Chapter V: Part 5

“She’ll surely give me a drink,” I said to myself. She greeted me with a smile as I made known my wants and in a moment I was quenching the thirst which had grown unendurable. As I set down the glass she noted my sample case.

“You bane sell someting?” she enquired with a wide smile.

With eager hands she fell upon the toilet articles as I opened the case.

“Yaw, yaw,” she cried. “I bane want someting long, long tam. Youst wait. I got money.”

She disappeared into the house.

I was laying out her selections when a harsh voice startled me.

“How dare you sneak into my home and take up the time of my maids? Leave this house instantly.”

I whirled around, too amazed to speak. A large, pompous woman was standing in the inner doorway, motioning me out with a be-ringed hand.

“But—but madam,” I stammered, “your maid wants to buy some of these articles. She has gone to get the money.”

“I’ll not have you cheating my servants. Go away from here.”

The girl appeared at that moment, but her mistress blocked the door.

“Hulda, you stay right where you are. Shame on you, wasting valuable time on a tricky pedler. What do you suppose I pay you wages for?”

“Oh, mam. I ban long tam want....”

“That will do. That will do. I don’t want any of your saucy talk. You are paid to do the housework, so get at it.” She turned on me.

“Get off these premises at once. You may be able to swindle these ignorant foreigners, but you can’t impose on me. Go now, or I’ll call the constable. The very idea, crowding yourself right into people’s homes, talking to their servants, impudent....”

She was still raving as I passed out of hearing. The day was very warm. I was dusty and tired and hungry. Aimlessly I followed the street till it terminated in a country road and finally sank down by the roadside, too weary and disheartened to think clearly.

I was roused by the sound of pattering hoofs and glancing up, saw a team of grey Indian ponies, attached to a light buckboard, come scampering around a curve. They shied sharply at sight of my recumbent figure, reared and tried to break into a run. Their driver drew them in with masterly skill, and circling through the weeds and brush, returned to learn the cause of the fracas. She was a tall, strong woman, with an aquiline nose and iron grey hair. The smile with which she greeted me as I approached the wagon was very winning.

“Is there something the matter? Are you ill or hurt?” she inquired, leaning toward me with kindling eyes.

“No, just tired and a bit blue, I guess. It didn’t seem worth while to walk any more, so I dropped right down here.”

“Pardon me, but aren’t you a stranger to these parts? I don’t recall seeing you before. In these little towns we generally know every one, at least by sight.”

“Yes, I arrived only a couple of hours ago, but I know this town pretty well already.”

She searched my face as though seeking the true meaning of my words; then her eyes fell on my sample case, which was still clutched in my left hand.

“Oh, you are selling something,” she exclaimed. “What is it, books?”

“No, not books. And I’m not selling anything either—not in this town.”

“Oh, so that’s it. You must have started on the wrong street. Suppose you jump in with me and ride out to the house. Maybe it will change your luck.”

I hesitated for a moment, my usual faith in human nature somewhat shaken by recent experiences.

“Come on, now. Jump in. I’ll bring you back to wherever you want to go, whenever you are ready.”

I walked around the wagon and clambered in. The ponies bounded forward, and away we flew, winding up among low, rolling hills, until we came to a small house perched on the side of a knoll. Care of the team had occupied my companion’s attention to the exclusion of conversation until we had entered the house. Then, as she set out a substantial lunch—afternoon tea, she termed it—we began to get acquainted.

Mrs. Holiday’s home was in Cheyenne, but her husband owned this large stock ranch, which led them to make frequent visits to Sydney.

As evening approached, she declared her intention of driving into town after Dan and keeping the two of us as long as our business permitted us to remain in the neighbourhood. Leaving me to devour a tableful of newspapers and late magazines, the first I had seen in months, she sped away with her frisky team and returned with Dan, who had grown quite accustomed to my peculiar way of making myself at home in unusual places. As they drove into the yard, Mr. Holiday rode in from the range and we all were soon on a most friendly footing.

Mr. Adams had already left a couple of sign orders with Dan to put up the next morning, but instead of going into town with him to resume my interrupted labours as a pedler, I decided to take a day off to wash and mend our clothing and incidentally starch my crumpled courage by an interchange of confidences with my hostess, who possessed a peculiarly invigorating temperament.

Her early years had been full of privations and severe struggles to gain an education. She had become a high school teacher, but her health failed, forcing her to seek the high altitudes of the Rockies. Here she had met and married Mr. Holiday, a well-to-do cattle man, and they had built a home in Cheyenne. One child—a girl—was born to them, but she had died some two years previously. Since her death the mother had been almost mad with loneliness, finding her chief consolation in mothering the calves and colts and other young creatures of the range.

She was greatly interested in the history of our experiences, and as I was telling her the story of Mandy of the corn fields, she suddenly leaned forward with sparkling eyes.

“Give me the address of that Mrs. Cummings. I’m going back there and if she is half the gritty little heroine that you make her out to be, I’ll bring her home with me and see that she gets the best education that money can buy. Maybe I’ll take one or two of the other children, too.”

“But ... but maybe their mother will object,” I faltered.

