A Daughter of the Middle Border Part 17

At Red Mountain, a mournful, half-buried, deserted mining town, we left our sleigh and stumbled into the dingy little railway station, so chilled, so cramped, that we could scarcely walk, and yet we did not regret our ride. However, we were glad of the warmth of the dirty little coach into which we climbed a few minutes later. It seemed delightfully safe to Zulime, and I was careful not to let her know that from this town the train descended of its own weight all the way to Silverton!

Fortunately, nothing happened, and at Silverton we changed to a real train, with a real engine, and as we dropped into Las Animas Canon we left December behind. At six o'clock we emerged from the canon at Durango into genial September--or so it seemed after our day of midwinter in the heights. Next day we returned to Colorado Springs.

Our stay in the mountains was at an end, but the memory of those burnished domes, those dark-hued forests, and the sound of those foaming streams, remain with us to this day.--All the way down the long slope to the Mississippi River, we reverted to this "circuit," recalling its most impressive moments, its n.o.blest vistas. It had been for my bride a procession of wonders, a colossal pageant--to me it was a double satisfaction because of her delight. With a feeling that I had in some degree atoned for my parsimony in the matter of an engagement ring and for the drab prose of our marriage ceremony, I brought the first half of our wedding journey to a close in Chicago.

I now looked forward to the meeting between my mother and her new daughter. This was, after all, the important part of my venture. Would my humble home content my artist bride?

In preparation I began to sing small. "Don't expect too much of the Garland Homestead," I repeated. "It is only an angular, slate-colored farm-house without a particle of charm outside or in. It is very far from being the home I should like you to be mistress of, and my people you must bear in mind, are pioneers, survivals of the Border. They are remote from all things urban."

To this the New Daughter responded loyally, "I am sure I shall like your home and I _know_ I shall love your mother."

As women of her race have done from the most immemorial times, she had left her own tribe and was about to enter the camp of her captor, but she pretended to happiness, resolute to make the best of whatever came.

Our friends in Chicago smiled when I told them where we had been. Lorado said, "A Honeymoon in the heart of the Rockies is just like you"--but I cared nothing for his gibes so long as Zulime was content, and I had but to over-hear her account of her trip to be rea.s.sured. To her it had been a n.o.ble exploration into a marvelous country.

This was the day before Thanksgiving, and with a knowledge that the old folks were counting the hours which intervened, I wrested Zulime from her friends, and hurried her to the train. "Dear old mother! I know just how she is waiting and watching for you. We must not fail her."

It was just daylight as we stepped down from the Pullman at West Salem, but father was there! Seated in our "canopy-top surrey" and holding restless ramping Black Dolly to her place, he was too busy to glance at us, but I could tell, by the set of his head, that he was emotionally intense.

"There's your new father," I said, pointing him out to Zulime, "and that is your family coach."

Father couldn't even shake hands, for Dolly was still pawing and plunging but he smiled as we approached and called out in reference to Dolly, "She'll quiet down in a minute."

While the train was pulling out I explained to Zulime that Dolly's fury was all a.s.sumed, "She'll soon be stolid as a stump."

It wasn't in the least the tender meeting I had expected to enjoy, but when at last my father was able to reach his hand down to Zulime, he said, "I'm glad to meet you, my daughter," and the tenderness in his vibrant voice touched me. "We were afraid you weren't coming," he added, and a little later I saw him wipe the tears from his eyes. The fact that he used a bandanna for this purpose, did not destroy the moving quality of his emotion.

The village looked woefully drab and desolate under that misty November sky. The elm trees, stripped of every leaf, the gardens weedy, ragged and forlorn, together with the ugly little houses suggested the sordid reality of the life to which I had brought my bride. It was all a far cry from the towering cliffs and colorful canons of Colorado.

The Homestead shared in the general ugliness of that rain-swept dawn.

Its maples were gaunt skeletons, its garden a sodden field over which the chickens were wandering in sad and aimless fashion. To my city-bred wife this home-coming must have been a cruel shock, but it was the best I could do, and whatever the girl felt, she concealed with a smile, resolute to make the best of me and mine.

Mother was waiting for us on the porch, tremulous with excitement, too eager to remain in doors, and as I took her in my arms, and kissed her, I said, "Mother, I've brought your new daughter."

For just a moment she hesitated (the grace and dignity of the tall girl awed her, confused her), then Zulime went to her, and the two women, so diverse, yet so dear to me, met in an embrace of mutual love and confidence.

Isabel Garland entered into possession of the daughter she had so long hoped for, and Zulime Taft became a member of the household of which Richard Garland was the head.

Breakfast was waiting for us, a n.o.ble meal, a sumptuous wedding breakfast, for mother and her two helpers (daughters of a neighboring farmer), had been up since five o'clock and while it was a good deal like a farmer's Sunday dinner, Zulime thanked the girls when father presented them to her, but was a bit startled when one of them took her seat at the table with us. She was not accustomed to this democratic custom of the village.

My aunt, Susan Bailey, a gentle, frail little body also joined our circle, adding one more pair of eyes to those whose scrutiny must have been somewhat trying to the bride. To meet these blunt, forthright folk at such a table without betraying amus.e.m.e.nt or surprise, required tact, but the New Daughter succeeded in winning them all, even Mary, the cook, who was decidedly difficult.

