The Man from the Bitter Roots

by Lockhart, Caroline

  Well-meaning but tactless, Abe Cone expressed the general feeling, when he observed:

  “I been stung once, already, and I ain’t lookin’ for it again.”

  To everyone’s surprise Abe got off unscathed. In fact Mr. Sprudell laughed good-naturedly.

  “Stung, Abe—that’s the word. And why?” He answered himself. “Because you were investing in something you did not understand.”

  “It looked all right,” Abe defended. “You could see the gold stickin’ out all over the rock, but I was ‘salted’ so bad I never got enough to drink since. I don’t understand this placer-mining either, when it comes to that.”

  Adolph Gotts, who had been a butcher, specializing in sausage, before he became a city contractor, was about to say the same thing, when Sprudell interrupted triumphantly:

  “Ah, but you will before I’m done.” It was the moment for which he had waited. “Follow me, gentlemen.”

  He threw open the door of the adjoining room with a wide gesture, his face radiant with elation.

  The company stared, and well it might, for at a signal a miniature placer mine started operation.

  The hotel porter shovelled imported sand into a sluice-box through which a stream of water ran and at the end was the gold-saving device invented by Mr. Sprudell which was to revolutionize placer-mining!

  The sand contained the gold-dust that represented half of Bruce’s laborious summer’s working and when Sprudell finally removed his coat and cleaned up the sluice boxes and the gold-saving machine, the residue left in the gold-pan was enough to give even a “‘49’er” heart failure.

  His triumph was complete. There was a note of awe even in Old Man “Gid” Rathburn’s voice, while Abe Cone fairly grovelled as he inquired:

  “Is it all like that? Where does it come from? How did it git into that dirt?”

  Mr. Sprudell removed his eyeglasses with great deliberation and pursed his lips:

  “In my opinion,” he said weightily—he might have been an eminent geologist giving his opinion of the conglomerate of the Rand banket, or Agricola elucidating his theory of vein formation—“in my opinion the gold found in this deposit was derived from the disintegration of gold-bearing rocks and veins in the mountains above. Chemical and mechanical processes are constantly freeing the gold from the rocks with which it is associated and wind and water carry it to lower levels, where, as in this instance, it concentrates and forms what we call placers.”

  Mr. Sprudell spoke so slowly and chose his words with such care that the company received the impression that this theory of placer deposit was his own and in spite of their personal prejudice their admiration grew.

  “As undoubtedly you know,” continued Mr. Sprudell, tapping his glasses judicially upon the edge of the sluice-box, “the richest gold in all alluvial deposits—”

  “What is an alluvial deposit?” inquired Abe Cone, eagerly.

  Mr. Sprudell looked hard at Abram but did not answer, one reason being that he wished to rebuke the interruption, and another that he did not know. He reiterated: “The richest gold in all alluvial deposits is found upon bed-rock. This placer, gentlemen, is no exception and while it is pay-dirt from the grass roots and the intermediate sand and gravel abundantly rich to justify their exploitation by Capital, it is upon bed-rock that will be uncovered a fortune to dazzle the mind of man!

  “Like myself, you are practical men—you want facts and figures, and when you invest your money you want to be more than reasonably sure of its return. Gentlemen, I have in the hands of a printer a prospectus giving the values of the ground per cubic yard, and from this data I have conservatively, very conservatively, calculated the profits which we might reasonably anticipate. You will be startled, amazed, bewildered by the magnitude of the returns upon the investment which I am giving you the opportunity to make.

  “I shall say no more at present, gentlemen, but when my prospectus is off the press I shall place it in your hands—”

  “Gemman to see you, suh.”

  “I’m engaged.”

  “Said it was important.” The bell boy lingered.

  Sprudell frowned.

  “Did he give no name?”

  “Yes, suh; he said to tell you Burt—Bruce Burt.”

  Sprudell grew a curious, chalky white and stood quite still. He felt his color going and turned quickly lest it be observed.

  Apologetically, to his guests:

  “One moment, if you please.”

