And here Miggles caught her dripping oilskin hat from her head, with a mischievous swirl that scattered a shower of raindrops over us; attempted to put back her hair; dropped two hairpins in the attempt; laughed and sat down beside Yuba Bill, with her hands crossed lightly on her lap.
The Judge recovered himself first, and essayed an extravagant compliment.
Ill trouble you for that thar harpin, said Miggles, gravely. Half a dozen hands were eagerly stretched forward; the missing hairpin was restored to its fair owner; and Miggles, crossing the room, looked keenly in the face of the invalid. The solemn eyes looked back at hers with an expression we had never seen before. Life and intelligence seemed to struggle back into the rugged face. Miggles laughed againit was a singularly eloquent laughand turned her black eyes and white teeth once more toward us.
This afflicted person is hesitated the Judge.
Jim, said Miggles.
Your father?
No.
Brother?
No.
Husband?
Miggles darted a quick, half-defiant glance at the two lady passengers who I had noticed did not participate in the general masculine admiration of Miggles, and said gravely, No; its Jim.
There was an awkward pause. The lady passengers moved closer to each other; the Washoe husband looked abstractedly at the fire; and the tall man apparently turned his eyes inward for self-support at this emergency. But Miggless laugh, which was very infectious, broke the silence. Come, she said briskly, you must be hungry. Wholl bear a hand to help me get tea?
She had no lack of volunteers. In a few moments Yuba Bill was engaged like Caliban in bearing logs for this Miranda; the expressman was grinding coffee on the veranda; to myself the arduous duty of slicing bacon was assigned; and the Judge lent each man his good-humored and voluble counsel. And when Miggles, assisted by the Judge and our Hibernian deck passenger, set the table with all the available crockery, we had become quite joyous, in spite of the rain that beat against windows, the wind that whirled down the chimney, the two ladies who whispered together in the corner, or the magpie who uttered a satirical and croaking commentary on their conversation from his perch above. In the now bright, blazing fire we could see that the walls were papered with illustrated journals, arranged with feminine taste and discrimination. The furniture was extemporized, and adapted from candle boxes and packing-cases, and covered with gay calico, or the skin of some animal. The armchair of the helpless Jim was an ingenious variation of a flour barrel. There was neatness, and even a taste for the picturesque, to be seen in the few details of the long low room.
The meal was a culinary success. But more, it was a social triumphchiefly, I think, owing to the rare tact of Miggles in guiding the conversation, asking all the questions herself, yet bearing throughout a frankness that rejected the idea of any concealment on her own part, so that we talked of ourselves, of our prospects, of the journey, of the weather, of each otherof everything but our host and hostess. It must be confessed that Miggless conversation was never elegant, rarely grammatical, and that at times she employed expletives the use of which had generally been yielded to our sex. But they were delivered with such a lighting-up of teeth and eyes, and were usually followed by a laugha laugh peculiar to Migglesso frank and honest that it seemed to clear the moral atmosphere.
Once during the meal we heard a noise like the rubbing of a heavy body against the outer walls of the house. This was shortly followed by a scratching and sniffling at the door. Thats Joaquin, said Miggles, in reply to our questioning glances; would you like to see him? Before we could answer she had opened the door, and disclosed a half-grown grizzly, who instantly raised himself on his haunches, with his forepaws hanging down in the popular attitude of mendicancy, and looked admiringly at Miggles, with a very singular resemblance in his manner to Yuba Bill. Thats my watch dog, said Miggles, in explanation. Oh, he dont bite, she added, as the two lady passengers fluttered into a corner. Does he, old Toppy? (the latter remark being addressed directly to the sagacious Joaquin). I tell you what, boys, continued Miggles after she had fed and closed the door on URSA MINOR, you were in big luck that Joaquin wasnt hanging round when you dropped in tonight. Where was he? asked the Judge. With me, said Miggles. Lord love you; he trots round with me nights like as if he was a man.
We were silent for a few moments, and listened to the wind. Perhaps we all had the same picture before usof Miggles walking through the rainy woods, with her savage guardian at her side. The Judge, I remember, said something about Una and her lion; but Miggles received it as she did other compliments, with quiet gravity. Whether she was altogether unconscious of the admiration she excitedshe could hardly have been oblivious of Yuba Bills adorationI know not; but her very frankness suggested a perfect sexual equality that was cruelly humiliating to the younger members of our party.
