Stories in Light and Shadow, Bret Harte [urban books to read .txt] 📗

citizen and not helping to force him into the German service.”

The consul saw in a flash the full military significance of this logic, and could not repress a smile. At which Captain Christian dropped easily into a chair beside him, and as easily into broken German English:—

“Und,” he went on, “dees town—dees Schlachtstadt is fine town, eh? Fine womens? Goot men? Und peer and sausage? Blenty to eat and trink, eh? Und you und te poys haf a gay times?”

The consul tried to recover his dignity. The waiter behind him, recognizing only the delightful mimicry of this adorable officer, was in fits of laughter. Nevertheless, the consul managed to say dryly:—

“And the barracks, the magazines, the commissariat, the details, the reserves of Schlachtstadt were very interesting?”

“Assuredly.”

“And Rheinfestung—its plans—its details, even its dangerous foundations by the river—they were to a soldier singularly instructive?”

“You have reason to say so,” said Captain Christian, curling his little mustache.

“And the fortress—you think?”

“Imprenable! Mais”—

The consul remembered General Adlerkreutz’s “Zo-o,” and wondered.

UNCLE JIM AND UNCLE BILLY

They were partners. The avuncular title was bestowed on them by Cedar Camp, possibly in recognition of a certain matured good humor, quite distinct from the spasmodic exuberant spirits of its other members, and possibly from what, to its youthful sense, seemed their advanced ages—which must have been at least forty! They had also set habits even in their improvidence, lost incalculable and unpayable sums to each other over euchre regularly every evening, and inspected their sluice-boxes punctually every Saturday for repairs—which they never made. They even got to resemble each other, after the fashion of old married couples, or, rather, as in matrimonial partnerships, were subject to the domination of the stronger character; although in their case it is to be feared that it was the feminine Uncle Billy—enthusiastic, imaginative, and loquacious—who swayed the masculine, steady-going, and practical Uncle Jim. They had lived in the camp since its foundation in 1849; there seemed to be no reason why they should not remain there until its inevitable evolution into a mining-town. The younger members might leave through restless ambition or a desire for change or novelty; they were subject to no such trifling mutation. Yet Cedar Camp was surprised one day to hear that Uncle Billy was going away.

The rain was softly falling on the bark thatch of the cabin with a muffled murmur, like a sound heard through sleep. The southwest trades were warm even at that altitude, as the open door testified, although a fire of pine bark was flickering on the adobe hearth and striking out answering fires from the freshly scoured culinary utensils on the rude sideboard, which Uncle Jim had cleaned that morning with his usual serious persistency. Their best clothes, which were interchangeable and worn alternately by each other on festal occasions, hung on the walls, which were covered with a coarse sailcloth canvas instead of lath-and-plaster, and were diversified by pictures from illustrated papers and stains from the exterior weather. Two “bunks,” like ships’ berths,—an upper and lower one,—occupied the gable-end of this single apartment, and on beds of coarse sacking, filled with dry moss, were carefully rolled their respective blankets and pillows. They were the only articles not used in common, and whose individuality was respected.

Uncle Jim, who had been sitting before the fire, rose as the square bulk of his partner appeared at the doorway with an armful of wood for the evening stove. By that sign he knew it was nine o’clock: for the last six years Uncle Billy had regularly brought in the wood at that hour, and Uncle Jim had as regularly closed the door after him, and set out their single table, containing a greasy pack of cards taken from its drawer, a bottle of whiskey, and two tin drinking-cups. To this was added a ragged memorandum-book and a stick of pencil. The two men drew their stools to the table.

“Hol’ on a minit,” said Uncle Billy.

His partner laid down the cards as Uncle Billy extracted from his pocket a pill-box, and, opening it, gravely took a pill. This was clearly an innovation on their regular proceedings, for Uncle Billy was always in perfect health.

“What’s this for?” asked Uncle Jim half scornfully.

“Agin ager.”

“You ain’t got no ager,” said Uncle Jim, with the assurance of intimate cognizance of his partner’s physical condition.

“But it’s a pow’ful preventive! Quinine! Saw this box at Riley’s store, and laid out a quarter on it. We kin keep it here, comfortable, for evenings. It’s mighty soothin’ arter a man’s done a hard day’s work on the river-bar. Take one.”

Uncle Jim gravely took a pill and swallowed it, and handed the box back to his partner.

“We’ll leave it on the table, sociable like, in case any of the boys come in,” said Uncle Billy, taking up the cards. “Well. How do we stand?”

Uncle Jim consulted the memorandum-book. “You were owin’ me sixty-two thousand dollars on the last game, and the limit’s seventy-five thousand!”

“Je whillikins!” ejaculated Uncle Billy. “Let me see.”

He examined the book, feebly attempted to challenge the additions, but with no effect on the total. “We oughter hev made the limit a hundred thousand,” he said seriously; “seventy-five thousand is only triflin’ in a game like ours. And you’ve set down my claim at Angel’s?” he continued.

“I allowed you ten thousand dollars for that,” said Uncle Jim, with equal gravity, “and it’s a fancy price too.”