“It won’t do her a bit of good if she does,” Mrs. Holiday replied firmly. “I always get what I go after. You know, when I saw you beside the road yesterday, I felt impelled to take you home with me. I believe in that kind of instinct—intuition—fate—call it what you will. That little Mandy will be my girl. I can teach her so much. It will be like renewing my youth. Of course, she’ll go to school in Cheyenne, too, and later to college if she likes. Oh, I’ll get her—rest assured of that. It’s mostly a question of money, anyway.”

I handed over the address without another word. Yes, it would be largely a question of money with that drunken father and ignorant mother, and it would be a wonderful opportunity for Mandy.

The workings of fate are marvellous to contemplate. If that old harridan of a woman had not ordered me from her house, I would not have wandered out into the country and met Mrs. Holiday. Then Mandy would not have had her chance. Thus, the harridan woman is clearly seen to be but an instrument of a benign Providence. Should she be censured for an act that results in so much good? I put the question to my companion, who laughed as I told her the story.

“You were unfortunate in that you began operations in the fashionable quarter of our fair city. I know the woman you describe. She is the shining light of local clubdom, the greatest society leader here. She would be highly insulted at the idea of serving as an instrument of Fate. Why, she would not be the servant of the Almighty himself—if she can’t boss the job, she won’t play.”

“It must be rather hard on the maid,” I observed.

“Well, she’s notorious for the way she handles her servants. She gets these green foreigners fresh from the old country, and keeps them penned in her kitchen so long as they will endure it. They are taught to cook and wash and all that, but she pays next to nothing, and does her best to prevent their learning decent English or mingling with their kind. She is a fine person to talk of swindling ignorant foreigners. A worse exploiter of unfortunate servant girls it would be difficult to find.

“But to-morrow I’ll take you into another part of town, over where the human people live, and probably you will do quite well.”

She was a good prophet, for I have succeeded in clearing nearly five dollars during the last few days. It will be with keen regret that I leave my newfound friend to-morrow morning and take the road again with the California outfit.

THIRTEEN

_July 23rd_,
CHEYENNE, WYOMING.

THIRTEEN

_July 23rd. Cheyenne, Wyoming._

Alas, for our dreams of a comfortable journey home; alas for our expectation of seeing the country; alas, too, for our hopes of saving money for a fresh start in the world. We face mountains and desert with nothing but a grim determination to win or die.

After we left Sydney, Mrs. Adams abandoned herself to a mounting jealousy, which became increasingly evident to us all. The hours that I was forced to spend with her behind the ambling mules, were torture. She took advantage of every opportunity to annoy and humiliate me, so that every atom of my patience and control was needed to avoid a scene. But my best efforts availed nothing with the woman. We had been travelling through a very sparsely settled region some twenty-five or thirty miles east of Cheyenne when the affair came to a climax. About eleven o’clock I left Mrs. Adams waiting in the country road while I called at a farm house, which stood some distance away in a clump of trees. She had refused to drive in as usual, but had ordered me to go in and trade for or purchase some fresh eggs. When I reached the house no one was at home, and after considerable search in the outbuildings, I returned empty handed to the road, only to find the wagon gone. Dust was rising in the distance and I could just see the black wagon top as the mules pulled slowly over a rise.

My blood was boiling as I set off down the road at a jog trot, expecting to overtake the slow-going mules in the first mile or so. I was within hailing distance of the team when Mrs. Adams glanced back, whipped the animals into a lively trot, and with an insulting gesture coolly outdistanced me.

“Very well,” I said to myself, steadying my pace. “I’ll walk no further than the first water. Then I’ll rest until night. Dan will come into camp and miss me. He’ll take the buckboard and start hunting. And when we finally come up with that woman there will be something doing.”

But water is scarce in that country, and at last I sat down in the sparse shade of a clump of bushes to wait for a rescue. It came much sooner than I expected, for it was not more than three o’clock when I was roused from a light doze by a cheerful halloo and sprang up to see Mr. Adams reining in the horses. He leaped down in a jiffy, brought out the oozing canvas bag of water that he always carried in this desert country and handed me a delicious draught.

“Get right into the rig, and I’ll unpack your lunch,” he exclaimed solicitously, assisting me over the wheel. “I only learned of this infernal outrage by accident. I landed a rather unusual order this morning and, leaving your husband on the job to sketch the preliminaries, drove back to meet the wagon and rush along the necessary supplies. What was my surprise to find you missing. My wife and I had a beautiful row while I was putting up this lunch and starting back to look for you. She’s gone ahead now, to take that new lot of letters to your husband.”

He had turned the team around as he spoke and was driving rapidly along the western track. Then I looked up from my meal in surprise, for he had swung into a narrow trail leading away to the north.

“What’s the idea?” I inquired. “Aren’t you taking the wrong turning?”

“There is a little spring up here a mile or so where we’ll stop to feed and water the horses. They’ve been jogging pretty steadily since early this morning.”