The incident of the bear did not add anything in Miggless favor to the opinions of those of her own sex who were present. In fact, the repast over, a chillness radiated from the two lady passengers that no pine boughs brought in by Yuba Bill and cast as a sacrifice upon the hearth could wholly overcome. Miggles felt it; and, suddenly declaring that it was time to turn in, offered to show the ladies to their bed in an adjoining room. You boys will have to camp out here by the fire as well as you can, she added, for thar aint but the one room.
Our sexby which, my dear sir, I allude of course to the stronger portion of humanityhas been generally relieved from the imputation of curiosity, or a fondness for gossip. Yet I am constrained to say that hardly had the door closed on Miggles than we crowded together, whispering, snickering, smiling, and exchanging suspicions, surmises, and a thousand speculations in regard to our pretty hostess and her singular companion. I fear that we even hustled that imbecile paralytic, who sat like a voiceless Memnon in our midst, gazing with the serene indifference of the Past in his passionate eyes upon our wordy counsels. In the midst of an exciting discussion the door opened again, and Miggles re-entered.
But not, apparently, the same Miggles who a few hours before had flashed upon us. Her eyes were downcast, and as she hesitated for a moment on the threshold, with a blanket on her arm, she seemed to have left behind her the frank fearlessness which had charmed us a moment before. Coming into the room, she drew a low stool beside the paralytics chair, sat down, drew the blanket over her shoulders, and saying, If its all the same to you, boys, as were rather crowded, Ill stop here tonight, took the invalids withered hand in her own, and turned her eyes upon the dying fire. An instinctive feeling that this was only premonitory to more confidential relations, and perhaps some shame at our previous curiosity, kept us silent. The rain still beat upon the roof, wandering gusts of wind stirred the embers into momentary brightness, until, in a lull of the elements, Miggles suddenly lifted up her head, and, throwing her hair over her shoulder, turned her face upon the group and asked:
Is there any of you that knows me?
There was no reply.
Think again! I lived at Marysville in 53. Everybody knew me there, and everybody had the right to know me. I kept the Polka saloon until I came to live with Jim. Thats six years ago. Perhaps Ive changed some.
Is there any of you that knows me?
There was no reply.
Think again! I lived at Marysville in 53. Everybody knew me there, and everybody had the right to know me. I kept the Polka saloon until I came to live with Jim. Thats six years ago. Perhaps Ive changed some.
The absence of recognition may have disconcerted her. She turned her head to the fire again, and it was some seconds before she again spoke, and then more rapidly:
Well, you see I thought some of you must have known me. Theres no great harm done, anyway. What I was going to say was this: Jim hereshe took his hand in both of hers as she spokeused to know me, if you didnt, and spent a heap of money upon me. I reckon he spent all he had. And one dayits six years ago this winterJim came into my back room, sat down on my sofy, like as you see him in that chair, and never moved again without help. He was struck all of a heap, and never seemed to know what ailed him. The doctors came and said as how it was caused all along of his way of lifefor Jim was mighty free and wild-likeand that he would never get better, and couldnt last long anyway. They advised me to send him to Frisco to the hospital, for he was no good to anyone and would be a baby all his life. Perhaps it was something in Jims eye, perhaps it was that I never had a baby, but I said No. I was rich then, for I was popular with everybodygentlemen like yourself, sir, came to see meand I sold out my business and bought this yer place, because it was sort of out of the way of travel, you see, and I brought my baby here.
With a womans intuitive tact and poetry, she had, as she spoke, slowly shifted her position so as to bring the mute figure of the ruined man between her and her audience, hiding in the shadow behind it, as if she offered it as a tacit apology for her actions. Silent and expressionless, it yet spoke for her; helpless, crushed, and smitten with the Divine thunderbolt, it still stretched an invisible arm around her.
Hidden in the darkness, but still holding his hand, she went on:
It was a long time before I could get the hang of things about yer, for I was used to company and excitement. I couldnt get any woman to help me, and a man I dursent trust; but what with the Indians hereabout, whod do odd jobs for me, and having everything sent from the North Fork, Jim and I managed to worry through. The Doctor would run up from Sacramento once in a while. Hed ask to see Miggless baby, as he called Jim, and when hed go away, hed say, Miggles; youre a trumpGod bless you; and it didnt seem so lonely after that. But the last time he was here he said, as he opened the door to go, Do you know, Miggles, your baby will grow up to be a man yet and an honor to his mother; but not here, Miggles, not here! And I thought he went away sadandand and here Miggless voice and head were somehow both lost completely in the shadow.
