen and household service; in our publicschools, that kept the active intelligences of our children passive;there were Rings of engaging, handsome, dissolute young fellows, whokept us moral but unengaging seniors from the favors of the fair; therewere subtle, conspiring Rings among our creditors, which sent us intobankruptcy and restricted our credit. In fact it would not be hazardousto say that all that was calamitous in public and private experiencewas clearly traceable to that combination of power in a minority overweakness in a majority--known as a Ring. 

Haply there was a body of demigods, as yet uninvoked, who shouldspeedily settle all that. When Smith of Minnesota, Robinson of Vermont, and Jones of Georgia returned to Congress from these rural seclusionsso potent with information and so freed from local prejudices, it wasunderstood, vaguely, that great things would be done. This was alwaysunderstood. There never was a time in the history of American politicswhen, to use the expression of the journals before alluded to, "thepresent session of Congress" did not "bid fair to be the most momentousin our history, " and did not, as far as the facts go, leave a vastamount of unfinished important business lying hopelessly upon itsdesks, having "bolted" the rest as rashly and with as little regard todigestion or assimilation as the American traveller has for his railwayrefreshment. 

In this capital, on this languid midsummer day, in an upper room of oneof its second-rate hotels, the Honorable Pratt C. Gashwiler sat athis writing-table. There are certain large, fleshy men with whom theomission of even a necktie or collar has all the effect of an indecentexposure. The Hon. Mr. Gashwiler, in his trousers and shirt, was a sightto be avoided by the modest eye. There were such palpable suggestions ofvast extents of unctuous flesh in the slight glimpse offered by his openthroat that his dishabille should have been as private as his business. Nevertheless, when there was a knock at his door he unhesitatingly said, "Come in!"--pushing away a goblet crowned with a certain aromatic herbwith his right hand, while he drew towards him with his left a few proofslips of his forthcoming speech. The Gashwiler brow became, as it were, intelligently abstracted. 

The intruder regarded Gashwiler with a glance of familiar recognitionfrom his right eye, while his left took in a rapid survey of the paperson the table, and gleamed sardonically. 

"You are at work, I see, " he said apologetically. 

"Yes, " replied the Congressman, with an air of perfunctoryweariness, --"one of my speeches. Those d----d printers make such a messof it; I suppose I don't write a very fine hand. "

If the gifted Gashwiler had added that he did not write a veryintelligent hand, or a very grammatical hand, and that his spelling wasfaulty, he would have been truthful, although the copy and proof beforehim might not have borne him out. The near fact was that the speechwas composed and written by one Expectant Dobbs, a poor retainer ofGashwiler, and the honorable member's labor as a proof-reader wasconfined to the introduction of such words as "anarchy, " "oligarchy, ""satrap, " "palladium, " and "Argus-eyed" in the proof, with littlerelevancy as to position or place, and no perceptible effect as toargument. 

The stranger saw all this with his wicked left eye, but continued tobeam mildly with his right. Removing the coat and waistcoat of Gashwilerfrom a chair, he drew it towards the table, pushing aside a portly, loud-ticking watch, --the very image of Gashwiler, --that lay beside him, and, resting his elbows on the proofs, said:

"Well?"

"Have you anything new?" asked the parliamentary Gashwiler. 

"Much! a woman!" replied the stranger. 

The astute Gashwiler, waiting further information, concluded to receivethis fact gaily and gallantly. "A woman?--my dear Mr. Wiles, --of course!The dear creatures, " he continued, with a fat, offensive chuckle, "somehow are always making their charming presence felt. Ha! ha! A man, sir, in public life becomes accustomed to that sort of thing, andknows when he must be agreeable, --agreeable, sir, but firm! I've had myexperience, sir, --my OWN experience, "--and the Congressman leaned backin his chair, not unlike a robust St. Anthony who had withstood onetemptation to thrive on another. 

"Yes, " said Wiles impatiently, "but d--n it, she's on the OTHER SIDE. "

"The other side!" repeated Gashwiler vacantly. 

"Yes, she's a niece of Garcia's. A little she devil. "

"But Garcia's on our side, " rejoined Gashwiler. 

"Yes, but she is bought by the Ring. "

"A woman!" sneered Mr. Gashwiler; "what can she do with men who won't bemade fools of? Is she so handsome?"

"I never saw any great beauty in her, " said Wiles shortly, "althoughthey say that she's rather caught that d----d Thatcher, in spite ofhis coldness. At any rate, she is his protegee. But she isn't the sortyou're thinking of, Gashwiler. They say she knows, or pretends to know, something about the grant. She may have got hold of some of her uncle'spapers. Those Greasers were always d----d fools; and, if he did anythingfoolish, like as not he bungled or didn't cover up his tracks. And withhis knowledge and facilities too! Why, if I'd--" but here Mr. Wiles stopped to sigh over the inequalities of fortune that wastedopportunities on the less skillful scamp. 

Mr. Gashwiler became dignified. "She can do nothing with us, " he saidpotentially. 

Wiles turned his wicked eye on him. "Manuel and Miguel, who sold out toour man, are afraid of her. They were our witnesses. I verily believethey'd take back everything if she got after them. And as for Pedro, hethinks she holds the power of life and death over him. "

"Pedro! life and death, --what's all this?" said the astonishedGashwiler. 

Wiles saw his blunder, but saw also that he had gone too far to stop. "Pedro, " he said, "was strongly suspected of having murdered Concho, oneof the original locators. "

Mr. Gashwiler turned white as a sheet, and then flushed again into anapoplectic glow. "Do you dare to say, " he began as soon as he couldfind his tongue and his legs, for in the exercise of his congressionalfunctions these extreme members supported each other, --"do you mean tosay, " he stammered in rising rage, "that you have dared to deceivean American lawgiver into legislating upon a measure connected with acapital offense? Do I understand you to say, sir, that murder standsupon the record--stands upon the record, sir, --of this cause to which, as a representative of Remus, I have lent my official aid? Do you meanto say that you have deceived my constituency, whose sacred trustI hold, in inveigling me to hiding a crime from the Argus eyes ofjustice?" And Mr. Gashwiler looked towards the bell-pull as if aboutto summon a servant to witness this outrage against the establishedjudiciary. 

"The murder, if it WAS a murder, took place before Garcia entered uponthis claim, or had a footing in this court, " returned Wiles blandly, "and is no part of the record. "

"You are sure it is not spread upon the record?"

"I am. You can judge for yourself. "

Mr. Gashwiler walked to the window, returned to the table, finished hisliquor in a single gulp, and then, with a slight resumption of dignity, said:

"That alters the case. "

Wiles glanced with his left eye at the Congressman. The right placidlylooked out of the window. Presently he said quietly, "I've brought youthe certificates of stock; do you wish them made out in your own name?"

Mr. Gashwiler tried hard to look as if he were trying to recall themeaning of Wiles's words. "Oh!--ah!--umph!--let me see, --oh, yes, thecertificates, --certainly! Of course you will make them out in the nameof my secretary, Mr. Expectant Dobbs. They will perhaps repay him forthe extra clerical labor required in the prosecution of your claim. Heis a worthy young man. Although not a public officer, yet he is so nearto me that perhaps I am wrong in permitting him to accept a fee forprivate interests. An American representative cannot be too cautious, Mr. Wiles. Perhaps you had better have also a blank transfer. The stockis, I understand, yet in the future. Mr. Dobbs, though talented andpraiseworthy, is poor; he may wish to realize. If some--ahem! someFRIEND--better circumstanced should choose to advance the cash to himand run the risk, --why, it would only be an act of kindness. "

"You are proverbially generous, Mr. Gashwiler, " said Wiles, openingand shutting his left eye like a dark lantern on the benevolentrepresentative. 

"Youth, when faithful and painstaking, should be encouraged, " repliedMr. Gashwiler. "I lately had occasion to point this out in a few remarksI had to make before the Sabbath school reunion at Remus. Thank you, Iwill see that they are--ahem!--conveyed to him. I shall give them to himwith my own hand, " he concluded, falling back in his chair, as ifthe better to contemplate the perspective of his own generosity andcondescension. Mr. Wiles took his hat and turned to go. Before hereached the door Mr. Gashwiler returned to the social level with achuckle:

"You say this woman, this Garcia's niece, is handsome and smart?"

"Yes. "

"I can set another woman on the track that'll euchre her every time!"

Mr. Wiles was too clever to appear to notice the sudden lapse in theCongressman's dignity, and only said, with his right eye:

"Can you?"

"By G-d, I WILL, or I don't know how to represent Remus. "

Mr. Wiles thanked him with his right eye, and looked a dagger with hisleft. "Good, " he said, and added persuasively: "Does she live here?"

The Congressman nodded assent. "An awfully handsome woman, --a particularfriend of mine!" Mr. Gashwiler here looked as if he would not mind tohave been rallied a little over his intimacy with the fair one; butthe astute Mr. Wiles was at the same moment making up his mind, afterinterpreting the Congressman's look and manner, that he must know thisfair incognita if he wished to sway Gashwiler. He determined to bide histime, and withdrew. 

The door was scarcely closed upon him when another knock diverted Mr. Gashwiler's attention from his proofs. The door opened to a young manwith sandy hair and anxious face. He entered the room deprecatingly, asif conscious of the presence of a powerful being, to be supplicated andfeared. Mr. Gashwiler did not attempt to disabuse his mind. "Busy, yousee, " he said shortly, "correcting your work!"

"I hope it is acceptable?" said the young man timidly. 

"Well--yes--it will do, " said Gashwiler; "indeed I may say it issatisfactory on the whole, " he added with the appearance of a largegenerosity; "quite satisfactory. "

"You have no news, I suppose, " continued the young man, with a slightflush, born of pride or expectation. 

"No, nothing as yet. " Mr. Gashwiler paused as if a thought had struckhim. 

"I have thought, " he said, finally, "that some position--such as asecretaryship with me--would help you to a better appointment. Now, supposing that I make you my private secretary, giving you someimportant and confidential business. Eh?"

Dobbs looked at his patron with a certain wistful, dog-like expectancy, moved himself excitedly on his chair seat in a peculiar canine-likeanticipation of gratitude, strongly suggesting that he would have waggedhis tail if he had one. At which Mr. Gashwiler became more impressive. 

"Indeed, I may say I anticipated it by certain papers I have put inyour charge and in your name, only taking from you a transfer that mightenable me to satisfy my conscience hereafter in recommending you asmy--ahem!--private secretary. Perhaps, as a mere form, you might now, while you are here, put your name to these transfers, and, so to speak, begin your duties at once. "

The glow of pride and hope that mantled the cheek of poor Dobbs mighthave melted a harder heart than Gashwiler's. But the senatorial togahad invested Mr. Gashwiler with a more than Roman stoicism towards thefeelings of others, and he only fell back in his chair in the pose ofconscious rectitude as Dobbs hurriedly signed the paper. 

"I shall place them in my portman-tell, " said Gashwiler, suiting theword to the action, "for safe keeping. I need not inform you, who arenow, as it were, on the threshold of official life, that perfect andinviolable secrecy in all affairs of State"--Mr. G. Here motioned towardhis portmanteau as if it contained a treaty at least--"is most essentialand necessary. "

Dobbs assented. "Then my duties will keep me with you here?" he askeddoubtfully. 

"No, no, " said Gashwiler hastily; then, correcting himself, he added:"that is--for the present--no!"

Poor Dobbs's face fell. The near fact was that he had lately had noticeto quit his present lodgings in consequence of arrears in his rent, andhe had a hopeful reliance that his confidential occupation would carrybread and lodging with it. But he only asked if there were any newpapers to make out. 