It was true. The poor beasts were in need of food and water, and I was glad when we drew up at a tiny stream, which flowed through the bottom of a ravine, where we could enjoy the protecting shade of a few straggling willows. Mr. Adams unharnessed the sweat-stained animals, allowed them a swallow or two of water and spread a flake of baled hay for them to munch until cool enough to eat their grain. I had settled myself beneath a tree and had just finished my lunch when he threw himself down beside me.

“Ethel,” he began, “you are too fine a woman for the kind of life you are leading. I love you, dear. Won’t you let me take you away and give you all the beautiful things that belong to you?”

I gazed at him a moment in silence. “Aren’t you forgetting yourself, Mr. Adams?” I inquired coldly. “How about your wife?”

“Oh, that woman. She is not my wife, and she has no hold on me whatever. Why she was running an assignation house in Detroit when I picked her up. Let her go back where she came from.”

“And you can live with a woman for more than two years, share the burdens of the road, eat at the same campfire, travel with her as your wife, and then dismiss her with a wave of the hand? You may consider yourself free perhaps, but I am a married woman and, besides, I love my husband.”

“You think you love him, no doubt, and maybe you do—now. But who knows how long that love will last? You yourself admit that love is the only legitimate basis for marriage. Your love for your husband may die to-morrow as the love of thousands of other women has done. Love is free as the wind, it comes and goes without reason, without warning, without restraint.

“Now, I am rich. I flatter myself that I know the world. I will aid you to a divorce and obtain one myself. After marriage we will travel, visit Florence, Naples, drink in all the myriad beauties of the Old World. If you have ambitions, I will help you to achieve. I will gratify your tastes for music, art, literature; I will free those wonderful impulses that throb beneath that calm exterior—those sensuous instincts to which your lout of a husband is so totally oblivious.”

I sprang to my feet. “That will be all, if you please. Don’t say another word.”

I busied myself with the horses. He placed their grain, then drew close to me.

“My God, Ethel. I love you, girl, love you, do you hear? Give me just a little chance, won’t you?”

He caught my hand and pressed it to his lips. I wrenched it away roughly, and looked about in desperation. The long shadows of late afternoon lay among the hills; the country was wild and rugged—not a human habitation in sight. I was absolutely alone with this maniac. I turned with resolute mien.

“See here, my friend. If you love me even half as much as you say you do, you will cease your insulting proposals, hitch up this team and take me back to civilisation. You will make me hate you, if you keep on as you are doing.”

He stood motionless, staring at me with sombre eyes. Then, as I began to place the harness on the horses, he came to my assistance, and together we watered them and hitched them to the buckboard.

We drove home in silence and reached camp just as Dan came whistling down the road. It was plain that my husband knew nothing of my desertion by Mrs. Adams that morning, and I was in no condition to tell him anything coherent. I stood like a wooden Indian as he seized me around the waist with a bearlike hug.

“Good news,” he cried. “To-day’s work brings our credit with the old man up to an even fifty dollars. Not so bad for a poor hobo, is it, now?”

He caught sight of my face and became all sympathy. “Why, sweetheart, what’s the matter? Are you sick?”

“N-no, not sick exactly,” I faltered, with lips that persisted in quivering a trifle.

“Well, you look awfully queer, some way. Has that old cat been bothering you again?”

“Yes,” I murmured. “She’s pretty mean, and it’s been so hot, and I—oh, I guess I’m about played out.”

He gently led me to a spot as far removed from the Adams’ camp as possible, made a couple of trips to the wagons and brought back our bedding, a few cooking utensils and some food for supper. Then he induced me to lie down, while he built a fire and prepared the meal.

“Poor little girl,” he murmured. “I know all this is mighty rough on you, but if I can only keep on as I’ve been doing for the past three weeks, it won’t be so very long till we can ride the cushions home in comfort. Meantime, leave the old cat alone as much as possible, and try not to take the situation too seriously.”

It seemed that I had scarcely fallen asleep when I was awakened by a consciousness of something wrong. The night was dark, but judging from the stars, it was about midnight. What was it that had aroused me? I lay still and listened.

There came a tinkling of trace chains from the other side of the big cattle pen where the Adams’ camp lay. Pshaw, it was only one of the mules, nosing around the camp in search of fruit parings, as he often did. I lay back reassured and dozed once more.

Again that premonition came; that peculiar instinct that thrills one into vivid wakefulness in the midst of quiet slumber. Again I sat up with a start. Again I heard mysterious noises from the direction of the other camp. I took my husband by the arm.

“Dan, Dan,” I hissed. “Wake up. I hear something.”

He grunted, groaned, stretched himself and sat up. “What’s the matter, Ethel?” he muttered sleepily.

“I don’t know what it is, but I feel sure there is something wrong. This is the second time I’ve waked up feeling this way.”

“Something wrong! What do you mean? What’s wrong?”

“That’s just it. I don’t know what it is, but there is something the matter at the Adams’ camp.”

“I don’t hear anything—you must have been dreaming——Don’t you feel well? I’ll get you a drink of water.” He jumped up and searched around for a cup.

“What’s the matter, folks? Did the noise disturb you?” It was the cheerful voice of Mr. Adams.

“Oh, Ethel’s got a notion that the bugaboos are after her,” answered Dan.