The folks about here are very kind, said Miggles, after a pause, coming a little into the light again. The men from the fork used to hang around here, until they found they wasnt wanted, and the women are kindand dont call. I was pretty lonely until I picked up Joaquin in the woods yonder one day, when he wasnt so high, and taught him to beg for his dinner; and then thars Pollythats the magpieshe knows no end of tricks, and makes it quite sociable of evenings with her talk, and so I dont feel like as I was the only living being about the ranch. And Jim here, said Miggles, with her old laugh again, and coming out quite into the firelight, Jimwhy, boys, you would admire to see how much he knows for a man like him. Sometimes I bring him flowers, and he looks at em just as natural as if he knew em; and times, when were sitting alone, I read him those things on the wall. Why, Lord! said Miggles, with her frank laugh, Ive read him that whole side of the house this winter. There never was such a man for reading as Jim.
Why, asked the Judge, do you not marry this man to whom you have devoted your youthful life?
Well, you see, said Miggles, it would be playing it rather low down on Jim, to take advantage of his being so helpless. And then, too, if we were man and wife, now, wed both know that I was bound to do what I do now of my own accord.
But you are young yet and attractive
Its getting late, said Miggles, gravely, and youd better all turn in. Good night, boys; and, throwing the blanket over her head, Miggles laid herself down beside Jims chair, her head pillowed on the low stool that held his feet, and spoke no more. The fire slowly faded from the hearth; we each sought our blankets in silence; and presently there was no sound in the long room but the pattering of the rain upon the roof and the heavy breathing of the sleepers.
It was nearly morning when I awoke from a troubled dream. The storm had passed, the stars were shining, and through the shutterless window the full moon, lifting itself over the solemn pines without, looked into the room. It touched the lonely figure in the chair with an infinite compassion, and seemed to baptize with a shining flood the lowly head of the woman whose hair, as in the sweet old story, bathed the feet of him she loved. It even lent a kindly poetry to the rugged outline of Yuba Bill, half-reclining on his elbow between them and his passengers, with savagely patient eyes keeping watch and ward. And then I fell asleep and only woke at broad day, with Yuba Bill standing over me, and All aboard ringing in my ears.
Coffee was waiting for us on the table, but Miggles was gone. We wandered about the house and lingered long after the horses were harnessed, but she did not return. It was evident that she wished to avoid a formal leave-taking, and had so left us to depart as we had come. After we had helped the ladies into the coach, we returned to the house and solemnly shook hands with the paralytic Jim, as solemnly settling him back into position after each handshake. Then we looked for the last time around the long low room, at the stool where Miggles had sat, and slowly took our seats in the waiting coach. The whip cracked, and we were off!
But as we reached the highroad, Bills dexterous hand laid the six horses back on their haunches, and the stage stopped with a jerk. For there, on a little eminence beside the road, stood Miggles, her hair flying, her eyes sparkling, her white handkerchief waving, and her white teeth flashing a last good-by. We waved our hats in return. And then Yuba Bill, as if fearful of further fascination, madly lashed his horses forward, and we sank back in our seats. We exchanged not a word until we reached the North Fork, and the stage drew up at the Independence House. Then, the Judge leading, we walked into the barroom and took our places gravely at the bar.
Are your glasses charged, gentlemen? said the Judge, solemnly taking off his white hat.
They were.
Well, then, heres to MIGGLES. GOD BLESS HER!
Perhaps He had. Who knows?
TENNESSEES PARTNER
I do not think that we ever knew his real name. Our ignorance of it certainly never gave us any social inconvenience, for at Sandy Bar in 1854 most men were christened anew. Sometimes these appellatives were derived from some distinctiveness of dress, as in the case of Dungaree Jack; or from some peculiarity of habit, as shown in Saleratus Bill, so called from an undue proportion of that chemical in his daily bread; or for some unlucky slip, as exhibited in The Iron Pirate, a mild, inoffensive man, who earned that baleful title by his unfortunate mispronunciation of the term iron pyrites. Perhaps this may have been the beginning of a rude heraldry; but I am constrained to think that it was because a mans real name in that day rested solely upon his own unsupported statement. Call yourself Clifford, do you? said Boston, addressing a timid newcomer with infinite scorn; hell is full of such Cliffords! He then introduced the unfortunate man, whose name happened to be really Clifford, as Jay-bird Charleyan unhallowed inspiration of the moment that clung to him ever after.