The claim in question being an unprospected hillside ten miles distant, which Uncle Jim had never seen, and Uncle Billy had not visited for years, the statement was probably true; nevertheless, Uncle Billy retorted:—

“Ye kin never tell how these things will pan out. Why, only this mornin’ I was taking a turn round Shot Up Hill, that ye know is just rotten with quartz and gold, and I couldn’t help thinkin’ how much it was like my ole claim at Angel’s. I must take a day off to go on there and strike a pick in it, if only for luck.”

Suddenly he paused and said, “Strange, ain’t it, you should speak of it tonight? Now I call that queer!”

He laid down his cards and gazed mysteriously at his companion. Uncle Jim knew perfectly that Uncle Billy had regularly once a week for many years declared his final determination to go over to Angel’s and prospect his claim, yet nevertheless he half responded to his partner’s suggestion of mystery, and a look of fatuous wonder crept into his eyes. But he contented himself by saying cautiously, “You spoke of it first.”

“That’s the more sing’lar,” said Uncle Billy confidently. “And I’ve been thinking about it, and kinder seeing myself thar all day. It’s mighty queer!” He got up and began to rummage among some torn and coverless books in the corner.

“Where’s that ‘Dream Book’ gone to?”

“The Carson boys borrowed it,” replied Uncle Jim. “Anyhow, yours wasn’t no dream—only a kind o’ vision, and the book don’t take no stock in visions.” Nevertheless, he watched his partner with some sympathy, and added, “That reminds me that I had a dream the other night of being in ‘Frisco at a small hotel, with heaps o’ money, and all the time being sort o’ scared and bewildered over it.”

“No?” queried his partner eagerly yet reproachfully. “You never let on anything about it to ME! It’s mighty queer you havin’ these strange feelin’s, for I’ve had ‘em myself. And only tonight, comin’ up from the spring, I saw two crows hopping in the trail, and I says, ‘If I see another, it’s luck, sure!’ And you’ll think I’m lyin’, but when I went to the wood-pile just now there was the THIRD one sittin’ up on a log as plain as I see you. Tell ‘e what folks ken laugh—but that’s just what Jim Filgee saw the night before he made the big strike!”

They were both smiling, yet with an underlying credulity and seriousness as singularly pathetic as it seemed incongruous to their years and intelligence. Small wonder, however, that in their occupation and environment—living daily in an atmosphere of hope, expectation, and chance, looking forward each morning to the blind stroke of a pick that might bring fortune—they should see signs in nature and hear mystic voices in the trackless woods that surrounded them. Still less strange that they were peculiarly susceptible to the more recognized diversions of chance, and were gamblers on the turning of a card who trusted to the revelation of a shovelful of upturned earth.

It was quite natural, therefore, that they should return from their abstract form of divination to the table and their cards. But they were scarcely seated before they heard a crackling step in the brush outside, and the free latch of their door was lifted. A younger member of the camp entered. He uttered a peevish “Halloo!” which might have passed for a greeting, or might have been a slight protest at finding the door closed, drew the stool from which Uncle Jim had just risen before the fire, shook his wet clothes like a Newfoundland dog, and sat down. Yet he was by no means churlish nor coarse-looking, and this act was rather one of easy-going, selfish, youthful familiarity than of rudeness. The cabin of Uncles Billy and Jim was considered a public right or “common” of the camp. Conferences between individual miners were appointed there. “I’ll meet you at Uncle Billy’s” was a common tryst. Added to this was a tacit claim upon the partners’ arbitrative powers, or the equal right to request them to step outside if the interviews were of a private nature. Yet there was never any objection on the part of the partners, and tonight there was not a shadow of resentment of this intrusion in the patient, good-humored, tolerant eyes of Uncles Jim and Billy as they gazed at their guest. Perhaps there was a slight gleam of relief in Uncle Jim’s when he found that the guest was unaccompanied by any one, and that it was not a tryst. It would have been unpleasant for the two partners to have stayed out in the rain while their guests were exchanging private confidences in their cabin. While there might have been no limit to their good will, there might have been some to their capacity for exposure.

Uncle Jim drew a huge log from beside the hearth and sat on the driest end of it, while their guest occupied the stool. The young man, without turning away from his discontented, peevish brooding over the fire, vaguely reached backward for the whiskey-bottle and Uncle Billy’s tin cup, to which he was assisted by the latter’s hospitable hand. But on setting down the cup his eye caught sight of the pill-box.

“Wot’s that?” he said, with gloomy scorn. “Rat poison?”

“Quinine pills—agin ager,” said Uncle Jim. “The newest thing out. Keeps out damp like Injin-rubber! Take one to follow yer whiskey. Me and Uncle Billy wouldn’t think o’ settin’ down, quiet like, in the evening arter work, without ‘em. Take one—ye ‘r’ welcome! We keep ‘em out here for the boys.”

Accustomed as the partners were to adopt and wear each other’s opinions before folks, as they did each other’s clothing, Uncle Billy was, nevertheless, astonished and delighted at Uncle Jim’s enthusiasm over HIS pills. The guest took one and swallowed it.

“Mighty bitter!” he said, glancing at his hosts with the quick Californian suspicion of some practical joke. But the honest faces of the partners reassured him.

“That bitterness ye taste,” said Uncle Jim quickly, “is whar the thing’s gittin’ in its work. Sorter sickenin’ the malaria—and kinder water-proofin’ the insides all to onct and at the same lick! Don’t yer see? Put another in yer vest pocket; you’ll be cryin’ for ‘em like