“She heard that mule, I suppose. Jack tried to get into the grain as usual and got tangled in the harness. I just finished straightening him out.”

“Anything I can do to help you, old man?” Dan called.

“No, thank you. Everything is all right now. Go back to bylo land and never mind if you hear me fussing around. I’m going to take a high-ball.”

Once more we lay down, and this time I slept soundly. I was awakened by a shout from Dan, who had risen and dressed without disturbing me. The sun was well up, but the camping ground was unaccountably silent. There was no sound of cackling hens, or of stamping, munching horses and mules; no smoke rose from the other side of the cattle pen.

“Ethel, Ethel,” Dan was calling. “Come here, quick.”

I wrapped a blanket about me and ran to him, then stopped in consternation.

The California outfit was gone.

Gone also were our odds and ends of equipment, saved from the wreck of the wheel, my emergency case, a change of clothing, all the groceries and provisions that I had worked so hard to accumulate, and last, but not least, gone were the fifty dollars, left in Mr. Adams’ hands for safe keeping, over which we had been rejoicing the night before.

Dan was stamping about like a madman shouting, “I’ll kill the —— I’ll get the law on him.”

He followed the wagon tracks to the main road, but it was impossible to tell in which direction they had gone. As he returned, he picked up the old battered canteen, given me by the ex-soldier as a keepsake, which had evidently slipped from the wagon as it jolted over the uneven ground.

Together we wandered back to our little camp. We still had our blankets, a few cooking utensils, a partly used box of cocoa, a little sugar, part of a can of sweetened condensed milk, and a few scrappy remains of the evening meal.

After making an unsatisfactory breakfast, we cast up accounts to determine our line of action. I had nearly five dollars in silver in a concealed pocket in my clothing, and Dan had a few dollars also.

We were camped near the loading pen of a large cattle corral placed beside a lonely railroad siding. We had no means of knowing where Adams had gone; no way of pursuing him. We had no idea where to find the sheriff of that county or other officer of the law. If we should succeed in capturing the thieves, what sort of a case could we make against them? We had no written agreement—not the scratch of a pen to show that they owed us anything at all. And possession is nine points of the law. Then, how could we live while waiting for results from the slow-moving legal machinery? The case looked hopeless from every angle.

I told Dan about Mrs. Adams’ conduct the day before and something of the affair with the man. He read me quite a lecture and then advised me to forget the whole episode as quickly as possible. We had but one object in life—to reach California as soon as fate would let us. We must dismiss the California outfit from our minds—not speak of it again. But one road lay open to us. We must have recourse to a “side-door Pullman.”

Bundles on backs, we struck out for a water tank, there to await the coming of a freight. A long string of coal cars pulled in and stopped for water. Dan’s request for a ride to Cheyenne was granted with the proviso that we drop off before we reached the city. The brakeman spoke to the engineer, who agreed to take advantage of a steep grade a few miles east of town to slow down sufficiently for us to jump in safety, adding that this would be our only chance, as trains always ran down the further slope into the city at a high speed. We were forced to ride in a gondola, which is a fairly warm place in a blazing sun. Mile after mile we rode, and at last were warned of the approach to the hill. Crouching at the end of the car, we waited for the speed to slacken.

Suddenly I noticed that the speed was increasing instead of diminishing, and a glance ahead showed the engineer waving his arms frantically. The brakeman bounded into the car.

“My God!” he yelled. “The super’s on behind and Buck daren’t slow down. We’re over the hill. You’ll be pinched in Cheyenne, sure, and we’ll get a sixty-day layoff, if we don’t all get the bounce.”

“We must jump for it, Dan,” I said. “There is no other way. And we’ll have to be quick about it, too.”

Gathering my skirts in one hand, I clung to the side of the car with the other and leaned far out and down. Dan begged me not to try it, but followed my lead when he saw that I was determined to go. The earth reeled by at a frightful speed, the wind lashed my face, the heavy freight lurched from side to side with crash and roar, gathering momentum with every turn of the wheels.

For a moment my courage failed and I hung motionless. Then with a violent outward thrust of hand and arm, I made a sidelong leap. My feet struck the gravelled path at the side of the rails with a thud, and catching my stride, I ran clear. Dan was not so fortunate, but rolled headlong down the embankment, landing in a clump of brush. In an instant I reached his side and found him unhurt, but pale as a ghost from the strain. Together we darted into the tall bushes and sank down, just as the caboose swept by, with a man, evidently the superintendent referred to by the brakeman, standing on the rear platform beside the conductor.

We were still a couple of miles from town, so, adjusting our packs, we set off down the hot and dusty road. We had not walked far when a teamster gave us a lift to our destination.

The only possible camping place was beside a small stream in a group of trees at the south side of the town. While I made camp Dan went into Cheyenne. About dusk he returned, whistling cheerfully, with the welcome news of a job in the morning. He had also made a trip to the reservation and delivered the note sent by our wayside acquaintance to his friend. This man sent us a little brown tent, made in two pieces with folding supports for convenience in carrying. It is called a “dog tent” by the soldiers and formed a valuable addition to our equipment. It shelters two persons comfortably and is so light that I could carry half besides my usual load without serious inconvenience.