"Ahem! not at present; the fact is I am obliged to give so much of mytime to callers--I have to-day been obliged to see half a dozen--thatI must lock myself up and say 'Not at home' for the rest of the day. "Feeling that this was an intimation that the interview was over, thenew private secretary, a little dashed as to his near hopes, but stillsanguine of the future, humbly took his leave. 

But here a certain Providence, perhaps mindful of poor Dobbs, threw intohis simple hands--to be used or not, if he were worthy or capable ofusing it--a certain power and advantage. He had descended the staircase, and was passing through the lower corridor, when he was made theunwilling witness of a remarkable assault. 

It appeared that Mr. Wiles, who had quitted Gashwiler's presence asDobbs was announced, had other business in the hotel, and in pursuanceof it had knocked at room No. 90. In response to the gruff voice thatbade him enter, Mr. Wiles opened the door, and espied the figure ofa tall, muscular, fiery-bearded man extended on the bed, with thebedclothes carefully tucked under his chin, and his arms lying flat byhis side. 

Mr. Wiles beamed with his right cheek, and advanced to the bed as ifto take the hand of the stranger, who, however, neither by word or signresponded to his salutation. 

"Perhaps I'm intruding?" said Mr. Wiles blandly. 

"Perhaps you are, " said Red Beard dryly. 

Mr. Wiles forced a smile on his right cheek, which he turned to thesmiter, but permitted the left to indulge in unlimited malevolence. "I wanted merely to know if you have looked into that matter?" he saidmeekly. 

"I've looked into it and round it and across it and over it and throughit, " responded the man gravely, with his eyes fixed on Wiles. 

"And you have perused all the papers?" continued Mr. Wiles. 

"I've read every paper, every speech, every affidavit, every decision, every argument, " said the stranger as if repeating a formula. 

Mr. Wiles attempted to conceal his embarrassment by an easy, right-handed smile, that went off sardonically on the left, andcontinued: "Then I hope, my dear sir, that, having thoroughly masteredthe case, you are inclined to be favorable to us?"

The gentleman in the bed did not reply, but apparently nestled moreclosely beneath the coverlids. 

"I have brought the shares I spoke of, " continued Mr. Wiles, insinuatingly. 

"Hev you a friend within call?" interrupted the recumbent man gently. 

"I don't quite understand!" smiled Mr. Wiles. "Of course any name youmight suggest--"

"Hev you a friend, any chap that you might waltz in here at a moment'scall?" continued the man in bed. "No? Do you know any of them waitersin the house? Thar's a bell over yan!" and he motioned with his eyestowards the wall, but did not otherwise move his body. 

"No, " said Wiles, becoming slightly suspicious and wrathful. 

"Mebbe a stranger might do? I reckon thar's one passin' in the hall. Call him in, --he'll do!"

Wiles opened the door a little impatiently, yet inquisitively, asDobbs passed. The man in bed called out, "Oh, stranger!" and, as Dobbsstopped, said, "Come yar. "

Dobbs entered a little timidly, as was his habit with strangers. 

"I don't know who you be--nor care, I reckon, " said the stranger. "Thisyer man"--pointing to Wiles--"is Wiles. I'm Josh Sibblee of Fresno, Member of Congress from the 4th Congressional District of Californy. I'm jist lying here, with a derringer into each hand, --jist lying herekivered up and holdin' in on'y to keep from blowin' the top o' thisd----d skunk's head off. I kinder feel I can't hold in any longer. WhatI want to say to ye, stranger, is that this yer skunk--which his nameis Wiles--hez bin tryin' his d--dest to get a bribe onto Josh, and Josh, outo respect for his constituents, is jist waitin' for some stranger towaltz in and stop the d--dest fight--"

"But, my dear Mr. Sibblee, there must be some mistake, " said Wilesearnestly. 

"Mistake? Strip me!"

"No! No!" said Wiles, hurriedly, as the simple-minded Dobbs was about todraw down the coverlid. 

"Take him away, " said the Hon. Mr. Sibblee, "before I disgrace myconstituency. They said I'd be in jail afore I get through the session. Ef you've got any humanity, stranger, snake him out, and pow'ful quick, too. "

Dobbs, quite white and aghast, looked at Wiles and hesitated. There wasa slight movement in the bed. Both men started for the door; and thenext minute it closed very decidedly on the member from Fresno. 

CHAPTER XI

HOW IT WAS LOBBIED FOR

The Hon. Pratt C. Gashwiler, M. C. , was of course unaware of theincident described in the last chapter. His secret, even if it had beendiscovered by Dobbs, was safe in that gentleman's innocent and honorablehands, and certainly was not of a quality that Mr. Wiles, at present, would have cared to expose. For, in spite of Mr. Wiles's discomfiture, he still had enough experience of character to know that the iratemember from Fresno would be satisfied with his own peculiar manner ofvindicating his own personal integrity, and would not make a publicscandal of it. Again, Wiles was convinced that Dobbs was equallyimplicated with Gashwiler, and would be silent for his own sake. So thatpoor Dobbs, as is too often the fate of simple but weak natures, hadfull credit for duplicity by every rascal in the land. 

From which it may be inferred that nothing occurred to disturb thesecurity of Gashwiler. When the door closed upon Mr. Wiles, he inditeda note which, with a costly but exceedingly distastefulbouquet, --rearranged by his own fat fingers, and discord and incongruityvisible in every combination of color, --he sent off by a specialmessenger. Then he proceeded to make his toilet, --an operation rarelygraceful or picturesque in our sex, and an insult to the spectator whenobesity is superadded. When he had put on a clean shirt, of which therewas grossly too much, and added a white waistcoat, that seemed to accenthis rotundity, he completed his attire with a black frock coat of thelatest style, and surveyed himself complacently before a mirror. It isto be recorded that, however satisfactory the result might have been toMr. Gashwiler, it was not so to the disinterested spectator. There aresome men on whom "that deformed thief, Fashion, " avenges himself bymaking their clothes appear perennially new. The gloss of the tailor'siron never disappears; the creases of the shelf perpetually rise injudgment against the wearer. Novelty was the general suggestion of Mr. Gashwiler's full-dress, --it was never his HABITUDE;--and "Our ownMake, " "Nobby, " and the "Latest Style, only $15, " was as patent on thelegislator's broad back as if it still retained the shop-man's ticket. 

Thus arrayed, within an hour he complacently followed the note and hisfloral offering. The house he sought had been once the residence ofa foreign Ambassador, who had loyally represented his government in asingle unimportant treaty, now forgotten, and in various receptions anddinners, still actively remembered by occasional visits to its salon;now the average dreary American parlor. "Dear me, " the fascinating Mr. Xwould say, "but do you know, love, in this very room I remember meetingthe distinguished Marquis of Monte Pio;" or perhaps the fashionableJones of the State Department instantly crushed the decayed friend hewas perfunctorily visiting by saying, "'Pon my soul, YOU here;--why, thelast time I was in this room I gossiped for an hour with the Countessde Castenet in that very corner. " For, with the recall of the aforesaidAmbassador, the mansion had become a boarding-place, kept by the wife ofa departmental clerk. 

Perhaps there was nothing in the history of the house more quaint andphilosophic than the story of its present occupant. Roger Fauquier hadbeen a departmental clerk for forty years. It was at once his practicalgood luck and his misfortune to have been early appointed to a positionwhich required a thorough and complete knowledge of the formulas androutine of a department that expended millions of the public funds. Fauquier, on a poor salary, diminishing instead of increasing with hisservice, had seen successive administrations bud and blossom and decay, but had kept his position through the fact that his knowledge was anecessity to the successive chiefs and employes. Once it was true thathe had been summarily removed by a new Secretary, to make room for acamp follower, whose exhaustive and intellectual services in a politicalcampaign had made him eminently fit for anything; but the alarmingdiscovery that the new clerk's knowledge of grammar and etymologywas even worse than that of the Secretary himself, and that, throughignorance of detail, the business of that department was retarded to adamage to the Government of over half a million of dollars, led to thereinstatement of Mr. Fauquier--AT A LOWER SALARY. For it was felt thatsomething was wrong somewhere, and as it had always been the custom ofCongress and the administration to cut down salaries as the first stepto reform, they made of Mr. Fauquier a moral example. A gentleman born, of somewhat expensive tastes, having lived up to his former salary, thischange brought another bread-winner into the field, Mrs. Fauquier, whotried, more or less unsuccessfully, to turn her old Southern habits ofhospitality to remunerative account. But as poor Fauquier could never beprevailed upon to present a bill to a gentleman, sir, and as some of thescions of the best Southern families were still waiting for, or hadbeen recently dismissed from, a position, the experiment was a pecuniaryfailure. Yet the house was of excellent repute and well patronized;indeed, it was worth something to see old Fauquier sitting at thehead of his own table, in something of his ancestral style, relatinganecdotes of great men now dead and gone, interrupted only by occasionalvisits from importunate tradesmen. 

Prominent among what Mr. Fauquier called his "little family" was ablack-eyed lady of great powers of fascination, and considerable localreputation as a flirt. Nevertheless, these social aberrations were amplycondoned by a facile and complacent husband, who looked with a lenientand even admiring eye upon the little lady's amusement, and to a certainextent lent a tacit indorsement to her conduct. Nobody minded Hopkinson;in the blaze of Mrs. Hopkinson's fascinations he was completely lostsight of. A few married women with unduly sensitive husbands, andseveral single ladies of the best and longest standing, reflectedseverely on her conduct. The younger men of course admired her, but Ithink she got her chief support from old fogies like ourselves. For itis your quiet, self-conceited, complacent, philosophic, broad-waistedpaterfamilias who, after all, is the one to whom the gay and giddy ofthe proverbially impulsive, unselfish sex owe their place in the socialfirmament. We are never inclined to be captious; we laugh at as afolly what our wives and daughters condemn as a fault; OUR "withers areunwrung, " yet we still confess to the fascinations of a pretty face. We know, bless us, from dear experience, the exact value of one woman'sopinion of another; we want our brilliant little friend to shine; itis only the moths who will burn their two-penny immature wings in theflame! And why should they not? Nature has been pleased to supply moremoths than candles! Go to!--give the pretty creature--be she maid, wife, or widow--a show! And so, my dear sir, while mater-familias bends herblack brows in disgust, we smile our superior little smile, and extendto Mistress Anonyma our gracious indorsement. And if giddiness isgrateful, or if folly is friendly, --well, of course, we can't help that. Indeed it rather proves our theory. 

I had intended to say something about Hopkinson; but really there isvery little to say. He was invariably good humored. A few ladies oncetried to show him that he really ought to feel worse than he did aboutthe conduct of his wife; and it is recorded that Hopkinson, in an excessof good humor and kindliness, promised to do so. Indeed the goodfellow was so accessible that it is said that young DeLancy of the TapeDepartment confided to Hopkinson his jealousy of a rival; and revealedthe awful secret that he (DeLancy) had reason to expect more loyaltyfrom his (Hopkinson's) wife. The good fellow is reported to havebeen very sympathetic, and to have promised Delaney to lend whateverinfluence he had with Mrs. Hopkinson in his favor. "You see, " he saidexplanatorily to DeLancy, "she has a good deal to attend to lately, andI suppose has got rather careless, --that's women's ways. But if Ican't bring her round I'll speak to Gashwiler, --I'll get him to use hisinfluence with Mrs. Hop. So cheer up, my boy, HE'LL make it all right. "

The appearance of a bouquet on the table of Mrs. Hopkinson was norare event; nevertheless, Mr. Gashwiler's was not there. Its hideouscontrasts had offended her woman's eye, --it is observable that goodtaste survives the wreck of all the other feminine virtues, --and she haddistributed it to make boutonnieres for other gentlemen. Yet, when heappeared, she said to him hastily, putting her little hand over thecardiac region:

"I'm so glad you came. But you gave me SUCH a fright an hour ago. "

Mr. Gashwiler was both pleased and astounded. "What have I done, my dearMrs. Hopkinson?" he began. 