Almost immediately after taking his seat my father began: "Well now, daughter, you are the captain. Right here I abdicate. Anything you want done shall be done. What you say about things in the kitchen shall be law. I will furnish the raw materials--you and the girls must do the rest. We like to be bossed, don't we, Belle?" He ended addressing mother.

In her concise, simple fashion, she replied: "Yes, the house is yours. I turn it all over to you."

It was evident that all this had been discussed many times for they seemed in haste to get its statement off their minds, and I could not check them or turn them aside.

Zulime made light of it. "I'd rather not _be_ captain," she laughingly protested. "I'd rather be pa.s.senger for a while."

Father was firm. "No, we need a commanding officer, and you must take charge. Now I've got a turkey out there--and cranberries--" He was off!

He told just what he had laid in for the dinner, and ended by saying, "If there's anything I've forgot, you just let me know, and I'll go right up town and get it."

As he talked, the tones of his resonant voice, the motions of his hands, the poise of his head, brought back to me a boyish feeling of subordination. I laughed, but I submitted to his domination, entirely willing that he should play the part of the commander for the last time.

It was amusing, but it had its pathetic side for my mother's silence was significant of her weakness. She said nothing--not a word, but with Zulime sitting beside her, she was content, so happy she could not find words in which to express her satisfaction. Her waiting was at an end!

My father made a handsome picture. His abundant white hair, his shapely beard, and his keen profile pleased me. Though a little stooped, he was still alert and graceful, and his voice rang like a trumpet as he entered upon an account of his pioneer experiences.

"I've always lived on the Border," he explained, "and I don't know much about the ways of city folks, so you must excuse me when I do the wrong thing. My will is the best in the world, and I'll do anything I can to please you."

That breakfast was the exact opposite of a "Continental Breakfast."

Steak, doughnuts, buckwheat cakes, cookies, apple sauce made me groan but Zulime smiled. She understood the care which had gone into its making.

When at last she and I were alone in my study I began, "Well, how do you like West Salem and the Garlands?"

"Your mother is a dear!" she replied, and her voice was convincing--"and I like your father. He's very good looking. And the breakfast was--well it was like one of your stories--Do you _always_ have steak and doughnuts for breakfast?"

"No," I replied, "not always, but breakfast is a real meal with us."

The sky darkened and a sleety rain set in during the forenoon, but mother did not mind the gloom outside, for within she had her daughter.

Upon our return to the sitting room, she led Zulime out into the kitchen to take account of all that was going on for dinner, and while the maids, with excited faces stood about waiting for orders from their new boss, Zulime laughingly protested that she had no wish to interfere. "Go on in your own way," she said.

To me, on her return to the sitting room, she exclaimed: "You should see the food in preparation out there! Enough to feed all the Eagle's Nest campers.--How many are coming to dinner?"

"No one but the McClintocks--and only a few of them," I soberly replied. "Uncle William and Aunt Maria, Frank and Lorette--and Deborah, all old people now. I don't know of any one else." In fact, we had less than this number, for Maria was not well enough to come out in the rain.

Our circle was small, but the spirit of Thanksgiving was over it, and when I saw my stately city wife sitting among my rough-hewn relations, listening to the quaint stories of Uncle Frank, or laughing at the humorous sallies of Aunt Lorette, I wondered what they thought of her.

She made a lovely picture, and all--even caustic Deborah--capitulated to her kindliness and charm. If she had failed of complete comprehension and sympathy I could not have blamed her, but to have her perfectly at home among these men and women of the vanishing Border displayed her in a new and n.o.ble guise.

If anything was lacking--any least quality of adaptation, it was supplied when, that evening, my uncles and my father discovered that Zulime could not only read music, but that she could play all the old songs which they loved to have me sing. This accomplishment completed their conquest, for under her deft hands the piano revived the wistful melodies of _Minnie Minturn_, _Maggie_, and _Nellie Wildwood_, and when my mother's voice, sweet as ever, but weak and hesitant, joined with mine in singing for our guests, I was both glad and sad, glad of my young wife, sad with a realization of my mother's weakness and age.

She did not reproach me for not bringing the daughter sooner. She had but one regret. "I wish Frank was here," she said, her thought going out to her other son.

How far away, how remote, how tender that evening seems to me after more than twenty years work and travel! To Zulime it unrolled like a scene from one of my novels, to me it was the closing, fading picture of an era, the end of an epoch, the pa.s.sing of a race, for the Garlands and McClintocks, warriors of the western conquest, representatives of a heroic generation were even then basking in the light of a dying camp-fire, recounting the deeds of brave days gone.

When we were again alone in my study, Zulime said, "I'm going to enjoy it here. I like your people, and I hope they liked me."

It was in this humble fashion that I brought to my mother the new daughter for whom she had longed, and it was in this homely way that the Garlands and McClintocks received my wife. Amid surroundings which were without grace of art or touch of poetry, the informal and very plain ceremony took place, but the words were sincere, and the forms and features of the speakers deeply significant of the past. No matter what my mother's storms and sorrows had been, she was now at peace. With a smiling face she confronted the future.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

My Father's Inheritance