  He remembered that Bruce Burt had warned him that he would come back and haunt him—he wished the corridor was one mile long.

  There was nothing of the wraith, or phantom, however, in the broad-shouldered figure in a wide-brimmed Stetson sitting in the office watching Sprudell’s approach with ominous intentness.

  With a fair semblance of cordiality Sprudell hastened forward with outstretched hand.

  “I’m amazed! Astonished—”

  “I thought you would be,” Bruce answered grimly, ignoring Sprudell’s hand. “I came to see about that letter—what you’ve done.”

  “Everything within my power, my friend—they’re gone.”

  “Gone! You could not find them?”

  “Not a trace.” Sprudell looked him squarely in the eye.

  “You did your best?”

  “Yes, Burt, I did my best.”

  “Well,” Bruce got up slowly, “I guess I’ll register.” His voice and face showed his disappointment. “You live here, they said, so I’ll see you in the morning and get the picture and the ‘dust’.”

  “In the morning, then. You’ll excuse me now, won’t you? I have a little dinner on.”

  He lingered a moment to watch Bruce walk across the office and he noticed how he towered almost head and shoulders above the clerk at the desk: and he saw also, how, in spite of his ill-fitting clothes so obviously ready-made, he commanded, without effort, the attention and consideration for which, in his heart, Sprudell knew that he himself had to pay and pose and scheme.

  A thought which was so strong, so like a conviction that it turned him cold, flashed into his mind as he looked. If, by any whim of Fate, Helen Dunbar and Bruce Burt should ever meet, all the material advantages which he had to offer would not count a straw’s weight with the girl he had determined to marry.

  But such a meeting was the most remote thing possible. There were nearer bridges to be crossed, and Sprudell was anxious to be rid of his guests that he might think.

  When Bruce stepped out of the elevator the next morning, Sprudell greeted him effusively and this time Bruce, though with no great enthusiasm, took his plump, soft hand. From the first he had a feeling which grew stronger, as the forenoon waned, that Sprudell was “riding herd on him,” guarding him, warding off chance acquaintances. It amused him, when he was sure of it, for he thought that it was due to Sprudell’s fear lest he betray him in his rôle of hero, though it seemed to Bruce that short as was their acquaintance Sprudell should know him better than that. When he had the young man corralled in his office at the Tool Works, he seemed distinctly relieved and his vigilance relaxed. He handed Bruce his own letter and a roll of notes, saying with a smile which was uncommonly gracious considering that the money was his own:

  “I suppose it won’t make any difference to you that your gold-dust has taken on a different form.”

  “Why, no,” Bruce answered. “It’s all the same.” Yet he felt a little surprise. “But the letter from ‘Slim’s’ sister, and the picture—I want them, too.”

  “I’m sorry,” Sprudell frowned in perplexity, “but they’ve been mislaid. I can’t think where I put them, to save my soul.”

  “How could you misplace them?” Bruce demanded sharply. “You kept them all together, didn’t you? I wanted that picture.”

  “It’ll turn up, of course,” Sprudell replied soothingly. “And when it does I’ll get it to you by the first mail.”

  Bruce did not answer—there seemed nothing more to say—but there was something
in Sprudell’s voice and eyes that was not convincing. Bruce had the feeling strongly that he was holding back the letter and the picture, but why? What could they possibly mean to a stranger? He was wrong in his suspicions, of course, but nevertheless, he was intensely irritated by the carelessness.

  He arose, and Sprudell did likewise.

  “You are going West from here?”

  Bruce answered shortly:

  “On the first train.”

  Sprudell lowered his lids that Bruce should not see the satisfaction in his eyes.

  “Good luck to you, and once more, congratulations on your safe return.”

  Bruce reluctantly took the hand he offered, wondering why it was that Sprudell repelled him so.

  “Good-bye,” he answered indifferently, as he turned to go.

  Abe Cone in his comparatively short career had done many impulsive and ill-considered things but he never committed a worse faux pas than when he dashed unannounced into Sprudell’s office, at this moment, dragging an out-of-town customer by the arm.