"Oh, don't talk, " she said sadly. "What have you done, indeed! Why, yousent me that beautiful bouquet. I could not mistake your taste in thearrangement of the flowers;--but my husband was here. You know hisjealousy. I was obliged to conceal it from him. Never--promise menow--NEVER do it again. "

Mr. Gashwiler gallantly protested. 

"No! I am serious! I was so agitated: he must have seen me blush. "

Nothing but the gross flattery to this speech could have clouded itsmanifest absurdity to the Gashwiler consciousness. But Mr. Gashwilerhad already succumbed to the girlish half-timidity with which it wasuttered. Nevertheless, he could not help saying:

"But why should he be so jealous now? Only day before yesterday I sawSimpson of Duluth hand you a nosegay right before him!"

"Ah, " returned the lady, "he was outwardly calm THEN, but you knownothing of the scene that occurred between us after you left. "

"But, " gasped the practical Gashwiler, "Simpson had given your husbandthat contract, --a cool fifty thousand in his pocket!"

Mrs. Hopkinson looked as dignifiedly at Gashwiler as was consistent withfive feet three (the extra three inches being a pyramidal structure ofstraw-colored hair), a frond of faint curls, a pair of laughing blueeyes, and a small belted waist. Then she said, with a casting down ofher lids:

"You forget that my husband loves me. " And for once the minx appeared tolook penitent. It was becoming; but as it had been originally practicedin a simple white dress, relieved only with pale-blue ribbons, it wasnot entirely in keeping with be-flounced lavender and rose-coloredtrimmings. Yet the woman who hesitates between her moral expression andthe harmony of her dress is lost. And Mrs. Hopkinson was victrix by hervery audacity. 

Mr. Gashwiler was flattered. The most dissolute man likes the appearanceof virtue. "But graces and accomplishments like yours, dear Mrs. Hopkinson, " he said oleaginously, "belong to the whole country. "Which, with something between a courtesy and a strut, he endeavored torepresent. "And I shall want to avail myself of all, " he added, "in thematter of the Castro claim. A little supper at Welcker's, a glass or twoof champagne, and a single flash of those bright eyes, and the thing isdone. "

"But, " said Mrs. Hopkinson, "I've promised Josiah that I would give upall those frivolities, and although my conscience is clear, you know howpeople talk! Josiah hears it. Why, only last night, at a reception atthe Patagonian Minister's, every woman in the room gossiped about mebecause I led the german with him. As if a married woman, whosehusband was interested in the Government, could not be civil to therepresentative of a friendly power?"

Mr. Gashwiler did not see how Mr. Hopkinson's late contract forsupplying salt pork and canned provisions to the army of the UnitedStates should make his wife susceptible to the advances of foreignprinces; but he prudently kept that to himself. Still, not being himselfa diplomat, he could not help saying:

"But I understood that Mr. Hopkinson did not object to your interestingyourself in this claim, and you know some of the stock--"

The lady started, and said:

"Stock! Dear Mr. Gashwiler, for Heaven's sake don't mention that hideousname to me. Stock, I am sick of it! Have you gentlemen no other topicfor a lady?"

She punctuated her sentence with a mischievous look at her interlocutor. For a second time I regret to say that Mr. Gashwiler succumbed. TheRoman constituency at Remus, it is to be hoped, were happily ignorant ofthis last defection of their great legislator. Mr. Gashwiler instantlyforgot his theme, --began to ply the lady with a certain bovine-likegallantry, which it is to be said to her credit she parried with aplayful, terrier-like dexterity, when the servant suddenly announced, "Mr. Wiles. "

Gashwiler started. Not so Mrs. Hopkinson, who, however, prudently andquietly removed her own chair several inches from Gashwiler's. 

"Do you know Mr. Wiles?" she asked pleasantly. 

"No! That is, I--ah--yes, I may say I have had some business relationswith him, " responded Gashwiler rising. 

"Won't you stay?" she added pleadingly. "Do!"

Mr. Gashwiler's prudence always got the better of his gallantry. "Notnow, " he responded in some nervousness. "Perhaps I had better go now, in view of what you have just said about gossip. You need not mention myname to this-er--this--Mr. Wiles. " And with one eye on the door, and anawkward dash of his lips at the lady's fingers, he withdrew. 

There was no introductory formula to Mr. Wiles's interview. He dashed atonce in medias res. "Gashwiler knows a woman that, he says, can help usagainst that Spanish girl who is coming here with proofs, prettiness, fascination, and what not! You must find her out. "

"Why?" asked the lady laughingly. 

"Because I don't trust that Gashwiler. A woman with a pretty face and anounce of brains could sell him out; aye, and US with him. "

"Oh, say TWO ounces of brains. Mr. Wiles, Mr. Gashwiler is no fool. "

"Possibly, except when your sex is concerned, and it is very likely thatthe woman is his superior. "

"I should think so, " said Mrs. Hopkinson with a mischievous look. 

"Ah, you know her, then?"

"Not so well as I know him, " said Mrs. H. Quite seriously. "I wish Idid. "

"Well, you'll find out if she's to be trusted! You are laughing, --it isa serious matter! This woman--"

Mrs. Hopkinson dropped him a charming courtesy and said, "C'est moi!"

CHAPTER XII

A RACE FOR IT

Royal Thatcher worked hard. That the boyish little painter who sharedhis hospitality at the "Blue Mass" mine should afterward have littlepart in his active life seemed not inconsistent with his habits. Atpresent the mine was his only mistress, claiming his entire time, exasperating him with fickleness, but still requiring that supremedevotion of which his nature was capable. It is possible that MissCarmen saw this too, and so set about with feminine tact, if not tosupplement, at least to make her rival less pertinacious and absorbing. Apart from this object, she zealously labored in her profession, yetwith small pecuniary result, I fear. Local art was at a discount inCalifornia. The scenery of the country had not yet become famous; ratherit was reserved for a certain Eastern artist, already famous, to makeit so; and people cared little for the reproduction, under their verynoses, of that which they saw continually with their own eyes, andvalued not. So that little Mistress Carmen was fain to divert herartist soul to support her plump little material body; and madedivers excursions into the regions of ceramic art, painting on velvet, illuminating missals, decorating china, and the like. I have in mypossession some wax flowers--a startling fuchsia and a bewilderingdahlia--sold for a mere pittance by this little lady, whose pictureslately took the prize at a foreign exhibition, shortly after she hadbeen half starved by a California public, and claimed by a Californiapress as its fostered child of genius. 

Of these struggles and triumphs Thatcher had no knowledge; yet he wasperhaps more startled than he would own to himself when, one Decemberday, he received this despatch: "Come to Washington at once. --Carmen deHaro. "

"Carmen de Haro!" I grieve to state that such was the preoccupation ofthis man, elected by fate to be the hero of the solitary amatory episodeof his story, that for a moment he could not recall her. When the honestlittle figure that had so manfully stood up against him, and had provedher sex by afterwards running away from him, came back at last to hismemory, he was at first mystified and then self-reproachful. He hadbeen, he felt vaguely, untrue to himself. He had been remiss to theself-confessed daughter of his enemy. Yet why should she telegraph tohim, and what was she doing in Washington? To all these speculationsit is to be said to his credit that he looked for no sentimentalor romantic answer. Royal Thatcher was naturally modest andself-depreciating in his relations to the other sex, as indeed most menwho are apt to be successful with women generally are, despite a vastdegree of superannuated bosh to the contrary. To the half dozen womenwho are startled by sheer audacity into submission there are scores whoare piqued by a self-respectful patience; and where a women has to dohalf the wooing, she generally makes a pretty sure thing of it. 

In his bewilderment Thatcher had overlooked a letter lying on his table. It was from his Washington lawyer. The concluding paragraph caught hiseye, --"Perhaps it would be well if you came here yourself. Roscommon ishere; and they say there is a niece of Garcia's, lately appeared, who islikely to get up a strong social sympathy for the old Mexican. I don'tknow that they expect to prove anything by her; but I'm told sheis attractive and clever, and has enlisted the sympathies of thedelegation. " Thatcher laid the letter down a little indignantly. Strongmen are quite as liable as weak women are to sudden inconsistencies onany question they may have in common. What right had this poor littlebud he had cherished, --he was quite satisfied now that he had cherishedher, and really had suffered from her absence, --what right had she tosuddenly blossom in the sunshine of power to be, perhaps, plucked andworn by one of his enemies? He did not agree with his lawyer that shewas in any way connected with his enemies: he trusted to her masculineloyalty that far. But here was something vaguely dangerous to thefeminine mind, --position, flattery, power. He was almost as firmlysatisfied now that he had been wronged and neglected as he had beenpositive a few moments before that he had been remiss in his attention. The irritation, although momentary, was enough to decide this strongman. He telegraphed to San Francisco; and, having missed the steamer, secured an overland passage to Washington; thought better of it, andpartly changed his mind an hour after the ticket was purchased; but, manlike, having once made a practical step in a wrong direction, hekept on rather than admit an inconsistency to himself. Yet he was notentirely satisfied that his journey was a business one. The impulsive, weak little Mistress Carmen had prudently scored one against the strongman. 

Only a small part of the present great trans-continental railway at thistime had been built, and was but piers at either end of a desolate andwild expanse as yet unbridged. When the overland traveller left therail at Reno, he left, as it were, civilization with it; and, until hereached the Nebraska frontier, the rest of his road was only theold emigrant trail traversed by the coaches of the Overland Company. Excepting a part of "Devil's Canyon, " the way was unpicturesque andflat; and the passage of the Rocky Mountains, far from suggesting thealleged poetry of that region, was only a reminder of those steriledistances of a level New England landscape. 

The journey was a dreary monotony that was scarcely enlivened by itsdiscomforts, never amounting to actual accident or incident, but utterlydestructive to all nervous tissue. Insanity often supervened. "On thethird day out, " said Hank Monk, driver, speaking casually but charitablyof a "fare, "--"on the third day out, after axing no end of questions andgetting no answers, he took to chewing straws that he picked outer thecushion, and kussin' to hisself. From that very day I knew it wasall over with him, and I handed him over to his friends at 'Shy Ann, 'strapped to the back seat, and ravin' and cussin' at Ben Holliday, thegent'manly proprietor. " It is presumed that the unfortunate tourist'sindignation was excited at the late Mr. Benjamin Holliday, then theproprietor of the line, --an evidence of his insanity that no one whoknew that large-hearted, fastidious, and elegantly-cultured Californian, since allied to foreign nobility, will for a moment doubt. 

Mr. Royal Thatcher was too old and experienced a mountaineer to do aughtbut accept patiently and cynically his brother Californian's method ofincreasing his profits. As it was generally understood that any onewho came from California by that route had some dark design, the victimreceived little sympathy. Thatcher's equable temperament and indomitablewill stood him in good stead, and helped him cheerfully in thisemergency. He ate his scant meals, and otherwise took care of thefunctions of his weak human nature, when and where he could, withoutgrumbling, and at times earned even the praise of his driver by hisability to "rough it. " Which "roughing it, " by the way, meant theability of the passengers to accept the incompetency of the Company. It is true there were times when he regretted that he had not taken thesteamer; but then he reflected that he was one of a Vigilance Committee, sworn to hang that admirable man, the late Commodore CorneliusVanderbilt, for certain practices and cruelties done upon the bodies ofcertain steerage passengers by his line, and for divers irregularitiesin their transportation. I mention this fact merely to show how sopractical and stout a voyager as Thatcher might have confounded theperplexities attending the administration of a great steamship companywith selfish greed and brutality; and that he, with other Californians, may not have known the fact, since recorded by the Commodore's familyclergyman, that the great millionaire was always true to the hymns ofhis childhood. 

