Lost Farm Camp Part 9

A door opened in the corridor. Bas...o...b.. in scanty attire, greeted him.

"Softly, my Romeo. Thy Juliet is not fully attired to receive. Shut the door, dear saint, the air blows chill."

They shook hands, eyeing each other quizzically. A big, white English bull-terrier uncurled himself and dropped from the foot of the bed to the floor.

"h.e.l.lo, Smoke! Haven't forgotten me, have you?"

The terrier sniffed at David and wagged his tail in grave recognition.

Then he climbed back to his couch on the tumbled blankets.

"Now," said Bas...o...b.. searching among his scattered effects for the toothbrush he held in his hand, "tell Uncle Walt, why, thus disguised, you pace the pensive byways of this ign.o.ble burg?"

"Outfitting," said David.

"Brief, and to the point, my Romeo."

"For the winter," added David.

"Quite explicit, Davy. You're the same old clam-eloquent, interestingly communicative."

David laughed. "What are you doing up here? I supposed you were snug in the office directing affairs in the absence of your father."

"Oh, the pater's back again. I guess the speed-limit in Baden Baden was too slow for him. He's building the new road, you know, N. M. & Q. Your Uncle Wallie is on the preliminary survey. Devil of a job, too."

"Oh, yes. I heard about it. It's going to be a big thing."

"Yes," said Bas...o...b.. peering with short-sighted eyes into the dim gla.s.s as he adjusted his tie, "it may be a big thing if I"-striking an att.i.tude and thumping his chest-"don't break my neck or die of starvation. Camp cooking, Davy-whew! Say, Davy, I'm the Christopher Columbus of this expedition, I am, and I'll get just about as much thanks for my stake-driving and exploring as he did."

Bas...o...b..kicked an open suit-case out of his way and a fresh, crackling blue-print sprang open on the floor.

"That's it. Here we are," he said, spreading the blue-print on the bed, "straight north from Tramworth, along the river. Then we cross here at Lost Farm, as they call it. Say, there's a canny old crab lives up there that holds the sh.e.l.l-back record for grouch. Last spring, when we were working up that way and I took a hand at driving stakes, just to ease my conscience, you know, along comes that old whiskered Cyclops with a big Winchester on his shoulder. I smelled trouble plainer than hot asphalt.

"'Campin'?' he asked.

"'No,' I said. 'Just making a few dents in the ground. A kind of air-line sketch of the new road-N. M. & Q.'

"'Uhuh!' he grunted. 'Suppose the new rud 's a-comin' plumb through here, ain't it?'

"'Right-o,' said I.

"I guess he didn't just cotton to the idea. Anyway he told me I could stop driving 'them stakes' on his land. I told him I'd like to accommodate him, but circ.u.mstances made it necessary to peg in a few more for the ultimate benefit of the public. Well, that old geyser straightened up, and so did I, for that matter.

"'Drive another one of them,' he said, pointing to the stake between my feet, 'and I reckon you'll pull it out with your teeth.'"

Bas...o...b..lit a cigarette and puffed reflectively. "Well, I never was much on mumble-the-peg, so I quit. The old chap looked too healthy to contradict."

David sat on the edge of the bed rubbing the dog's ears.

Bas...o...b..observed him thoughtfully.

"Say, Davy, I don't suppose you want to keep Smoke for a while, do you?

He's no end of bother in camp. He has it in for the cook and it keeps me busy watching him."

"The cook? That's unnatural for a dog, isn't it?"

"Well, you see our aboriginal chef don't like dogs, and Smoke knows it.

Besides, he once gave Smoke a deer-shank stuffed with lard and red-pepper, regular log-roller's joke, and since then his legs aren't worth insuring-the cook's, I mean. You used to be quite chummy with Smoke, before you dropped out of the game."

"I'll take him, if he'll come," said David. "Just what I want, this winter. He'll be lots of company. That is, if you mean it-if you're serious."

"As serious as a Scotch dominie eating oysters, Davy mon."

"Won't Smoke make a fuss, though?"

"Not if I tell him to go. Oh, you needn't grin. See here." Bas...o...b..called the dog to him, and taking the wide jaws between his hands he spoke quietly. "Smoke," he said, "I'm going to leave you with Davy. He is a chaste and upright young man, so far as I ken. Quite suitable as a companion for you. You stick to him and do as he says. Look after him, for he needs looking after. And don't you leave him till I come for you, sir! Now, go and shake hands on it."

The dog strode to David and raised a muscular foreleg. Laughing, David seized it and shook it vigorously.

"It's a bargain, Smoke."

The terrier walked to Bas...o...b.. sniffed at his knees and then returned to David, but his narrow eyes moved continually with Bas...o...b..s nervous tread back and forth across the room.

"What's on your mind, Wallie?"

"Oh, mud-mostly. Dirt, earth, land, real-estate; but don't mind me. I was just concocting a letter to the pater. Say, Davy, you don't want a job, do you? You know some law and enough about land deals, to-to cook 'em up so they won't smell too strong, don't you?"

"That depends, Walt."

"Well, the deal I have in mind depends, all right. It's hung up-high.

It's this way. That strip of timber on the other side of No-Man's Lake, up Lost Farm way, has never seen an axe nor a cross-cut saw. There's pine there that a friend of mine says is ready money for the chap that corrals it. I wrote the pater and he likes the idea of buying it out and out and holding on till the railroad makes it marketable. And the road is going plumb through one end of it. Besides, the pater's on the N. M.

& Q. Board of Directors. When the road buys the right-of-way through that strip, there'll be money in it for the owner. I've been after it on the Q.T., but the irate gentleman with the one lamp, who held me up on the survey, said that 'if it was worth sellin', by G.o.dfrey, it was worth keepin'.' I showed him a certified check that would seduce an angel, but he didn't shed a whisker. My commission would have kept me in Paris for a year." Bas...o...b..sighed lugubriously. "Do you want to tackle it, Davy?"

"Thanks for the chance, Wallie, but I'm engaged for the winter, at least."

"Congratulations, old man. It's much more convenient that way,-short-term sentence, you know,-if the young lady doesn't object."

Bas...o...b..s banter was apparently innocent of insinuation, although he knew that his sister had recently broken her engagement with David.

If the latter was annoyed at his friend's chaff, he made no show of it as he stood up and looked at his watch.

"That reminds me, Wallie. I'm due at the dressmaker's in about three minutes. Had no idea it was so late."

"Dressmaker's! See here, Davy, your Jonathan is miffed. Here I've been scouring this town for anything that looked like a real skirt and didn't walk like a bag of onions or a pair of shears, and you've gone and found one."

"That's right," said David, "but it was under orders, not an original inspiration."

"Hear that, Smoke! Davy'll bear watching up here."

"Come on, Wallie. It's only a block distant."