For a week now I have had leisure to wash and mend our clothes and purchase a few necessities for the coming struggle with deserts and mountains. Work is too scarce and wages too low to tempt us to remain here in the hope of accumulating enough to take us home in proper fashion.

FOURTEEN

_July 24th_,
CHEYENNE, WYOMING.

FOURTEEN

_July 24th. Cheyenne, Wyoming._

Dan came in last evening quite disturbed over his failure to collect his wages on the completion of the work. He worked very cheap for this contractor, who seems to employ many floaters, and now he is refused the little money that is due him. He went uptown this morning, and returned about four o’clock enraged and disheartened. It seems that his employer makes a business of hiring men who drift into town, at as low a wage as possible; then beats them out of the money altogether, if he can. At times some unfortunate, whose spirit is not yet broken, threatens violence, in which case a trip to jail and a month on the chain-gang curb, if not cure, his desire for justice. When Dan hinted at reprisals, legal or otherwise, it was suggested that the Cheyenne climate was wont to prove unhealthy for such as he, so it would be well for him to seek new fields while the going was good. Inasmuch as we have no standing in this community, besides possessing less than three dollars in cash, which would not go far toward lawyer’s fees or bail money, it would seem that this advice, bitter as it is, should be followed.

FIFTEEN

_August 2nd_,
LARAMIE, WYOMING.

FIFTEEN

_August 2nd. Laramie, Wyoming._

A faint sunset glow illumined the dry, brown plain as we approached the grade west of Cheyenne. A pungent odour rose from under foot as we trailed through the low brush, and as we approached the track, the rails set up a low humming that steadily increased in pitch and volume. A glaring eye appeared in the distance. I had never attempted to board a train in rapid motion and was more or less ignorant of ladders, hand holds and other details of car construction, and the idea of leaping on the roaring mass that came thundering through the semidarkness appalled me. Nearer and nearer drew the engine. The fierce glow of the furnace, as the fireman laboured to fill the insatiable maw, gleamed red upon the gravelled track. Black smoke rolled from the stack and hung low in the quiet air. With laboured pants, like an exhausted leviathan, the great machine lurched past.

Dan caught my hand and we ran beside the track. Car after car clanked by. The hammering wheels seemed hungry for a victim. My eyes visioned the ghastly death of an unknown man, whose life had been ground out but a scant half hour before we had discovered the mangled remains. I saw myself, hampered with clinging skirts and weighted with a heavy bundle, clinging, slipping, falling between the ravening wheels, and a deadly nausea seized me. With a half stifled cry I turned down the embankment. Dan pulled and exhorted in vain.

“It’s no use,” I said doggedly. “I just can’t do it.”

The tail-lights of the caboose faded from view.

“Well, I’ll be darned,” said Dan. “I never knew you were a coward.”

“I don’t care if I am. It’s better than being chopped to pieces under that train. I feel sure I should have gone under if I had made the attempt.”

“Nonsense,” he replied. “Now we’re in a nice fix. We can’t stay here. We can’t walk across that wilderness. And we can’t catch a freight in the railroad yard on account of Jeff Farr. First time I ever saw you show the white feather.”

“Just you wait till morning and we’ll see who’ll show the white feather. I’m going to walk right into that yard, and Jeff Farr or no Jeff Farr, I’ll board the first west-bound freight that pulls out.”

Jeff Farr, as all the hoboes know, is an officer, especially dreaded because of his drastic methods of handling vagrants, who makes his headquarters at Cheyenne. We had heard of him repeatedly, for his fame had spread even beyond Omaha, and his mere name was sufficient to strike fear in the stoutest heart.

In a disgruntled mood, we plunged into the bushes, and without attempting to make camp, threw ourselves on the ground and slept. At dawn we ate a cold lunch and turned back toward Cheyenne.

At the west entrance of the railroad yard, a watchman stopped us. I pleaded our cause to such good effect that he turned his back and gazed into space as we scurried past. Two long strings of boxcars stood as though ready for the road, and as we approached, a brakeman clambered from the top of the nearest and spoke to me. He had noted the behaviour of the detective, so as soon as I explained the situation he motioned to the second string and told us that it was a west-bound train, already searched and passed by the detectives, and now waiting, under the guard of our friend the watchman, for engine and crew.

Ducking across the tracks we examined the long line of cars, but each was shut and sealed. In the middle of the train stood several gondolas, and in lieu of nothing better, we boarded one. Crouching down, we waited for the start with every nerve at high tension. A pair of hands grasped the edge of the gondola. “Jeff Farr,” thought I with a shudder. A man’s head appeared above the brim. With staring eyes, he glared at us for a moment, then, with an inarticulate grunt, dropped to the ground. The brakeman who had directed our movements engaged him in conversation. Another pair of hands came over the other side of the car. Again a vision of revolvers, handcuffs, courtroom and jail flashed through my mind. Again a man’s head appeared.

“Well, I’ll be blowed—a woman!” he gasped, and disappeared from view.

Then a third man appeared. He evidently knew what to expect, for he stared at us with a friendly grin.