Nevertheless, Thatcher found time to be cheerful and helpful to hisfellow passengers, and even to be so far interesting to "Yuba Bill, "the driver, as to have the box seat placed at his disposal. "But, " saidThatcher, in some concern, "the box seat was purchased by that othergentleman in Sacramento. He paid extra for it, and his name's on yourway-bill!" "That, " said Yuba Bill, scornfully, "don't fetch me even efhe'd chartered the whole shebang. Look yar, do you reckon I'm goin' tospile my temper by setting next to a man with a game eye? And such aneye! Gewhillikins! Why, darn my skin, the other day when we war wateringat Webster's, he got down and passed in front of the off-leader, --thatyer pinto colt that's bin accustomed to injins, grizzlies, and buffalo, and I'm bless ef, when her eye tackled his, ef she didn't jist git upand rar round that I reckoned I'd hev to go down and take them blindersoff from HER eyes and clap on HIS. " "But he paid the money, and isentitled to his seat, " persisted Thatcher. "Mebbe he is--in the officeof the Kempeny, " growled Yuba Bill; "but it's time some folks knowedthat out in the plains I run this yer team myself. "--A fact which wasself-evident to most of the passengers. "I suppose his authority isas absolute on this dreary waste as a ship captain's in mid ocean, "exclaimed Thatcher to the baleful-eyed stranger. Mr. Wiles--whom thereader has recognized--assented with the public side of his face, butlooked vengeance at Yuba Bill with the other, while Thatcher, innocentof the presence of one of his worst enemies, placated Bill so far asto restore Wiles to his rights. Wiles thanked him. "Shall I havethe pleasure of your company far?" Wiles asked insinuatingly. "ToWashington, " replied Thatcher frankly. "Washington is a gay city duringthe session, " again suggested the stranger. "I'm going on business, "said Thatcher bluntly. 

A trifling incident occurred at Pine-Tree Crossing which did notheighten Yuba Bill's admiration of the stranger. As Bill opened thedouble-locked box in the "boot" of the coach--sacred to Wells, Fargo &Co. 's Express and the Overland Company's treasures--Mr. Wiles perceiveda small, black morocco portemanteau among the parcels. "Ah, you carrybaggage there too?" he said sweetly. "Not often, " responded Yuba Billshortly. "Ah, this then contains valuables?" "It belongs to that manwhose seat you've got, " said Yuba Bill, who, for insulting purposesof his own, preferred to establish the fiction that Wiles was aninterloper; "and ef he reckons, in a sorter mixed kempeny like this, to lock up his portmantle, I don't know who's business it is. Who?"continued Bill, lashing himself into a simulated rage, "who, in blank, is running this yer team? Hey? Mebbe you think, sittin' up thar on thebox seat, you are. Mebbe you think you kin see round corners with thatthar eye, and kin pull up for teams round corners, on down grades, a mile ahead?" But here Thatcher, who, with something of Lancelot'sconcern for Modred, had a noble pity for all infirmities, interfered sosternly that Yuba Bill stopped. 

On the fourth day they struck a blinding snow-storm, while ascending thedreary plateau that henceforward for six hundred miles was to be theirroadbed. The horses, after floundering through the drift, gave outcompletely on reaching the next station, and the prospects ahead, toall but the experienced eye, looked doubtful. A few passengers advisedtaking to sledges, others a postponement of the journey until theweather changed. Yuba Bill alone was for pressing forward as they were. "Two miles more and we're on the high grade, whar the wind is strongenough to blow you through the windy, and jist peart enough to pack awayover them cliffs every inch of snow that falls. I'll jist skirmish roundin and out o' them drifts on these four wheels whar ye can't drag oneo' them flat-bottomed dry-goods boxes through a drift. " Bill had aCalifornia whip's contempt for a sledge. But he was warmly seconded byThatcher, who had the next best thing to experience, the instinctthat taught him to read character, and take advantage of anotherman's experience. "Them that wants to stop kin do so, " said Billauthoritatively, cutting the Gordian knot; "them as wants to take asledge can do so, --thar's one in the barn. Them as wants to go on withme and the relay will come on. " Mr. Wiles selected the sledge anda driver, a few remained for the next stage, and Thatcher, with twoothers, decided to accompany Yuba Bill. These changes took up somevaluable time; and the storm continuing, the stage was run under theshed, the passengers gathering around the station fire; and not untilafter midnight did Yuba Bill put in the relays. "I wish you a goodjourney, " said Wiles, as he drove from the shed as Bill entered. Billvouchsafed no reply, but, addressing himself to the driver, said curtly, as if giving an order for the delivery of goods, "Shove him out atRawlings, " and passed contemptuously around to the tail board of thesled, and returned to the harnessing of his relay. 

The moon came out and shone high as Yuba Bill once more took the reinsin his hands. The wind, which instantly attacked them as they reachedthe level, seemed to make the driver's theory plausible, and for half amile the roadbed was swept clean, and frozen hard. Further on a tongueof snow, extending from a boulder to the right, reached across theirpath to the height of two or three feet. But Yuba Bill dashed through apart of it, and by skillful maneuvering circumvented the rest. But evenas the obstacle was passed, the coach dropped with an ominous lurch onone side, and the off fore wheel flew off in the darkness. Bill threwthe horses back on their haunches; but, before their momentum could bechecked, the near hind wheel slipped away, the vehicle rocked violently, plunged backwards and forwards, and stopped. 

Yuba Bill was on the road in an instant with his lantern. Then followedan outbreak of profanity which I regret, for artistic purposes, exceedsthat generous limit which a sympathizing public has already extended tome in the explication of character. Let me state, therefore, that ina very few moments he succeeded in disparaging the characters of hisemployers, their male and female relatives, the coach builder, thestation keeper, the road on which he travelled, and the travellersthemselves, with occasional broad expletives addressed to himself andhis own relatives. For the spirit of this and a more cultivated poetryof expression, I beg to refer the temperate reader to the 3d chapter ofJob. 

The passengers knew Bill, and sat, conservative, patient, and expectant. As yet the cause of the catastrophe was not known. At last Thatcher'svoice came from the box seat:

"What's up, Bill?"

"Not a blank lynch pin in the whole blank coach, " was the answer. 

There was a dead silence. Yuba Bill executed a wild war dance ofhelpless rage. 

"Blank the blank ENCHANTED thing to blank!"

(I beg here to refer the fastidious and cultivated reader to the onlyadjective I have dared transcribe of this actual oath which I once hadthe honor of hearing. He will I trust not fail to recognize the oldclassic daemon in this wild western objurgation. )

"Who did it?" asked Thatcher. 

Yuba Bill did not reply, but dashed up again to the box, unlocked the"boot, " and screamed out:

"The man that stole your portmantle, --Wiles!"

Thatcher laughed:

"Don't worry about that, Bill. A 'biled' shirt, an extra collar, and afew papers. Nothing more. "

Yuba Bill slowly descended. When he reached the ground, he pluckedThatcher aside by his coat sleeve:

"Ye don't mean to say ye had nothing in that bag ye was trying to getaway with?"

"No, " said the laughing Thatcher frankly. 

"And that Wiles warn't one o' them detectives?"

"Not to my knowledge, certainly. "

Yuba Bill sighed sadly, and returned to assist in the replacing of thecoach on its wheels again. 

"Never mind, Bill, " said one of the passengers sympathizingly, "we'llcatch that man Wiles at Rawlings sure;" and he looked around at theinchoate vigilance committee, already "rounding into form" about him. 

"Ketch him!" returned Yuba Bill, derisively, "why we've got to go backto the station; and afore we're off agin he's pinted fur Clarmont on therelay we lose. Ketch him! H-ll's full of such ketches!"

There was clearly nothing to do but to go back to the station to awaitthe repairing of the coach. While this was being done Yuba Bill againdrew Thatcher aside:

"I allers suspected that chap's game eye, but I didn't somehow allowfor anything like this. I reckoned it was only the square thing tolook arter things gen'rally, and 'specially your traps. So, to purventtroubil, and keep things about ekal, ez he was goin' away, I sorterlifted this yer bag of hiz outer the tail board of his sleigh. I don'tknow as it is any exchange or compensation, but it may give ye a chanceto spot him agin, or him you. It strikes me as bein' far-minded andsquar';" and with these words he deposited at the feet of the astoundedThatcher the black travelling bag of Mr. Wiles. 

"But, Bill, --see here! I can't take this!" interrupted Thatcher hastily. "You can't swear that he's taken my bag, --and--and, --blank it all, --thiswon't do, you know. I've no right to this man's things, even if--"

"Hold your hosses, " said Bill gravely; "I ondertook to take chargeo' your traps. I didn't--at least that d----d wall-eyed--Thar's aportmantle! I don't know who's it is. Take it. "

Half amused, half embarrassed, yet still protesting, Thatcher took thebag in his hands. 

"Ye might open it in my presence, " suggested Yuba Bill gravely. 

Thatcher, half laughingly, did so. It was full of papers andsemi-legal-looking documents. Thatcher's own name on one of them caughthis eye; he opened the paper hastily and perused it. The smile fadedfrom his lips. 

"Well, " said Yuba Bill, "suppose we call it a fair exchange at present. "

Thatcher was still examining the papers. Suddenly this cautious, strong-minded man looked up into Yuba Bill's waiting face, and saidquietly, in the despicable slang of the epoch and region:

"It's a go! Suppose we do. "

CHAPTER XIII

HOW IT BECAME FAMOUS

Yuba Bill was right in believing that Wiles would lose no time atRawlings. He left there on a fleet horse before Bill had returned withthe broken-down coach to the last station, and distanced the telegramsent to detain him two hours. Leaving the stage road and its dangeroustelegraphic stations, he pushed southward to Denver over the armytrail, in company with a half-breed packer, crossing the Missouri beforeThatcher had reached Julesburg. When Thatcher was at Omaha, Wiles wasalready in St. Louis; and as the Pullman car containing the hero ofthe "Blue Mass" mine rolled into Chicago, Wiles was already walking thestreets of the national capital. Nevertheless, he had time en routeto sink in the waters of the North Platte, with many expressions ofdisgust, the little black portmanteau belonging to Thatcher, containinghis dressing case, a few unimportant letters, and an extra shirt, towonder why simple men did not travel with their important documentsand valuables, and to set on foot some prudent and cautious inquiriesregarding his own lost carpet bag and its important contents. 

But for these trifles he had every reason to be satisfied with theprogress of his plans. "It's all right, " said Mrs. Hopkinson merrily;"while you and Gashwiler have been working with your 'stock, ' andtreating the whole world as if it could be bribed, I've done more withthat earnest, self-believing, self-deceiving, and perfectly patheticRoscommon than all you fellows put together. Why, I've told his pitifulstory, and drawn tears from the eyes of Senators and Cabinet Ministers. More than that, I've introduced him into society, put him in a dresscoat, --such a figure!--and you know how the best folk worship everythingthat is outre as the sincere thing. I've made him a complete success. Why, only the other night, when Senator Misnancy and Judge Fitzdawdlewere here, after making him tell his story, --which you know I think hereally believes, --I sang 'There came to the beach a poor Exile of Erin, 'and my husband told me afterwards it was worth at least a dozen votes. "

"But about this rival of yours, --this niece of Garcia's?"

