The Wrong Woman Part 16

"Mistah Sattlee an' John d.i.c.k an' some mo'."

"Is Steve Brown at home?"

"No, sah. He 's gone somewha's. An' he ain' come back. Mos' all de men folks is gone away."

"Has Miss Alice got back yet?"

"No, sah. She's off to de school-house in Boston yet. An' it ain't leff out. She 's gwine be back dis spring."

"What's cattle bringing now?"

"Dunno, sah. I heah dey 's done riz."

"Has little Johnnie Martin got his curls cut yet?"

"No, sah. Ah seed 'em on him."

"What's doing in town? Anything new there?"

"No, sah. Jes' 'bout de same as usual."

Uncle Israel, feeling that his information had not been very abundant, scratched his head and stirred his mind up thoroughly for news. He met the demand with two pieces of information.

"De railroad's done built a new loadin'-pen. An' dat high-tone bull took sick wif acclimatin'. But we 's got him restin' easy now."

"The railroad's getting real extravagant, ain't it?" commented Jonas, turning his attention to the oxen again.

Having said a few words appropriate to the occasion of starting up, he flung out his bullwhip in a flourish of aerial penmans.h.i.+p and drove home the aforesaid remarks with a startling report. Again the bovine procession got under way.

In the course of time he came to where Claxton road ends and Claxton Road begins. It will be recalled that Claxton road, hemmed in by barb wire, leads interminably past vacant stretches of prairie with occasionally a farm and farmhouse. Nearing town its scene and atmosphere suddenly change. On the left are the ranchmen's home estates, with the stables and windmills and short avenues of china-berry trees leading up to comfortable porches; to the right, or facing these, is a large square of green with no roadside houses and no longer any confining fence. To any one who had come a long distance between the barb wires, this emergence upon the free, open common was very much as if he had been following a stream which, after long confinement to its course, opens out suddenly into a lake. This piece of land was not different from the prairie it had always been, except that the houses which faced it on all sides, as if it were a lake of the summer-resort variety, gave it an importance which was not its own.

It was no more nor less than a square of primeval prairie whose owner, being satisfied with it, let it be as it was. Surrounded on all sides by real estate and other improvements, it held its own as immovably as if Texas had here taken her last stand, in hollow square, against the encroachments of civilization. It belonged to Jonas Hicks. In the exact middle of it was the paintless frame house which we have already mentioned.

This structure is easily described. It consisted of a house with one room downstairs and one room upstairs. Its boarding was of the kind that runs up and down with battening strips at the cracks. Any one familiar with prairie architecture would see at once that the owner, having a house to build, had gone straightway to work and erected a herder's shack on a residential scale and put some windows in it.

Because of its porchlessness it seemed rather tall, as if it had grown after it was built or had stretched itself up to get a better view; and the single window in the end of the upper story gave it a watchful appearance. This watchful window, which might be said to mark its front, looked toward the residences along Williston Road.

The cottages which faced this place on the side toward town were confined to "lots" along an unpaved street. Across on Claxton Road town lots grew to the size of country estates and looked more commanding. But the shack house, with its twenty acres of elbow room, rather commanded them all, especially as its central position marked the common as its own grounds. Being tall and upright and spare, like a Texan, it had an att.i.tude toward them like that of a pioneer drill-master; it seemed to be standing out on the drill-grounds with the other houses all marshaled up before it and toeing the social line.

The place was given shape and form entirely by the other property, all of which was fenced on its own side of the highway, the owner of the twenty acres never having shut it off from the roads which pa.s.sed along two sides of it. This hospitable openness was a fortunate thing for the traveling public, affording as it did a short cut to town. Quite a little of the traffic that came down Williston Road turned out and followed the trail which led diagonally across it past the door of the house. And usually the traveler, whether horseman or driver, would speak in pa.s.sing; or, more likely, stop to have a talk with Jonas Hicks, who, if he were at home, might be engaged in plaiting a whip or mixing batter for pancakes or taking a st.i.tch in his clothes, the iron seat of a "prairie-busting" plow being particularly hard on the seat of a man's trousers. It was to this place that the plowman was bending his homeward way.