  “Excuse me for intrudin’,” he apologized breathlessly, “but my friend here, Mr. Herman Florsheim—shake hands with Mr. Sprudell, Herman—wants to catch a train and he’s interested in what I been tellin’ him of that placer ground you stumbled on this fall. He’s got friends in that country and wanted to know just where it is. I remember you said something about Ore City bein’ the nearest post-office, but what railroad is it on? If we need any outside money, why, Herman here—”

  Bruce’s hand was on the door-knob, but he lingered, ignoring the most urgent invitation to go that he ever had seen in any face.

  “I’m busy, Abe,” Sprudell said so sharply that his old friend stared. “You are intruding. You should have sent your name.”

  Bruce closed the door which he had partially opened and came back.

  “Don’t mind me,” he said slowly, looking at Sprudell. “I’d like to hear about that placer—the one you stumbled on last fall.”

  “We’ll come another time,” Abe said, crestfallen.

  Bruce turned to him:

  “No, don’t go. I’ve just come from Ore City and I may be able to tell your friend something that he wants to know. Where is your placer ground, Sprudell?”

  Sprudell sat down in his office chair, toying with a desk-fixture, while Bruce shoved both hands in his trousers’ pockets and waited for him to speak.

  “Burt,” he said finally, “I regret this unpleasantness, but the fact is you did not comply with the law—you have never recorded and you are located out.”

  “So you’ve taken advantage of the information with which I trusted you to jump my ground?” Bruce’s eyes blazed into Sprudell’s.

  “The heirs could not be found, you were given up for dead, and in any event I’ve not exceeded my rights.”

  “You have no rights upon that ground!” Bruce answered hotly, “My locations were properly made in ‘Slim’s’ name and my own. The sampling and the cabin and the tunnel count for assessment work. I had not abandoned the claim.”

  “Nevertheless, my engineer informs me——”

  “Your engineer?” A light dawned.

  “Wilburt Dill—pity you did not meet him, a bright young chap—”

  “I met him,” Bruce answered grimly. “I shall hope to meet him again.”

  “No doubt you will,” Sprudell taunted, “if you happen to be there when we’re putting up the plant. As I was saying, Mr. Dill’s telegram, which came last night, informs me that he has carried out my instructions, and therefore, individually, and as the President of the Bitter Root Placer Mining Company, I now control one hundred and sixty acres of ground up and down the river, including the bar upon which your cabin stands.” Sprudell’s small, red mouth curved in its tantalizing smile.

  “You’ll never hold it!” Bruce said furiously.

  “The days of gun-plays have gone by,” Sprudell reminded him. “And you haven’t got the price to fight me in the courts. You’d better lay down before you start and save yourself the worry. What can you do? You have no money, no influence, no brains to speak of,” he sneered insultingly, “or you wouldn’t be down there doing what you are. You haven’t a single asset but your muscle, and in the open market that’s worth about three-fifty a day.”

  Bruce stood like a mute, the blood burning in his face. Even toward “Slim” he never had felt such choking, speechless rage as this.

  “You Judas Iscariot!” he said when he could speak. “You betrayed my hospitality—my trust. Next to a cache robber you’re the meanest kind of a thief I’ve ever known. I’ve read your story in the newspaper, and so has the old man who saved your rotten life. We know you for the lying braggart that you are. You made yourself out a hero when you were a weakling and a coward.

  “You’re right—you tell the truth when you twit me with the fact that I have no money no influence, perhaps no brains—not a single asset, as you say, but brute strength; yet somehow, I’ll beat you!” He stepped closer and looking deep into the infantile blue eyes that had grown as hard as granite, reiterated—“Somehow I’m going to win!”

  To say that Abe Cone and Mr. Herman Florsheim departed is not enough—they faded, vanished, without a sound.

  Sprudell’s eyes quailed a little beneath the fierce intensity of Bruce’s gaze, but for a moment only.