"Another of your blunders; you men know nothing of women. Firstly, she'sa swarthy little brunette, with dots for eyes; and strides like a man, dresses like a dowdy, don't wear stays, and has no style. Then, she's asingle woman, and alone; and, although she affects to be an artist, andhas Bohemian ways, don't you see she can't go into society without achaperon or somebody to go with her? Nonsense. "

"But, " persisted Wiles, "she must have some power; there's Judge Masonand Senator Peabody, who are constantly talking about her; and Dinwiddieof Virginia escorted her through the Capitol the other day. "

Mistress Hopkinson laughed. "Mason and Peabody aspire to be thoughtliterary and artistic, and Dinwiddie wanted to pique ME!"

"But Thatcher is no fool--"

"Is Thatcher a lady's man?" queried the lady suddenly. 

"Hardly, I should say, " responded Wiles. "He pretends to be absorbed inhis swindle and devoted to his mine; and I don't think that even you--"he stopped with a slight sneer. 

"There, you are misunderstanding me again, and, what is worse, you aremisunderstanding your case. Thatcher is pleased with her because he hasprobably seen no one else. Wait till he comes to Washington and has anopportunity for comparison;" and she cast a frank glance at her mirror, where Wiles, with a sardonic bow, left her standing. 

Mr. Gashwiler was quite as confident of his own success with Congress. "We are within a few days of the end of the session. We will manage tohave it taken up and rushed through before that fellow Thatcher knowswhat he is about. "

"If it could be done before he gets here, " said Wiles, "it's areasonably sure thing. He is delayed two days: he might have beendelayed longer. " Here Mr. Wiles sighed. If the accident had happenedon a mountain road, and the stage had been precipitated over the abyss, what valuable time would have been saved, and success become a surety. But Mr. Wiles's functions as an advocate did not include murder; atleast, he was doubtful if it could be taxed as costs. 

"We need have no fears, sir, " resumed Mr. Gashwiler; "The matter is nowin the hands of the highest tribunal of appeal in the country. Itwill meet, sir, with inflexible justice. I have already prepared someremarks--"

"By the way, " interrupted Wiles infelicitously, "where's your youngman, --your private secretary, --Dobbs?"

The Congressman for a moment looked confused. "He is not here. And Imust correct your error in applying that term to him. I have never putmy confidence in the hands of any one. "

"But you introduced him to me as your secretary?"

"A mere honorary title, sir. A brevet rank. I might, it is true, havethought to repose such a trust in him. But I was deceived, sir, as Ifear I am too apt to be when I permit my feelings as a man to overcomemy duty as an American legislator. Mr. Dobbs enjoyed my patronage andthe opportunity it gave me to introduce him into public life only toabuse it. He became, I fear, deeply indebted. His extravagance wasunlimited, his ambition unbounded, but without, sir, a cash basis. Iadvanced money to him from time to time upon the little property youso generously extended to him for his services. But it was quicklydissipated. Yet, sir, such is the ingratitude of man that his familylately appealed to me for assistance. I felt it was necessary tobe stern, and I refused. I would not for the sake of his family sayanything, but I have missed, sir, books from my library. On the dayafter he left, two volumes of Patent Office reports and a Blue Book ofCongress, purchased that day by me at a store on Pennsylvania avenue, were MISSING, --missing! I had difficulty, sir, great difficulty inkeeping it from the papers!"

As Mr. Wiles had heard the story already from Gashwiler's acquaintances, with more or less free comment on the gifted legislator's economy, hecould not help thinking that the difficulty had been great indeed. Buthe only fixed his malevolent eye on Gashwiler and said:

"So he is gone, eh?"

"Yes. "

"And you've made an enemy of him? That's bad. "

Mr. Gashwiler tried to look dignifiedly unconcerned; but something inhis visitor's manner made him uneasy. 

"I say it is bad, if you have. Listen. Before I left here, I found at aboardinghouse where he had boarded, and still owed a bill, a trunk whichthe landlord retained. Opening it, I found some letters and papers toyours, with certain memoranda of his, which I thought ought to be inYOUR possession. As an alleged friend of his, I redeemed the trunk bypaying the amount of his bill, and secured the more valuable papers. "

Gashwiler, whose face had grown apoplectically suffused as Wiles wenton, at last gasped: "But you got the trunk, and have the papers?"

"Unfortunately, no; and that's why it's bad. "

"But, good God! what have you done with them?"

"I've lost them somewhere on the Overland Road. "

Mr. Gashwiler sat for a few moments speechless, vacillating between apurple rage and a pallid fear. Then he said hoarsely:

"They are all blank forgeries, --every one of them. "

"Oh, no!" said Wiles, smiling blandly on his dexter side, and enjoyingthe whole scene malevolently with his sinister eye. "YOUR papers are allgenuine, and I won't say are not all right, but unfortunately I had inthe same bag some memoranda of my own for the use of my client, that, you understand, might be put to some bad use if found by a clever man. "

The two rascals looked at each other. There is on the whole really verylittle "honor among thieves, "--at least great ones, --and the inferiorrascal succumbed at the reflection of what HE might do if he were in theother rascal's place. "See here, Wiles, " he said, relaxing his dignitywith the perspiration that oozed from every pore, and made the collar ofhis shirt a mere limp rag. "See here, WE"--this first use of the pluralwas equivalent to a confession--"we must get them papers. "

"Of course, " said Wiles coolly, "if we CAN, and if Thatcher doesn't getwind of them. "

"He cannot. "

"He was on the coach when I lost them, coming East. "

Mr. Gashwiler paled again. In the emergency he had recourse to thesideboard and a bottle, forgetting Wiles. Ten minutes before Wiles wouldhave remained seated; but it is recorded that he rose, took the bottlefrom the gifted Gashwiler's fingers, helped himself FIRST, and then satdown. 

"Yes, but, my boy, " said Gashwiler, now rapidly changing situations withthe cooler Wiles; "yes, but, old fellow, " he added, poking Wiles with afat forefinger, "don't you see the whole thing will be up before he getshere?"

"Yes, " said Wiles gloomily, "but those lazy, easy, honest men have away of popping up just at the nick of time. They never need hurry; allthings wait for them. Why, don't you remember that on the very day Mrs. Hopkinson and I and you got the President to sign that patent, that veryday one of them d--n fellows turns up from San Francisco or Australia, having taken his own time to get here, --gets here about half an hourafter the President had signed the patent and sent it over to theoffice, finds the right man to introduce him to the President, has atalk with him, makes him sign an order countermanding its issuance, andundoes all that has been done in six years in one hour. "

"Yes, but Congress is a tribunal that does not revoke its decrees, "said Gashwiler with a return of his old manner; "at least, " he added, observing an incredulous shrug in the shoulder of his companion, "atleast DURING THE SESSION. "

"We shall see, " said Wiles, quietly taking his hat. 

"We shall see, sir, " said the member from Remus with dignity. 

CHAPTER XIV

WHAT CULTURE DID FOR IT

There was at this time in the Senate of the United States an eminent andrespected gentleman, scholarly, orderly, honorable, and radical, --thefit representative of a scholarly, orderly, honorable, and radicalCommonwealth. For many years he had held his trust with consciousrectitude, and a slight depreciation of other forms of merit; and foras many years had been as regularly returned to his seat by hisconstituency with equally conscious rectitude in themselves and an equalskepticism regarding others. Removed by his nature beyond the reach ofcertain temptations, and by circumstances beyond even the knowledge ofothers, his social and political integrity was spotless. An orator andpractical debater, his refined tastes kept him from personality, and thepublic recognition of the complete unselfishness of his motives and themagnitude of his dogmas protected him from scurrility. His principleshad never been appealed to by a bribe; he had rarely been approached byan emotion. 

A man of polished taste in art and literature, and possessing the meansto gratify it, his luxurious home was filled with treasures hehad himself collected, and further enhanced by the stamp of hisappreciation. His library had not only the elegance of adornment thathis wealth could bring and his taste approve, but a certain refinednegligence of habitual use, and the easy disorder of the artist'sworkshop. All this was quickly noted by a young girl who stood on itsthreshold at the close of a dull January day. 

The card that had been brought to the Senator bore the name of "Carmende Haro"; and modestly in the right hand corner, in almost microscopicscript, the further description of herself as "Artist. " Perhaps thepicturesqueness of the name, and its historic suggestion caught thescholar's taste, for when to his request, through his servant, that shewould be kind enough to state her business, she replied as frankly thather business was personal to himself, he directed that she should beadmitted. Then entrenching himself behind his library table, overlookinga bastion of books, and a glacis of pamphlets and papers, and throwinginto his forehead and eyes an expression of utter disqualification foranything but the business before him, he calmly awaited the intruder. 

She came, and for an instant stood, hesitatingly, framing herself asa picture in the door. Mrs. Hopkinson was right, --she had "no style, "unless an original and half-foreign quaintness could be called so. Therewas a desperate attempt visible to combine an American shawl with thehabits of a mantilla, and it was always slipping from one shoulder, that was so supple and vivacious as to betray the deficiencies of aneducation in stays. There was a cluster of black curls around herlow forehead, fitting her so closely as to seem to be a part of theseal-skin cap she wore. 

Once, from the force of habit, she attempted to put her shawl overher head and talk through the folds gathered under her chin, but anastonished look from the Senator checked her. Nevertheless, he feltrelieved, and rising, motioned her to a chair with a heartiness he wouldhave scarcely shown to a Parisian toilleta. And when, with two or threequick, long steps, she reached his side, and showed, a frank, innocent, but strong and determined little face, feminine only in its flash of eyeand beauty of lip and chin curves, he put down the pamphlet he had takenup somewhat ostentatiously, and gently begged to know her business. 

I think I have once before spoken of her voice, --an organ more oftencultivated by my fair country-women for singing than for speaking, which, considering that much of our practical relations with the sex arecarried on without the aid of an opera score, seems a mistaken notion oftheirs, --and of its sweetness, gentle inflexion, and musical emphasis. She had the advantage of having been trained in a musical language, andcame of a race with whom catarrhs and sore throats were rare. So thatin a few brief phrases she sang the Senator into acquiescence as sheimparted the plain libretto of her business, --namely, a "desire to seesome of his rare engravings. "

Now the engravings in question were certain etchings of the early GreatApprentices of the art, and were, I am happy to believe, extremely rare. From my unprofessional view they were exceedingly bad, --showing the meregenesis of something since perfected, but dear, of course, to thetrue collector's soul. I don't believe that Carmen really admired themeither. But the minx knew that the Senator prided himself on havingthe only "pot-hooks" of the great "A, " or the first artistic efforts of"B, "--I leave the real names to be filled in by the connoisseur, --andthe Senator became interested. For the last year, two or three of theseabominations had been hanging in his study, utterly ignored by thecasual visitor. But here was appreciation! "She was, " she added, "only apoor young artist, unable to purchase such treasures, but equally unableto resist the opportunity afforded her, even at the risk of seemingbold, or of obtruding upon a great man's privacy, " &c. &c. 

This flattery, which, if offered in the usual legal tender of thecountry, would have been looked upon as counterfeit, delivered here ina foreign accent, with a slightly tropical warmth, was accepted by theSenator as genuine. These children of the Sun are so impulsive! We, of course, feel a little pity for the person who thus transcends ourstandard of good taste and violates our conventional canon, --but theyare always sincere. The cold New Englander saw nothing wrong in oneor two direct and extravagant compliments, that would have insured hisvisitor's early dismissal if tendered in the clipped metallic phrases ofthe Commonwealth he represented. 

So that in a few moments the black, curly head of the little artist andthe white, flowing locks of the Senator were close together bendingover the rack that contained the engravings. It was then that Carmen, listening to a graphic description of the early rise of Art in theNetherlands, forgot herself and put her shawl around her head, holdingits folds in her little brown hand. In this situation they were, at different times during the next two hours, interrupted by fiveCongressmen, three Senators, a Cabinet officer, and a Judge of theSupreme Bench, --each of whom was quickly but courteously dismissed. Popular sentiment, however, broke out in the hall. 