Eventually, as oxen always do, they arrived. Having navigated them up to the kitchen door and brought them to a stop with a stentorian _Wo_, he unhooked the wheelers, dropped the chain from each yoke, and turned them loose to graze or lie down as each pair might decide; then he went around the corner of the house and set to work making a fire in the stove. It was an outdoor stove of the locomotive variety, having two large iron wheels upon which it had traveled thousands of miles in the service of the J. W. Cattle Company. Mr. Hicks had fastened its tongue or handle to a staple in the chimney of the house, for which chimney it had no use, having a smoke-stack of its own.

When the stove was belching forth smoke he turned his attention to the inside of the house. Presently he came out with a pan of flour and various kitchen utensils which he placed on a bench beside the door; then he drew a bucket of water and proceeded to mix pancake batter. He had not accomplished much when he was interrupted. Just when the batter was mixed to the right consistency, and the first spoonful was ready to go on, a little girl appeared. She had a pie which she bore before her with a look of great responsibility.

"Ma says maybe you would like to have a pie."

"Why, how do, Susie. How 's Susie getting along these days?"

"Real well," replied Susan, holding the pie up higher.

Mr. Hicks bent his tall Texas form in the middle and took it from her.

The pie had the outlines of a star in its centre by way of a vent-hole; the edges were nicely crimped.

"It's a mighty good-looking pie. What does that stand for, Susie?" he asked, holding the pie up so that she could view its face and placing his finger upon its centre.

"That stands for Texas," answered Susan promptly.

Mr. Hicks put the pie on the bench and sat down beside it with his elbows on his knees.

Something like a smile betrayed itself in the lean muscles of his jaw and showed somehow around his large aggressive chin.

"How does it come that you did n't go to school to-day, Susie?" He pointed to the white frame school-house which occupied a corner of his place.

"'Cause," answered Susan, by way of complete explanation.

"That's a mighty good reason. If I had an excuse like that I would n't go to school myself. How's your ma? Is she well?"

"Yes, sir. Only she had a kinda headache this morning, and I wiped the dishes."

"You did? How did you know so quick that I was back? Were you watching for me so that you could bring over the pie?"

"Oh!" exclaimed Susan, "we heard you coming. We could hear you saying bad words when you was 'way up the road."

A change suddenly came over the spirit of Mr. Hicks's physiognomy. He sat stroking his wide-spreading moustache. Jonas Hicks had a self-made moustache which seemed to have borrowed its style from the horns of a Texas steer. It might be said that, for the moment, he looked serious; but you could never tell from his face exactly what his emotions were.

It was against his principles to be caught laughing, and yet his solemnity was somewhat radiant despite him.

Suddenly he rose and went into the house. In a little while he reappeared carrying a milk-pan filled with comb-honey. It was white honey which the bees had deposited in his useless chimney; the sirup filled the pan almost to its edge, while the middle was piled high with oozing chunks of comb. He placed it on the bench beside him. The eyes of Susan opened wide as she saw this sight. He talked about one thing and another and asked her many inconsequential questions. After much tantalizing talk on Mr. Hicks's part, she learned that the honey was for her and that she was to take it all home with her.

Susan was for starting home at once.

"What' s your hurry, Susie? Won't you stay a while and have a piece of pie?"

"I 'd rather I 'd have a pancake," said Susan, looking furtively at the smoking griddle.

He rose at once and put on a large spoonful of batter. When the cake was ready to turn, he caused it to turn a somersault with a quick toss of the griddle; then he spread it evenly with honey and rolled it into the form of a cylinder with the honey inside.

"There, now, Susie. That's what I call a joof-lick.u.m _tamale_. It's pancake _de la verandah_. Watch out that you don't burn your fingers."

He set the griddle temporarily aside and sat down again. While Susan ate, she leaned across his tall knee and looked up at him admiringly.

"I like your pancakes," she volunteered. "Your pancakes has got fringe on them."

Mr. Hicks's countenance took on more of an expression around the eyes; he regarded her with deep interest.

"All the boys at school like your pancakes, too," she continued. "They are coming over some other recess when you are home, and you can make them all a pancake again. Will you put honey on their pancakes?"

"For boys!" exclaimed Susan's heroine in great surprise. "No honey for boys. Honey is only for girls."

"And mas too," added Susan. "Ain't honey for mas too?"