“The boys said they was a woman up here, but I thought they was kidding me. Say, you folks got nerve—sticking your head into the lion’s mouth like this. Ever hear of Jeff Farr?”

“It’ll take something a whole lot worse than Jeff Farr to keep me in this God-forsaken hole of a Cheyenne,” I replied.

“They said you had grit. Hope you get through all right,” he answered, as a jolt announced the arrival of the engine.

“Off brakes,” whistled the engineer. With gasps of relief we saw the buildings glide past, for we knew we were safe for the present.

At the second station out an empty box car was picked up and the crew transferred us into that. The strict laws against riding freights caused us to keep every opening closed. There was no ventilation, and as the sun climbed higher, we suffered severely from thirst, for in the excitement of departure we had neglected to fill the canteen. Shortly after noon the train stopped and we heard voices near at hand. The door was shoved open and a man’s head appeared.

“You can’t ride in there. Come out at once.”

We leaped to the ground.

“Clear out as fast as you know how. I don’t want to run you in, but if anybody comes along, I’ll have to, and that may mean a month in jail.”

After our Wood River experience, a word was sufficient to put us in motion, and as we struck off across the tracks, I glanced back and saw that we were in the town of Laramie.

This little city stands in the midst of a barren plain, ringed about by distant mountain ranges. Trees are scarce, and what few there are evidently belong to doting owners, so that it is difficult for travellers of our persuasion to find shelter from the broiling sun. On the south side of town a narrow gauge railroad meanders off across the flat, grey plain, and near it we found a few discouraged trees in an abandoned rhubarb field. We made camp, set up the tent and cooked a much appreciated meal. As night came on mosquitoes swarmed about and we had recourse to a great smudge in front of the tent. About sundown I saw a tall, gaunt man walking slowly toward an abandoned freight car that stood on a rusty spur of the dinky railroad. As I watched his listless movements my professional interest was aroused, for I took him to be some unfortunate from the east in search of health.

Next morning we went up town, Dan to hunt for work and I to buy some much-needed provisions. Dan was lucky enough to secure immediate employment on some construction work at the Wyoming State University, located a short distance north of town.

I learned from a neighbour that no use was now being made of the pie-plant that grew on the railroad property, so I helped myself to a fine cooking. Forced to abstain from fruit and vegetables so long, the rhubarb made an especial appeal to our palates. I also discovered a large patch of a wild plant, which, as a child, I had often gathered for my mother. She called it “lamb’s quarter,” and held the young and tender shoots in high esteem for greens. I now pulled a large panful and we found them a pleasant addition to our menu. As I worked I again saw the invalid, and that night the poor fellow was sitting on a pile of ties with his head in his hands when Dan came home from work. He looked so desperately lonely and miserable that I asked Dan to go over and talk to him and see if there was anything we could do to help. In a few minutes Dan came back.

“The man is not sick. He’s hungry,” he said.

“Hungry!” I cried. “If that is all that ails him, he must be starving to look as he does. Go and invite him here for supper.”

Dan returned with the ragged, pallid stranger, whose emaciated face was almost covered by a heavy brown beard. He took a seat on an old stump and ate what was offered him in silence. After the meal he filled the water bucket, carried dried dung to replenish the smudge, then set off toward the boxcar without a word.

Next morning he sat on the ties as before. Again Dan called him over, and again he ate in silence, but on leaving he doffed his scare-crow hat.

“Thank you very much,” he muttered.

That evening he appeared without waiting to be summoned and as he drank his cocoa, I saw Dan choking with suppressed emotion. No sooner had the man gone, after attending to the chores as before, when Dan burst out.

“Did you see what that chap did? He picked up the salt instead of the sugar (we keep both in cocoa cans) and put a heaping spoonful in his cocoa, and blessed if he didn’t drink the unspeakable mess without a quiver.”

Next day our peculiar visitor came in rather early and stood awkwardly about, fumbling with his hat. Then with a shy, sidelong movement, he laid a fifty cent piece on our pine box table, and bolted away like a scared rabbit. A half hour later he came hesitatingly back, and prompted by Dan’s questions, explained that he had spent most of the day chopping wood, for which work he had received the fifty cents.

We had dubbed him Larabo for want of a better name, as a convenient abbreviation of Laramie Hobo, and that night he spent the evening beside our fire. Emboldened by our acceptance of his pitiful offering and encouraged by tactful questions, he told us his story.

He was born in Angel’s Camp, California, some twenty-three years ago, and was one of those unfortunate children whose father must remain unknown and whose mother died at his birth, leaving him to the care of her sisters in shame. The lad grew up untrained and uneducated, despised by the children of decent parents; and as he developed into a rugged, raw-boned youth, took up the work of a gold miner. He was not lacking in ambition, and saved his money with some vague idea of escaping the sins of his parents by migrating to parts unknown and establishing himself in some business.

At the age of twenty-one he had several hundred dollars in the savings bank, and set out for the east to better his condition. Farm life attracted him, so he hired out to a dairy-man. In course of a year he became very expert and, having saved his wages carefully, in the fall of 1907 determined to start a dairy of his own. He rented a small farm, laid in a good stock of hay and arranged to buy a herd of dairy cattle. His idea was to make as large an initial payment as possible, giving his note for the balance and depending on cream checks to pay off the indebtedness.