"Well, I'm blanked, but this gets me. " (The speaker was a Territorialdelegate. )

"At his time o' life, too, lookin' over pictures with a gal young enoughto be his grandchild. " (This from a venerable official, since suspectedof various erotic irregularities. )

"She don't handsome any. " (The honorable member from Dakota. )

"This accounts for his protracted silence during the sessions. " (Aserious colleague from the Senator's own State. )

"Oh, blank it all!" (Omnes. )

Four went home to tell their wives. There are few things more touchingin the matrimonial compact than the superb frankness with which eachconfides to each the various irregularities of their friends. It isupon these sacred confidences that the firm foundations of marriage restunshaken. 

Of course the objects of this comment, at least ONE of them, were quiteoblivious. "I trust, " said Carmen, timidly, when they had for the fourthtime regarded in rapt admiration an abominable something by someDutch wood-chopper, "I trust I am not keeping you from your greatfriends:"--her pretty eyelids were cast down in tremulous distress:--"Ishould never forgive myself. Perhaps it is important business of theState?"

"Oh, dear, no! THEY will come again, --it's THEIR business. "

The Senator meant it kindly. It was as near the perilous edge of acompliment as your average cultivated Boston man ever ventures, andCarmen picked it up, femininely, by its sentimental end. "And I supposeI shall not trouble you again?"

"I shall always be proud to place the portfolio at your disposal. Command me at any time, " said the Senator, with dignity. 

"You are kind. You are good, " said Carmen, "and I--I'm but, --lookyou, --only a poor girl from California, that you know not. "

"Pardon me, I know your country well. " And indeed he could have told herthe exact number of bushels of wheat to the acre in her own county ofMonterey, its voting population, its political bias. Yet of the moreimportant product before him, after the manner of book-read men, he knewnothing. 

Carmen was astonished, but respectful. It transpired presently that shewas not aware of the rapid growth of the silk worm in her own district, knew nothing of the Chinese question, and very little of the Americanmining laws. Upon these questions the Senator enlightened her fully. "Your name is historic, by the way, " he said pleasantly. "There was aKnight of Alcantara, a 'De Haro, ' one of the emigrants with Las Casas. "

Carmen nodded her head quickly, "Yes; my great-great-great-g-r-e-a-tgrandfather!"

The Senator stared. 

"Oh, yes. I am the niece of Victor Castro, who married my father'ssister. "

"The Victor Castro of the 'Blue Mass' mine?" asked the Senator abruptly. 

"Yes, " she said quietly. 

Had the Senator been of the Gashwiler type, he would have expressedhimself, after the average masculine fashion, by a long-drawn whistle. But his only perceptible appreciation of a sudden astonishment andsuspicion in his mind was a lowering of the social thermometer of theroom so decided that poor Carmen looked up innocently, chilled, and drewher shawl closer around her shoulders. 

"I have something more to ask, " said Carmen, hanging her head, --"it is agreat, oh, a very great favor. "

The Senator had retreated behind his bastion of books again, and wasvisibly preparing for an assault. He saw it all now. He had been, insome vague way, deluded. He had given confidential audience to the nieceof one of the Great Claimants before Congress. The inevitable axe hadcome to the grindstone. What might not this woman dare ask of him?He was the more implacable that he felt he had already beenprepossessed--and honestly prepossessed--in her favor. He was angry withher for having pleased him. Under the icy polish of his manner therewere certain Puritan callosities caused by early straight-lacing. He wasnot yet quite free from his ancestor's cheerful ethics that Nature, as represented by an Impulse, was as much to be restrained as Orderrepresented by a Quaker. 

Without apparently noticing his manner, Carmen went on, with a certainpotential freedom of style, gesture, and manner scarcely to be indicatedin her mere words. "You know, then, I am of Spanish blood, and that, what was my adopted country, our motto was, 'God and Liberty. ' It wasof you, sir, --the great Emancipator, --the apostle of that Liberty, --thefriend of the down-trodden and oppressed, --that I, as a child, firstknew. In the histories of this great country I have read of you, I havelearned your orations. I have longed to hear you in your own pulpitdeliver the creed of my ancestors. To hear you, of yourself, speak, ah!Madre de Dios! what shall I say, --speak the oration eloquent, --to makethe--what you call--the debate, that is what I have for so longhoped. Eh! Pardon, --you are thinking me foolish, --wild, eh?--a smallchild, --eh?"

Becoming more and more dialectical as she went on, she said suddenly, "Ihave you of myself offended. You are mad of me as a bold, bad child? Itis so?"

The Senator, as visibly becoming limp and weak again behind hisentrenchments, managed to say, "Oh, no!" then, "really!" and finally, "Tha-a-nks!"

"I am here but for a day. I return to California in a day, as it wereto-morrow. I shall never, never hear you speak in your place in theCapitol of this great country?"

The Senator said hastily that he feared--he in fact was convinced--thathis duty during this session was required more at his desk, in thecommittee work, than in speaking, &c. , &c. 

"Ah, " said Carmen sadly, "it is true, then, all this that I have heard. It is true that what they have told me, --that you have given up thegreat party, --that your voice is not longer heard in the old--what youcall this--eh--the old ISSUES?"

"If any one has told you that, Miss De Haro, " responded the Senatorsharply, "he has spoken foolishly. You have been misinformed. May I askwho--"

"Ah!" said Carmen, "I know not! It is in the air! I am a stranger. Perhaps I am deceived. But it is of all. I say to them, When shall Ihear him speak? I go day after day to the Capitol, I watch him, --thegreat Emancipator, --but it is of business, eh?--it is the claim of thatone, it is the tax, eh? it is the impost, it is the post-office, but itis the great speech of human rights--never, NEVER. I say, 'How arrivesall this?' And some say, and shake their heads, 'never again he speaks. 'He is what you call 'played--yes, it is so, eh?--played out. ' I know itnot, --it is a word from Bos-ton, perhaps? They say he has--eh, I speaknot the English well--the party he has shaken, 'shook, '--yes, --he hasthe party 'shaken, ' eh? It is right, --it is the language of Bos-ton, eh?"

"Permit me to say, Miss De Haro, " returned the Senator, rising with someasperity, "that you seem to have been unfortunate in your selection ofacquaintances, and still more so in your ideas of the derivations of theEnglish tongue. The--er--the--er--expressions you have quoted are notcommon to Boston, but emanate, I believe, from the West. "

Carmen de Haro contritely buried everything but her black eyes in hershawl. 

"No one, " he continued, more gently, sitting down again, "has the rightto forecast from my past what I intend to do in the future, or designatethe means I may choose to serve the principles I hold or the party Irepresent. Those are MY functions. At the same time, should occasion--oropportunity--for we are within a day or two of the close of theSession--"

"Yes, " interrupted Carmen, sadly, "I see, --it will be some business, some claim, something for somebody, --ah! Madre de Dios, --you will notspeak, and I--"

"When do you think of returning?" asked the Senator, with gravepoliteness; "when are we to lose you?"

"I shall stay to the last, --to the end of the Session, " said Carmen. "And NOW I shall go. " She got up and pulled her shawl viciously over hershoulders, with a pretty pettishness, perhaps the most feminine thingshe had done that evening. Possibly, the most genuine. 

The Senator smiled affably: "You do not deserve to be disappointed ineither case; but it is later than you imagine; let me help you on theshorter distance in my carriage; it is at the door. "

He accompanied her gravely to the carriage. As it rolled away, sheburied her little figure in its ample cushions and chuckled to herself, albeit a little hysterically. When she had reached her destination, shefound herself crying, and hastily, and somewhat angrily, dried her eyesas she drew up at the door of her lodgings. 

"How have you prospered?" asked Mr. Harlowe, of counsel for RoyalThatcher, as he gallantly assisted her from the carriage. "I havebeen waiting here for two hours; your interview must have beenprolonged, --that was a good sign. "

"Don't ask me now, " said Carmen, a little savagely, "I'm worn out andtired. "

Mr. Harlowe bowed. "I trust you will be better to-morrow, for we expectour friend, Mr. Thatcher. "

Carmen's brown cheek flushed slightly. "He should have been here before. Where is he? What was he doing?"

"He was snowed up on the plains. He is coming as fast as steam can carryhim; but he may be too late. "

Carmen did not reply. 

The lawyer lingered. "How did you find the great New-England Senator?"he asked with a slight professional levity. 

Carmen was tired, Carmen was worried, Carmen was a littleself-reproachful, and she kindled easily. Consequently she said icily:

"I found him A GENTLEMAN!"

CHAPTER XV

HOW IT BECAME UNFINISHED BUSINESS

The closing of the ---- Congress was not unlike the closing of theseveral preceding Congresses. There was the same unbusiness-like, impractical haste; the same hurried, unjust, and utterly inadequateadjustment of unfinished, ill-digested business, that would not havebeen tolerated for a moment by the sovereign people in any privateinterest they controlled. There were frauds rushed through; there werelong-suffering, righteous demands shelved; there were honest, unpaiddebts dishonored by scant appropriations; there were closing sceneswhich only the saving sense of American humor kept from being utterlyvile. The actors, the legislators themselves, knew it, and laughedat it; the commentators, the Press, knew it and laughed at it; theaudience, the great American people, knew it and laughed at it. Andnobody for an instant conceived that it ever, under any circumstances, might be otherwise. 

The claim of Roscommon was among the Unfinished Business. The claimanthimself, haggard, pathetic, importunate, and obstinate, was among theUnfinished Business. Various Congressmen, more or less interested inthe success of the claim, were among the Unfinished Business. The memberfrom Fresno, who had changed his derringer for a speech against theclaimant, was among the Unfinished Business. The gifted Gashwiler, uneasy in his soul over certain other Unfinished Business in the shapeof his missing letters, but dropping oil and honey as he mingled withhis brothers, was King of Misrule and Lord of the Unfinished Business. Pretty Mrs. Hopkinson, prudently escorted by her husband, butimprudently ogled by admiring Congressmen, lent the charm of herpresence to the finishing of Unfinished Business. One or two editors, who had dreams of a finished financial business, arising out ofUnfinished Business, were there also, like ancient bards, to record withpaean or threnody the completion of Unfinished Business. Various uncleanbirds, scenting carrion in Unfinished Business, hovered in the halls orroosted in the Lobby. 

The lower house, under the tutelage of the gifted Gashwiler, drankdeeply of Roscommon and his intoxicating claim, and passed thehalf-empty bottle to the Senate as Unfinished Business. But, alas! inthe very rush, and storm, and tempest of the unfinishing business, anunlooked-for interruption arose in the person of a great Senator whosepower none could oppose, whose right to free and extended utterance atall times none could gainsay. A claim for poultry, violently seized bythe army of Sherman during his march through Georgia, from the hen-coopof an alleged loyal Irishman, opened a constitutional question, and withit the lips of the great Senator. 

For seven hours he spoke eloquently, earnestly, convincingly. For sevenhours the old issues of party and policy were severally taken up anddismissed in the old forcible rhetoric that had early made him famous. Interruptions from other Senators, now forgetful of Unfinished Business, and wild with reanimated party zeal; interruptions from certain Senatorsmindful of Unfinished Business, and unable to pass the Roscommon bottle, only spurred him to fresh exertion. The tocsin sounded in the Senatewas heard in the lower house. Highly-excited members congregated atthe doors of the Senate, and left Unfinished Business to take care ofitself. 

