Miss Dividends Part 13

On which the girl asks him if his mine is so rich, why does he not work it himself.

"Because I am tired of barbarism!" he cries. "I want a home and a wife, and I wouldn't ask any woman to share a mining cabin with me."

"What matters," says Erma airily, "if she loved you?"

"Do you mean that?" remarks Harry, a peculiar ring coming into his voice.

"Yes," says the girl, rising; "if I loved a man I believe I could give up for him--even New York. But it is growing late. You tell me we have an early breakfast to-morrow morning, Captain Lawrence?"

"Yes, six o'clock," he says shortly, and escorts his charge to the door of the hotel, where her maid is waiting for her. Here she nonchalantly says, "Good-night. Thank you so much!" Then, a sudden impulse impelling her, she steps to the man who is just turning from her and whispers, her eyes glowing gratefully, "G.o.d bless you for saving Ferdie's life! G.o.d bless you for being kind to me!"

Next, seemingly frightened at herself, she runs lightly up the stairs to her bedroom, where she goes to sleep; but once she is awakened by the clanging of freight trains in the night, and this thought comes into her head: "What manner of man is this who two days ago was a stranger to me, but who has built railroads and slain desperadoes and Indians and whom I think about waking and sleeping?" Then she utters a little affrighted cry, "WHY, HE HAS EVEN MADE ME FORGET MY FATHER!"

The gentleman she has slighted has been under discussion on the railroad platform below.

Mr. Chauncey and Lawrence, strolling out before going to bed to take a preliminary smoke, the Captain suddenly asks, between puffs of his cigar: "Miss Travenion's father was quite a swell in New York?"

"Was?--IS!" cries Ferdie. "I only know him by sight, but I inspected him once or twice last year when he was in town, sitting in the Unity windows, chewing a cane, and following with his eyes any likely ankle up the Avenue. In fact, he's about as heavy a swell now as you'd want to see, though they say when he lived in New York permanently he used to be heavier."

"Ah," replies Harry, taking a long puff at his Havana, "a thorough club man?"

"I should think so!" returns Mr. Chauncey. "He is an out and outer.

There are some curious stories extant that would make your hair stand on end about Ralph Travenion in the old days. They say----"

But Ferdie stops here in sudden surprise, for Lawrence's hand is on his arm, and he is whispering: "Don't tell me anything that would make me think less of her father!"

"Oh, of course not, if you don't wish it," replies the boy. Then he laughingly says: "You're not going to judge of Miss Beauty up there by her paternal, are you, old man? That would be _rather_ a heavy handicap." A moment later he goes on, the other not replying: "But she'd stand it. She's a good girl; even a big fortune and the adoration of Newport's smart set couldn't give her airs. She's liable to marry some fellow just for love."

"You think so?" asks Lawrence with a hearty voice.

"Certainly. Did you notice her thanking you for saving my life?" returns the boy. "Could she have shown more grat.i.tude if you'd been an English duke? And I thank you for it also. We Harvard men are not apt to gush, my boy; but we feel just the same. If I was in love with Erma Travenion, I'd sooner have what you did to-day to my credit than a million in bonds."

"Would you!" cries the captain. "Would you!" and his clasp is so cordial as he shakes Ferdie's hand on bidding him good-night that the boy goes away and mutters, "He's got a grip like a prize-fighter--but hang it, I sent him to bed happy for saving my life--and he did save it. Good Lord, if it hadn't been for him, where would yours truly have been now? Oh ginger!" And this idea making him serious, he goes to bed and sleeps, a thing that Harry finds more difficult.

The next morning there is a very happy smile on Miss Travenion's face as she trips down to her breakfast, where she is met by Captain Lawrence and Ferdie, and the three shortly after go to the Utah Central and take train there for Salt Lake, and after running through prosperous Mormon villages and outlying farms for about an hour and a half, Erma suddenly cries, "What is that great turtle rising out of the trees?"

To this Lawrence answers, "The Mormon Tabernacle!" and a few minutes after they run into the "City of the Saints," where certain things shall come to Erma Travenion such as this young lady of New York society wots not are in the heavens above the earth, nor in the waters that are beneath it.

BOOK II.

A CURIOUS CLUB MAN.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE CITY OF SAINTS.

Here they are met by Mr. Oliver Livingston, who has a carriage in waiting. To his anxious questioning as to how they had missed the train, and had fared during the night in Ogden, Miss Travenion says shortly, "First my father; is he not here with you?" and looks about the depot with scrutinizing eyes. A moment after she continues hurriedly, "Your mother received my telegram?"

"Yes," remarks Ollie. "It arrived just in time to save mamma from a fainting fit."

"And you did not communicate it to my father?"

"No," returns Mr. Livingston; "that was impossible. He was not at the station here. At all events, I did not see him, as I would undoubtedly have, if he had been waiting for you."

"Then he cannot have been in town," cries Erma, her pretty lips pouting with disappointment, for Mr. Livingston is very well acquainted with Mr.

Travenion by sight, having seen that gentleman on some of his visits to New York.