The farmer from whom he was purchasing the cows took him to a money lender to arrange for the loan. When Larabo came to sign he discovered that the note ran but six months, and since winter was coming on with the inevitable drop in cream production he doubted his ability to meet the note when due. The banker assured him that the note could be renewed without trouble, if necessary, and advised him that this short term note was in his favour, since it would enable him to pay off some of the debt in the spring and secure the remainder with a new note if desired, thus effecting a saving in interest. Thus persuaded, Larabo signed.

All winter long he fed and tended the cattle most faithfully and they did well, but as he had anticipated, the receipts from the creamery were insufficient to meet the note. When he asked for the promised renewal, the banker declared he could not do it, the times were too hard, money was scarce, some banks had issued script. If he failed to pay the debt, he would be sold out. The green, ignorant boy did his utmost to raise the necessary cash, but money was tight, as the banker had said, and a month later hay, equipment, cattle and savings were swept away.

Penniless and discouraged, he started to beat his way to the gold mines of the west. He was brutally slugged at Cheyenne, and at Laramie was arrested and given thirty days in jail. On his release he obtained work as a dishwasher in a restaurant and there remained until he had saved twenty dollars. On his way to the station to take a train for the west he met an officer, who took his money and ran him in. The judge remembered his face and gave him a sixty-day sentence.

During this period he brooded over his experiences and on his release sought out the man who had arrested and robbed him and administered a beating. He was once more arrested and clubbed and sentenced as a habitual offender. When his term expired, the chief of police ordered him to stay away from the business section of town under penalty of immediate arrest, and all officers, train crews and detectives were warned against him. Twice he walked miles along the western track and caught a freight, only to be beaten and thrown off. He was too feeble from abuse and confinement to cross the mountain wastes on foot, and at last resigned himself to slow starvation in the rotting freight car. For five weeks he had averaged but one meal a day, earned by doing odd jobs around the outskirts of town, and his wonderful endurance had almost reached its limit when we took him in.

Daily he has come to the camp for breakfast and supper, and has revealed his gratitude for our attentions by many little helpful acts and a dumb show of affection like a faithful dog.

Yesterday afternoon dense black clouds blew up while I was doing some marketing, and before I could reach camp the most severe hailstorm of my experience struck the town. I took shelter in the doorway of a cottage to escape the fearful pelting, but a woman appeared and sharply bade me be gone. I then stopped under a cow shed, but a man came from a near-by house and threatened me with arrest. Buffeted by the slashing hailstones, I struggled on to camp, only to find our little tent blown flat and covered with limbs torn from the trees by the storm.

The clouds passed as quickly as they had come. The sun shone with dazzling brilliance but little warmth; the sky resumed its wonderful transparent blue; and in the rarefied atmosphere the distant mountain peaks loomed clear and sharp with a deceptive aspect of proximity.

Despite the flood of golden sunshine the ground was still concealed by a liberal coating of hailstones as night fell.

I had done all I could to make things endurable when Dan came in from work, but he thought it best to sleep in some barn on account of the intense cold. After seeking permission at four or five houses and meeting with curt refusals and even threats, we returned to camp and found Larabo feeding a rousing fire and busily scraping a spot clear of ice. Here we set up the tent and spread our thin blankets on the ground, while a cutting wind swept across the valley and threatened to tear our shelter from its fastenings.

Dan’s work was finished, so as soon as we had thawed out and eaten breakfast this morning he went to town to get a time table and see if something could be done for poor Larabo. We have decided to take a passenger train to the first small station west of here, so I packed our baggage for the journey while Larabo looked on disconsolately.

Suddenly he whirled about and took to his heels and, glancing around, I saw a well-dressed man approaching through the rhubarb field. He came directly to me and began to talk about the recent storm. This led to some conversation concerning the University and I told him that Dan had been working there. His eyes fell on Larabo, who was moving restlessly about some hundred yards away.

“You should not allow that disreputable tramp to hang around your camp,” the stranger said. “People complain that you are harbouring hoboes and criminals, and it is giving you a bad reputation.”

His words loosed the flood of seething indignation that had been gathering strength with each succeeding day. I described the heartless treatment accorded us by the townspeople; I told the story of Larabo, and concluded with a scathing arraignment and denunciation of the Chief of Police who permitted such outrages. As I paused for breath the stranger broke in.

“I feel sure that the things of which you complain are mostly due to lack of understanding,” said he. “Take this Chief of Police now. He is really not such a bad fellow. His intentions are good. Fact is, I’m the Chief. Some of our good people have been complaining and calling this a tramp roost, and have asked me to have you arrested or run out of town.”

“You don’t look like the heartless brute that I had pictured, and I am glad indeed to meet you,” I responded, “for now I feel sure that you will take poor Larabo up town and protect him while he is earning enough money to get away.”

With that I invited the Chief to have a seat on a stump and we talked with mutual benefit and pleasure until Dan returned. The men were introduced and Dan explained that he had secured work with room and board for Larabo with a Socialist family, who would treat him kindly and vouch for his good behaviour. All that was necessary was for the Chief to grant permission for him to remain in town and furnish protection from official thugs.