Left to itself for seven hours, Unfinished Business gnashed its falseteeth and tore its wig in impotent fury in corridor and hall. For sevenhours the gifted Gashwiler had continued the manufacture of oiland honey, whose sweetness, however, was slowly palling upon thecongressional lip; for seven hours Roscommon and friends beat withimpatient feet the lobby, and shook fists, more or less discolored, atthe distinguished Senator. For seven hours the one or two editors wereobliged to sit and calmly compliment the great speech which that nightflashed over the wires of a continent with the old electric thrill. And, worse than all, they were obliged to record with it the closing of the---- Congress, with more than the usual amount of Unfinished Business. 

A little group of friends surrounded the great Senator with hymns ofpraise and congratulations. Old adversaries saluted him courteously asthey passed by with the respect of strong men. A little woman with ashawl drawn over her shoulders, and held with one small brown hand, approached him timidly:

"I speak not the English well, " she said gently, "but I have read much. I have read in the plays of your Shakspeare. I would like to say toyou the words of Rosalind to Orlando when he did fight: 'Sir you havewrestled well, and have overthrown more than your enemies. '" And withthese words she was gone. 

Yet not so quickly but that pretty Mrs. Hopkinson, coming, --as Victrixalways comes to Victor, to thank the great Senator, albeit the faces ofher escorts were shrouded in gloom, --saw the shawled figure disappear. 

"There, " she said, pinching Wiles mischievously, "there! that's thewoman you were afraid of. Look at her. Look at that dress. Ah, Heavens!look at that shawl. Didn't I tell you she had no style?"

"Who is she?" said Wiles sullenly. 

"Carmen de Haro, of course, " said the lady vivaciously. "What are youhurrying away so for? You're absolutely pulling me along. "

Mr. Wiles had just caught sight of the travel-worn face of RoyalThatcher among the crowd that thronged the stair-case. Thatcher appearedpale and distrait: Mr. Harlowe, his counsel, at his side, rallied him. 

"No one would think you had just got a new lease of your property, andescaped a great swindle. What's the matter with you? Miss De Haropassed us just now. It was she who spoke to the Senator. Why did you notrecognize her?"

"I was thinking, " said Thatcher gloomily. 

"Well, you take things coolly! And certainly you are not verydemonstrative towards the woman who saved you to-day. For, as sure asyou live, it was she who drew that speech out of the Senator. "

Thatcher did not reply, but moved away. He HAD noticed Carmen de Haro, and was about to greet her with mingled pleasure and embarrassment. But he had heard her compliment to the Senator, and this strong, preoccupied, automatic man, who only ten days before had no thoughtbeyond his property, was now thinking more of that compliment to anotherthan of his success; and was beginning to hate the Senator who had savedhim, the lawyer who stood beside him, and even the little figure thathad tripped down the steps unconscious of him. 

CHAPTER XVI

AND WHO FORGOT IT

It was somewhat inconsistent with Royal Thatcher's embarrassment andsensitiveness that he should, on leaving the Capitol, order a carriageand drive directly to the lodgings of Miss De Haro. That on finding shewas not at home, he should become again sulky and suspicious, and evenbe ashamed of the honest impulse that led him there, was, I suppose, manlike and natural. He felt that he had done all the courtesy required;he had promptly answered her dispatch with his presence. If she choseto be absent at such a moment, HE had at least done HIS duty. In short, there was scarcely any absurdity of the imagination which this oncepractical man did not permit himself to indulge in, yet always with acertain consciousness that he was allowing his feelings to run away withhim, --a fact that did not tend to make him better humored, and ratherinclined him to place the responsibility of the elopement on somebodyelse. If Miss De Haro had been home, &c. &c. , and not going intoecstasies over speeches, &c. &c. , and had attended to her business, i. E. , being exactly what he had supposed her to be, --all this would nothave happened. 

I am aware that this will not heighten the reader's respect for my hero. But I fancy that the imperceptible progress of a sincere passion in thematured strong man is apt to be marked with even more than the usualhaste and absurdity of callous youth. 

The fever that runs riot in the veins of the robust is apt to pass yourailing weakling by. Possibly there may be some immunity in inoculation. It is Lothario who is always self-possessed and does and says theright thing, while poor honest Coelebs becomes ridiculous with genuineemotion. 

He rejoined his lawyer in no very gracious mood. The chambers occupiedby Mr. Harlowe were in the basement of a private dwelling once occupiedand made historic by an Honorable Somebody, who, however, was rememberedonly by the landlord and the last tenant. There were various shelvesin the walls divided into compartments, sarcastically known as "pigeonholes, " in which the dove of peace had never rested, but which stillperpetuated, in their legends, the feuds and animosities of suitors nowbut common dust together. There was a portrait, apparently of a cherub, which on nearer inspection turned out to be a famous English LordChancellor in his flowing wig. 

There were books with dreary, unenlivening titles, --egotistic always, as recording Smith's opinions on this, and Jones's commentaries onthat. There was a hand bill tacked on the wall, which at first offeredhilarious suggestions of a circus or a steamboat excursion, but whichturned out only to be a sheriff's sale. There were several oddly-shapedpackages in newspaper wrappings, mysterious and awful in dark corners, that might have contained forgotten law papers or the previous week'swashing of the eminent counsel. There were one or two newspapers, whichat first offered entertaining prospects to the waiting client, butalways proved to be a law record or a Supreme Court decision. There wasthe bust of a late distinguished jurist, which apparently had never beendusted since he himself became dust, and had already grown a perceptiblydusty moustache on his severely-judicial upper lip. It was a cheerlessplace in the sunshine of day; at night, when it ought, by everysuggestion of its dusty past, to have been left to the vengeful ghosts, the greater part of whose hopes and passions were recorded and gatheredthere; when in the dark the dead hands of forgotten men were stretchedfrom their dusty graves to fumble once more for their old title deeds;at night, when it was lit up by flaring gaslight, the hollow mockeryof this dissipation was so apparent that people in the streets, lookingthrough the illuminated windows, felt as if the privacy of a familyvault had been intruded upon by body-snatchers. 

Royal Thatcher glanced around the room, took in all its drearysuggestions in a half-weary, half-indifferent sort of way, and droppedinto the lawyer's own revolving chair as that gentleman entered from theadjacent room. 

"Well, you got back soon, I see, " said Harlowe briskly. 

"Yes, " said his client, without looking up, and with this notabledistinction between himself and all other previous clients, that heseemed absolutely less interested than the lawyer. "Yes, I'm here; and, upon my soul, I don't exactly know why. "

"You told me of certain papers you had discovered, " said the lawyersuggestively. 

"Oh, yes, " returned Thatcher with a slight yawn. "I've got heresome papers somewhere;"--he began to feel in his coat pocketlanguidly;--"but, by the way, this is a rather dreary and God-forsakensort of place! Let's go up to Welker's, and you can look at them over abottle of champagne. "

"After I've looked at them, I've something to show you, myself, " saidHarlowe; "and as for the champagne, we'll have that in the other room, by and by. At present I want to have my head clear, and yours too, --ifyou'll oblige me by becoming sufficiently interested in your own affairsto talk to me about them. "

Thatcher was gazing abstractedly at the fire. He started. "I dare say, "he began, "I'm not very interesting; yet it's possible that my affairshave taken up a little too much of my time. However, --" he stopped, tookfrom his pocket an envelope, and threw it on the desk, --"there aresome papers. I don't know what value they may be; that is for youto determine. I don't know that I've any legal right to theirpossession, --that is for you to say, too. They came to me in a queerway. On the overland journey here I lost my bag, containing my few trapsand some letters and papers 'of no value, ' as the advertisements say, 'to any but the owner. ' Well, the bag was lost, but the stage driverdeclares that it was stolen by a fellow-passenger, --a man by the name ofGiles, or Stiles, or Piles--"

"Wiles, " said Harlowe earnestly. 

"Yes, " continued Thatcher, suppressing a yawn; "yes, I guess you'reright, --Wiles. Well, the stage driver, finally believing this, goesto work and quietly and unostentatiously steals--I say, have you got acigar?"

"I'll get you one. "

Harlowe disappeared in the adjoining room. Thatcher dragged Harlowe'sheavy, revolving desk chair, which never before had been removedfrom its sacred position, to the fire, and began to poke the coalsabstractedly. 

Harlowe reappeared with cigars and matches. Thatcher lit onemechanically, and said, between the pulls:

"Do you--ever--talk--to yourself?"

"No!--why?"

"I thought I heard your voice just now in the other room. Anyhow, thisis an awful spooky place. If I stayed here alone half an hour, I'd fancythat the Lord Chancellor up there would step down in his robes, out ofhis frame, to keep me company. "

"Nonsense! When I'm busy, I often sit here and write until aftermidnight. It's so quiet!"

"D--mnably so!"

"Well, to go back to the papers. Somebody stole your bag, or you lostit. YOU stole--"

"The driver stole, " suggested Thatcher, so languidly that it couldhardly be called an interruption. 

"Well, we'll say the driver stole, and passed over to you as hisaccomplice, confederate, or receiver, certain papers belonging--"

"See here, Harlowe, I don't feel like joking in a ghostly law officeafter midnight. Here are your facts. Yuba Bill, the driver, stole a bagfrom this passenger, Wiles, or Smiles, and handed it to me to insure thereturn of my own. I found in it some papers concerning my case. Therethey are. Do with them what you like. "

Thatcher turned his eyes again abstractedly to the fire. 

Harlowe took out the first paper:

"A-w, this seems to be a telegram. Yes, eh? 'Come to Washington atonce. --Carmen de Haro. '"

Thatcher started, blushed like a girl, and hurriedly reached for thepaper. 

"Nonsense. That's a mistake. A dispatch I mislaid in the envelope. "

"I see, " said the lawyer dryly. 

"I thought I had torn it up, " continued Thatcher, after an awkwardpause. I regret to say that here that usually truthful man elaborated afiction. He had consulted it a dozen times a day on the journey, and itwas quite worn in its enfoldings. Harlowe's quick eye had noticed this, but he speedily became interested and absorbed in the other papers. Thatcher lapsed into contemplation of the fire. 

"Well, " said Harlowe, finally turning to his client, "here's enoughto unseat Gashwiler, or close his mouth. As to the rest, it's goodreading--but I needn't tell you--no LEGAL evidence. But it's proofenough to stop them from ever trying it again, --when the existence ofthis record is made known. Bribery is a hard thing to fix on a man; theonly witness is naturally particeps criminis;--but it would not be easyfor them to explain away this rascal's record. One or two things I don'tunderstand: What's this opposite the Hon. X's name, 'Took the medicinenicely, and feels better?' and here, just in the margin, after Y's, 'Must be labored with?'"

"I suppose our California slang borrows largely from the medical andspiritual profession, " returned Thatcher. "But isn't it odd that a manshould keep a conscientious record of his own villainy?"

Harlowe, a little abashed at his want of knowledge of American metaphor, now felt himself at home. "Well, no. It's not unusual. In one ofthose books yonder there is the record of a case where a man, who hadcommitted a series of nameless atrocities, extending over a period ofyears, absolutely kept a memorandum of them in his pocket diary. It wasproduced in Court. Why, my dear fellow, one half our business arisesfrom the fact that men and women are in the habit of keeping lettersand documents that they might--I don't say, you know, that they OUGHT, that's a question of sentiment or ethics--but that they MIGHT destroy. "

Thatcher half-mechanically took the telegram of poor Carmen and threw itin the fire. Harlowe noticed the act and smiled. 