  “I’ve heard men talk like that before.” He shrugged a shoulder and looked Bruce up and down—at his coat too tight across the chest, at his sleeves, too short for his length of arm, at his clumsy miner’s shoes, as though to emphasize the gulf which lay between Bruce’s condition and his own. Then with his eyes bright with vindictiveness and his hateful smile of confidence upon his lips, he stood in his setting of affluence and power waiting for Bruce to go, that he might close the door.

  * * *

  XII

  Thorns—and a Few Roses

  Helen Dunbar was exercising that doubtful economy, walking to save car-fare, when she saw Mae Smith with her eyes fixed upon her in deadly purpose making a bee-line across the street. If there was any one thing more needed to complete her depression it was a meeting with Mae Smith.

  She stopped and waited, trying to think what it was Mae Smith resembled when she hurried like that. A penguin! that was it—Mae Smith walked exactly like a penguin. But Helen did not smile at the comparison, instead, she continued to look somberly and critically at the woman who approached. When Helen was low spirited, as now, Mae Smith always rose before her like a spectre. She saw herself at forty another such passé newspaper woman trudging from one indifferent editor to another peddling “space.” And why not? Mae Smith had been young and good-looking once, also a local celebrity in her way when she had signed a column in a daily. But she had grown stale with the grind, and having no special talent or personality had been easily replaced when a new Managing Editor came. Now, though chipper as a sparrow, she was always in need of a small loan.

  As Helen stood on the corner, in her tailor-made, which was the last word in simplicity and good lines, the time looked very remote when she, too, would be peddling space in a $15 gown, that had faded in streaks, but Helen had no hallucinations concerning her own ability. She knew that she had no great aptitude for her work and realized that her success was due more often to the fact that she was young, well-dressed, and attractive than to any special talent. This was all very well now, while she got results, but what about the day when her shoes spread over the soles and turned over at the heels, and she bought her blouse “off the pile?” When her dollar gloves were shabby and would not button at the wrist? What about the day when she was too dispirited to dress her hair becomingly, but combed it straight up at the back, so that her “scolding locks” hung down upon her coat-collar, and her home-trimmed hat rode carelessly on one ear?

  All these things were characteristic of Mae Smith, who personified unsuccessful, anxious middle-age. But there was one thing, she told herself as she returned Mae Smith’s effusive greeting, that never, n
ever, no matter how sordid her lot became, should there emanate from her that indefinable odor of poverty—cooking, cabbage, lack of ventilation, bad air—not if she had to hang her clothing out the window by a string!

  “I’ve been over to the Chronicle office,” Mae Smith chattered. “Left some fashion notes for the Sunday—good stuff—but I don’t know whether he’ll use ’em; that kid that’s holdin’ down McGennigle’s job don’t buy much space. He’s got it in for me anyhow. I beat him on a convention story when he was a cub. I was just goin’ down to your office.”

  “Yes? I’m on the way to the doctor’s.”

  “You don’t look well, that’s a fact. Sick?”

  Helen smiled, faintly. “I do feel miserable. Like every one else I got a drenching at the Thanksgiving Game.”

  “That’s too bad,” Mae Smith murmured absently. What was a cold compared to the fact that she needed two dollars and a half? “Say, I wonder if I could get a little loan for a few days? You know I bought this suit on the installment plan and I’m two weeks behind on it. The collector was around yesterday and said he’d have to take it back. I can’t go around gettin’ fashion notes in my kimono, and the milkman wouldn’t leave any milk until I paid for the last ticket. I’m up against it and I thought maybe—”

  “How much do you want?”

  “About two dollars and a half.” The tense look faded instantly from Miss Smith’s face.

  Helen did not mention, as she laid that amount in her eager hand, that it was part of the money she had saved to buy a pair of long gloves.

  “Thank you”—gaily—“ever so much obliged! I’ve got a corking idea in my head for a Sunday special and just as soon as I write it and get paid—”

  “No hurry,” Helen answered with a quizzical smile, and she watched Mae Smith clamber joyously on a street car to ride two blocks and spend the fare that Helen had walked eight blocks to save.