Larabo was summoned and came reluctantly. I bade him and the Chief good-bye as Dan went with them to see our protégé settled in his new quarters. When Dan gets back we, too, will bid adieu to the rhubarb field and go our way with a satisfied feeling of work well done.

SIXTEEN

_August 9th_,
OGDEN, UTAH.

SIXTEEN

_August 9th. Ogden, Utah._

One more step taken, and a nice long one, too. We left the passenger train that took us out of Laramie at the inevitable water tank. The first freight that passed we made no attempt to board, for excellent reasons. A number of hoboes were lounging about, and when this freight pulled in the crowd separated, some running one way and some another.

As we walked down the siding loud sounds of altercation arose and a hobo came tearing up the path with a brakeman swinging a pick handle one short jump behind. The tramp dodged under the train and disappeared. A few yards further on another trainman with a heavy chain in his hands was making vicious cuts at a slender boy, who dodged nimbly around and over the cars, now here, now there. It seemed an inauspicious moment to make the acquaintance of the train crew, so we returned to the welcome shade of the water tank.

Evening came. We cooked our simple meal and prepared for the journey. It was perhaps nine o’clock when the heavy vibration of the roadbed announced the coming of another freight. We crouched in the bushes at the side of the track. The train jarred to a halt and in the light from the fire box we could see the hose being let down to the engine tank.

Silently we drew near and made a hurried inspection of the rolling stock. Only one car was open. This was a gondola loaded with some massive, black machinery. We swung our bundles over the edge and scrambled in ourselves. Pieces of machinery were heaped in a confused mass, but in one end two broad, curving bars of metal like huge springs fitted together in such a way as to form an elliptical enclosure. Hastily we opened a bundle and extracted an oilcloth covered blanket. Bundles, hats and canteen were stowed beneath a projection. Then we wedged ourselves into the oblong space that scarcely afforded room for our bodies and tucked the black covering neatly over us. Hardly were we down when a “shack,” as the hoboes call the trainmen, approached over the top of the train and with lantern in hand leaped from one piece of machinery to another, narrowly missing our bodies as he passed.

Dan fell asleep almost immediately, but I was not so fortunate. My head and shoulders rested on a heavy piece of metal which vibrated and bounded up and down with the violent jarring of the train. Crowded as we were in the constricted space, I had no opportunity to change my position, so could only submit to the constant pounding with fortitude. At times it seemed that I could no longer endure the concussion at the base of the skull, which set up a violent headache, and also I was in fear that a shift of the great mass of metal might pin us down and perhaps crush us. But moving was out of the question, for the trainmen were constantly passing with lanterns and pick handles, and woe to the unlucky hobo who crossed their path.

The night wore away, and as the first grey streaks of dawn showed in the sky the train entered a division point. Several men engaged in conversation at the side of the car in which we lay concealed.

“Got any ’boes aboard this trip, Bill?” inquired a heavy voice.

“Well, I’ve got a suspicion that we may have. When we stopped for water just this side of Laramie I thought I saw a couple scooting along the side. But we haven’t been able to locate anybody. Better see what you can raise.”

The next instant a man vaulted onto the end of the car and sat on the edge, with feet dangling a scant twelve inches above my head. Dan was sound asleep, and I was in deadly fear lest he waken suddenly and make some move or sound. The intruder carried a lantern, which shone palely in the growing light.

“Here, Joe, gimme that lantern a second. I want to take a look in that refrigerator car.”

The seated detective passed the light to his mate, then leisurely placed his foot within an inch of my right ear, and stepping over our heads, made his way across the car. His pal peered into the open ventilator in the ice chest of the car ahead, and a moment later both men jumped to the ground to greet the new crew.

“All right, boys. No ’boes this morning. She’s all ready to take out.”

The engineer sounded the welcome signal and we entered a new division. It was broad daylight before I saw a trainman, and then a brakie appeared, coming over the tops from the rear. With a cautious motion I pulled the blanket over Dan, who still slept, and drew a fold across my own face.

The brakeman advanced with a cheerful whistle, and his heel rang sharply on the iron projection at Dan’s shoulder, who threw out both arms and raised up with a cry. As Dan sat up, the brakie sat down with exceeding swiftness. The two men glared at one another and it would be difficult to say which had the blanker expression—Dan, who had been so rudely startled out of his sound sleep, or the brakeman, who had witnessed the apparition of a man rising out of apparently solid metal. The sight of their gaping mouths and bulging eyes proved too much for my risibles and stretching out my cramped arms, I burst into peals of laughter. My unexpected appearance seemed the one thing needed to complete the utter mental disorganisation of the unfortunate trainman. He was too far gone to speak, but gulped and gasped like a dying fish. Dan and I gradually eased our stiffened bodies out of our iron cradle, and by degrees the brakeman’s wits returned. I at once got to work and soon had his promise to leave us unmolested.

But we were not to remain so for long. The conductor himself came over the top—a new thing in our experience—and kindly, but firmly, told us to get off at the next stop.