"I'll venture to say, however, that there's nothing in the bag that YOUlost that need give you a moment's uneasiness. It's only your rascal orfool who carries with him that which makes him his own detective. "

"I had a friend, " continued Harlowe, "a clever fellow enough, but whowas so foolish as to seriously complicate himself with a woman. He washimself the soul of honor, and at the beginning of their correspondencehe proposed that they should each return the other's letters with theiranswer. They did so for years, but it cost him ten thousand dollars andno end of trouble after all. "

"Why?" asked Thatcher simply. 

"Because he was such an egotistical ass as TO KEEP THE LETTER PROPOSINGIT, which she had duly returned, among his papers as a sentimentalrecord. Of course somebody eventually found it. "

"Good night, " said Thatcher, rising abruptly. "If I stayed here muchlonger I should begin to disbelieve my own mother. "

"I have known of such hereditary traits, " returned Harlowe with a laugh. "But come, you must not go without the champagne. " He led the way to theadjacent room, which proved to be only the ante-chamber of another, onthe threshold of which Thatcher stopped with genuine surprise. It was anelegantly furnished library. 

"Sybarite! Why was I never here before?"

"Because you came as a client; to-night you are my guest. All who enterhere leave their business, with their hats, in the hall. Look; thereisn't a law book on those shelves; that table never was defaced by atitle deed or parchment. You look puzzled? Well, it was a whim ofmine to put my residence and my work-shop under the same roof, yet sodistinct that they would never interfere with each other. You know thehouse above is let out to lodgers. I occupy the first floor with mymother and sister, and this is my parlor. I do my work in that severeroom that fronts the street: here is where I play. A man must havesomething else in life than mere business. I find it less harmful andexpensive to have my pleasure here. "

Thatcher had sunk moodily in the embracing arms of an easy chair. He wasthinking deeply; he was fond of books too, and, like all men who havefared hard and led wandering lives, he knew the value of cultivatedrepose. Like all men who have been obliged to sleep under blanketsand in the open air, he appreciated the luxuries of linen sheets anda frescoed roof. It is, by the way, only your sick city clerk or yourdyspeptic clergyman who fancy that they have found in the bad bread, fried steaks, and frowzy flannels of mountain picknicking the true artof living. And it is a somewhat notable fact that your true mountaineeror your gentleman who has been obliged to honestly "rough it, " does not, as a general thing, write books about its advantages, or implore theirfellow mortals to come and share their solitude and their discomforts. 

Thoroughly appreciating the taste and comfort of Harlowe's library, yethalf-envious of its owner, and half-suspicious that his own earnestlife for the past few years might have been different, Thatcher suddenlystarted from his seat and walked towards a parlor easel, whereon stooda picture. It was Carmen de Haro's first sketch of the furnace and themine. 

"I see you are taken with that picture, " said Harlowe, pausing with thechampagne bottle in his hand. "You show your good taste. It's been muchadmired. Observe how splendidly that firelight plays over the sleepingface of that figure, yet brings out by very contrast its almostdeath-like repose. Those rocks are powerfully handled; what a suggestionof mystery in those shadows! You know the painter?"

Thatcher murmured, "Miss De Haro, " with a new and rather oddself-consciousness in speaking her name. 

"Yes. And you know the story of the picture of course?"

Thatcher thought he didn't. Well, no; in fact, he did not remember. 

"Why, this recumbent figure was an old Spanish lover of hers, whom shebelieved to have been murdered there. It's a ghastly fancy, isn't it?"

Two things annoyed Thatcher: first the epithet "lover, " as applied toConcho by another man; second, that the picture belonged to him: andwhat the d---l did she mean by--

"Yes, " he broke out finally, "but how did YOU get it?"

"Oh, I bought it of her. I've been a sort of patron of her ever sinceI found out how she stood towards us. As she was quite alone here inWashington, my mother and sister have taken her up, and have been doingthe social thing. "

"How long since?" asked Thatcher. 

"Oh, not long. The day she telegraphed you, she came here to know whatshe could do for us, and when I said nothing could be done except tokeep Congress off, why, she went and DID IT. For SHE, and she alone, gotthat speech out of the Senator. But, " he added, a little mischievously, "you seem to know very little about her?"

"No!--I--that is--I've been very busy lately, " returned Thatcher, staring at the picture. "Does she come here often?"

"Yes, lately, quite often; she was here this evening with mother; washere, I think, when you came. "

Thatcher looked intently at Harlowe. But that gentleman's face betrayedno confusion. Thatcher refilled his glass a little awkwardly, tossed offthe liquor at a draught, and rose to his feet. 

"Come, old fellow, you're not going now. I shan't permit it, " saidHarlowe, laying his hand kindly on his client's shoulder. "You're out ofsorts! Stay here with me to-night. Our accommodations are not large, but are elastic. I can bestow you comfortably until morning. Wait here amoment while I give the necessary orders. "

Thatcher was not sorry to be left alone. In the last half hour he hadbecome convinced that his love for Carmen de Haro had been in some waymost dreadfully abused. While HE was hard at work in California, she wasbeing introduced in Washington society by parties with eligible brotherswho bought her paintings. It is a relief to the truly jealous mind toindulge in plurals. Thatcher liked to think that she was already besetby hundreds of brothers. 

He still kept staring at the picture. By and by it faded away in part, and a very vivid recollection of the misty, midnight, moonlit walk hehad once taken with her came back, and refilled the canvas with itsmagic. He saw the ruined furnace; the dark, overhanging masses of rock, the trembling intricacies of foliage, and, above all, the flash of darkeyes under a mantilla at his shoulder. What a fool he had been! Had henot really been as senseless and stupid as this very Concho, lyinghere like a log? And she had loved that man. What a fool she must havethought him that evening! What a snob she must think him now!

He was startled by a slight rustling in the passage, that ceased almostas he turned. Thatcher looked towards the door of the outer office, asif half expecting that the Lord Chancellor, like the commander in DonJuan, might have accepted his thoughtless invitation. He listened again;everything was still. He was conscious of feeling ill at ease and atrifle nervous. What a long time Harlowe took to make his preparations. He would look out in the hall. To do this it was necessary to turn upthe gas. He did so, and in his confusion turned it out!

Where were the matches? He remembered that there was a bronze somethingon the table that, in the irony of modern decorative taste, might holdashes or matches, or anything of an unpicturesque character. He knockedsomething over, evidently the ink, --something else, --this time achampagne glass. Becoming reckless, and now groping at random in theruins, he overturned the bronze Mercury on the center table, and thensat down hopelessly in his chair. And then a pair of velvet fingers slidinto his, with the matches, and this audible, musical statement:

"It is a match you are seeking? Here is of them. "

Thatcher flushed, embarrassed, nervous, --feeling the ridiculousness ofsaying, "Thank you" to a dark somebody, --struck the match, beheld by itsbrief, uncertain glimmer Carmen de Haro beside him, burned his fingers, coughed, dropped the match, and was cast again into outer darkness. 

"Let me try!"

Carmen struck a match, jumped briskly on the chair, lit the gas, jumpedlightly down again, and said: "You do like to sit in the dark, --eh? Soam I--sometimes--alone. "

"Miss De Haro, " said Thatcher, with sudden, honest earnestness, advancing with outstretched hands, "believe me I am sincerely delighted, overjoyed, again to meet--"

She had, however, quickly retreated as he approached, ensconcing herselfbehind the high back of a large antique chair, on the cushion of whichshe knelt. I regret to add also that she slapped his outstretchedfingers a little sharply with her inevitable black fan as he stilladvanced. 

"We are not in California. It is Washington. It is after midnight. I ama poor girl, and I have to lose--what you call--'a character. ' You shallsit over there, "--she pointed to the sofa, --"and I shall sit here;" sherested her boyish head on the top of the chair; "and we shall talk, forI have to speak to you, Don Royal. "

Thatcher took the seat indicated, contritely, humbly, submissively. Carmen's little heart was touched. But she still went on over the backof the chair. 

"Don Royal, " she said, emphasizing each word at him with her fan, "before I saw you, --ever knew of you, --I was a child. Yes, I was buta child! I was a bold, bad child;--and I was what you calla--a--'forgaire'!"

"A what?" asked Thatcher, hesitating between a smile and a sigh. 

"A forgaire!" continued Carmen demurely. "I did of myself write thenames of ozzer peoples;" when Carmen was excited she lost the control ofthe English tongue; "I did write just to please myself;--it was my onklethat did make of it money;--you understand, eh? Shall you not speak?Must I again hit you?"

"Go on, " said Thatcher laughing. 

"I did find out, when I came to you at the mine, that I had forgedagainst you the name of Micheltorena. I to the lawyer went, and foundthat it was so--of a verity--so! so! all the time. Look at me not now, Don Royal;--it is a 'forgaire' you stare at. "

"Carmen!"

"Hoosh! Shall I have to hit you again? I did overlook all the papers. Ifound the application: it was written by me. There. "

She tossed over the back of her chair an envelope to Thatcher. He openedit. 

"I see, " he said gently, "you repossessed yourself of it!"

"What is that--'r-r-r-e--possess'?"

"Why!"--Thatcher hesitated--"you got possession of this paper, --thisinnocent forgery, --again. "

"Oh! You think me a thief as well as a 'forgaire. ' Go away! Get up. Getout. "

"My dear girl--"

"Look at the paper! Will you? Oh, you silly!"

Thatcher looked at the paper. In paper, handwriting, age, and stamp itwas identical with the formal, clerical application of Garcia for thegrant. The indorsement of Micheltorena was unquestionably genuine. BUTTHE APPLICATION WAS MADE FOR ROYAL THATCHER. And his own signature wasimitated to the life. 

"I had but one letter of yours wiz your name, " said Carmenapologetically; "and it was the best poor me could do. "

"Why, you blessed little goose and angel, " said Thatcher, with the bold, mixed metaphor of amatory genius, "don't you see--"

"Ah, you don't like it, --it is not good?"

"My darling!"

"Hoosh! There is also an 'old cat' up stairs. And now I have here acharacter. WILL you sit down? Is it of a necessity that up and down youshould walk and awaken the whole house? There!"--she had given him avicious dab with her fan as he passed. He sat down. 

"And you have not seen me nor written to me for a year?"

"Carmen!"

"Sit down, you bold, bad boy. Don't you see it is of business that youand I talk down here; and it is of business that ozzer people up stairsare thinking. Eh?"

"D--n business! See here, Carmen, my darling, tell me"--I regret to sayhe had by this time got hold of the back of Carmen's chair--"tell me, myown little girl, --about--about that Senator. You remember what you saidto him?"

"Oh, the old man? Oh, THAT was business. And you say of business, 'd--n. '"

"Carmen!"

"Don Royal!"

*****

Although Miss Carmen had recourse to her fan frequently during thisinterview, the air must have been chilly, for a moment later, on his waydown stairs, poor Harlowe, a sufferer from bronchitis, was attacked witha violent fit of coughing, which troubled him all the way down. 

"Well, " he said, as he entered the room, "I see you have found Mr. Thatcher, and shown those papers. I trust you have, for you've certainlyhad time enough. I am sent by mother to dismiss you all to bed. "

Carmen still in the arm chair, covered with her mantilla, did not speak. 

"I suppose you are by this time lawyer enough to know, " continuedHarlowe, "that Miss De Haro's papers, though ingenious, are not legallyavailable, unless--"

"I chose to make her a witness. Harlowe! you're a good fellow! I don'tmind saying to you that these are papers I prefer that my WIFE shouldnot use. We'll leave it for the present--Unfinished Business. "

They did. But one evening our hero brought Mrs. Royal Thatcher a papercontaining a touching and beautiful tribute to the dead Senator. 

"There, Carmen, love, read that. Don't you feel a little ashamed ofyour--your--your lobbying--"

"No, " said Carmen promptly. "It was business, --and if all lobbyingbusiness was as honest, --well?--"