While this colloquy has been going on, Ferdie and Harry have been conversing apart. Miss Travenion now turns to them, and seeing that Ollie does not recognize her protector of the night before, says, rapidly, but earnestly, "Mr. Livingston, you must remember Captain Lawrence on the train. He was very kind to me last night and took good care of me. You should thank him also."

The latter part of this speech has been made in some embarra.s.sment, for the young men are looking at each other with by no means kindly eyes.

Its last sentence makes them enemies, for Livingston, who had already been slightly jealous of the attentions of the Westerner to the young lady he regards even now as his _fiancee_, becomes very jealous, and Lawrence, who has somehow formed the shrewd idea that there is some connection between Miss Travenion and the son of her chaperon, interprets the "You should thank him also," for indication of engagement and future marriage between the pair, and from this moment takes that kind of a liking to Mr. Livingston a man generally has for a rival who is more blessed by circ.u.mstance and position in matters pertaining to his suit--which generally means envious hate.

Being compelled to social truce, at least in the presence of the young lady, the two men are obliged to recognize each other and acknowledge the re-introduction. This Livingston does by a rather snarly "How are yer?" and Lawrence by a nod of indifference.

Then Miss Travenion gives an additional pang to Mr. Livingston, for she says: "Captain, another request. You know Salt Lake very well? You are acquainted with some of the journals?"

"One only," remarks Harry. "The Salt Lake _Tribune_,--the Gentile newspaper."

"Then you can do me a favor," returns Erma. "My father apparently has not received my telegram. Would you take care that a notice of my arrival is inserted prominently in that paper, so that if papa is in town, he will see it; if in any of the mining camps or settlements about here, it may reach his eye. The sooner I behold him, the happier I shall be."

"Any request from you will be a command to me," says Lawrence, eagerly.

"The announcement shall be made in the _Tribune_, but it cannot be until to-morrow morning. If I can aid you in any other way, please do not fail to call upon me." To this he adds hurriedly: "I shall leave town early this afternoon for Tintic Mining District, but shall return in three days."

"Very well," answers the young lady. "Do not forget that we stop at the Townsend House, where I shall always be most happy to see you." She emphasizes her invitation by so cordial a grasp of the hand, and Harry returns it so heartily, that Mr. Oliver Livingston pulls down his immaculate s.h.i.+rt-cuffs in anguish and rage.

This is not decreased by Ferdie's admiring remark: "Ain't the Cap a high stepper!" as the party step into the carriage and drive away.

They are soon at the corner of West Temple and South Second Streets, and find themselves in front of a rather rambling two-story house with an attic attachment, at this time the princ.i.p.al hotel in Salt Lake City, for in 1871 the Walker House is not yet built. It has a generally yellow appearance, though its windows are protected from the sun by green Venetian blinds.

Alighting here, Miss Travenion is informed that Mrs. Livingston is not yet up, and going to her room, lies down, it being still quite early in the day, while her maid unpacks her trunks and arranges her dresses.

Though fatigued by her long railroad trip, sleep does not come to Erma, for thoughts of her father are upon her; and after a little, growing anxious on this subject, she springs up, and says: "I'll look for him!"

So, making a hasty but effective toilet, robed in a dainty summer dress, the girl stepping to the window, looks out and cries: "How pretty!" for she is gazing upon Salt Lake City on an October day, which is as beautiful as any day can be, save a May day, when there is a little less dust on the streets and a little more water in the rivulets that course through them.

All round her are houses embowered in green foliage, and broad streets, also planted with trees, and streams of living water, fresh from the melting snows of the Wahsatch, coursing by their sidewalks where gutters would be in ordinary towns.

In these streets there is a curious, heterogeneous life, the like of which she has never seen before. Immediately below her, in front of the hotel, men of many climes lounge about the unpaved sidewalk, most of them seated, their feet against the trees that line its side, each man smoking a cigar, the aromas of which, as they float up to her, seem to be pleasant.

Most of these are mining speculators from California, the East, and Europe; as their voices rise to her, she catches tones similar to those she has heard in Delmonico's from travelling Englishmen. For the Emma mine is in its glory; and much British capital has floated into this Territory, to be invested in the silver leads of the great mountains that cut off her view to the east, and the low ranges that she can see to the south and west; a good deal of it never to return to London again; for, of all the speculators of many nations who have invested in American securities, stocks, bonds, mining properties and beer interests, none have so rashly and so lavishly squandered their money as the speculators of merry England. These have sometimes been allured to financial discomfort by Yankee shrewdness, but more often have been betrayed by the ignorance or carelessness or rascality of those whom they have sent from their native isle to represent them, who have judged America, Western mines and Yankee business methods by England, Cornish lodes and the financial conditions that prevail in Thread-Needle Street.

Two or three hacks and carriages, such as are seen in the East, stand in front of the hotel, while in the street before her move some big mule teams, laden with bars of lead and silver, from some smelter on the Jordan, and a little further on is a wagon of the prairies, covered with the mud and dust of long travel, driven by some Mormon who has come up from the far southern settlements of Manti, or Parowan, or the pretty oasis towns of Payson or Spanish Fork or some other garden spot by the side of the fresh waters of Utah Lake, to go through the rites of the Endowment House, and take unto himself another wife; paying well for the ceremonies in farm produce.