Jessica Trent: Her Life On A Ranch Part 22

"That's the true word!"

"And I want you all to be--be good and not tease her."

"Hurrah! Hurrah! All in favor of minding the captain, say Ay!"

They swung her down from her perch and carried her on their shoulders everywhere about the old mission. They offered her all their possessions, including pistols and bowie knives, at peaceful Sobrante more useful for target practice and pruning vines than their original purposes.

But she declined all these warlike things, saying that Ephraim would carry only his own rifle, and finally tore herself away from them to the anxious mother at the cottage, naturally jealous of each moment of her darling's company.

"Don't see how Eph. ever saved so much. Hasn't had any wages since ours failed, as I know of. Mine always go fast as earned, and thought everybody's did," said one, when Jessica had left them.

"Some folks have all the luck! Why didn't it happen to me to have money to give her? or to offer first to go hunt them liars? Shucks!" said Samson, in disgust. Though he had been back some time from escorting the stranger "off bounds," that task had left him in a bad humor.

"Well, the captain'd tell me envy was wicked, and when I was hearing her say it I'd believe it. But I do envy old eighty his chance,"

complained Joe. "h.e.l.lo! there's Ferd! Come to think of it I haven't noticed him around these two days. Not since that stranger cast his ugly shadow on the ranch. Hi, there, Dwarf! Where you been?"

"Where I seen bad doings."

"Right. Seeing you was there yourself. What doings was they?"

In ordinary the older men had little to say to Antonio's "Left Hand,"

but he afforded them diversion, just then, when they were all a little anxious and downhearted over their captain's departure on what seemed to some of them a wild-goose chase.

Ferd went through a pantomime of theft. Furtively putting one hand into his neighbor's pocket to instantly thrust it back into his own.

He produced a buckskin bag and twisting some eucalyptus leaves into rolls, suggesting those of money, thrust these within the bag and that within his jacket. Then he glanced about with an absurdly innocent expression, threw his shoulders back, and stepped forward a few paces with so firm a step and erect a bearing that more than one instantly recognized the mimicry.

"Forty-niner."

Having produced the effect he had intended, Ferd slouched back into his own natural att.i.tude and begged:

"Something to eat."

At that moment Ephraim had been approaching and was an indignant witness of this performance, nor was he less quick to see its significance than his mates had been. Also, to him that buckskin bag was a familiar object. With one stride he collared Ferd and shook him like a rat.

"You imp! What do you mean by that? And how came you by Elsa Winkler's pouch?"

Ferd broke from his captor and his face changed color beneath its filth. He was one who was perfectly satisfied to live in a country where water was scarce; but, by way of fun, another ranchman caught him as he escaped from Ephraim, and forcibly ducked his head and shoulders in the washing-trough. After that he was let go and later on was given a liberal supper at the messroom. He ate this as if he had not seen food since he had gone away two days before, but he was greedy at all times, and the present instance excited no comment.

The morning came and all was ready for the start. Every person at Sobrante gathered before the cottage door, and each with his or her word of farewell advice or good will. Aunt Sally, fluttering with patchwork strips of already "pieced blocks," flung jauntily over either shoulder, her spectacles slipping off the point of her nose and her hands holding forth a fat fig pie, hot and dripping from the oven.

"I've been a-bakin' all night, Ephy. There's a pair of fowls, a ham, four loaves, some hard-boiled eggs, salt, pepper, sugar, tea, coffee, b.u.t.ter, dishes, five vials of medicine, some dish towels, some----"

"What in reason! How expect me to carry that great basket, as well as the saddlebags, and myself--on one horse? You're old enough to have sense--but you'll never learn it. One loaf----"

"Ephraim Marsh! Are you eighty years old or are you not? At your age would you starve the little darling daughter of the best friends you ever had? Here, Jessie. You get off that donkey. We'll wait till we can pick out some other man that----"

"Give me the basket; I'll carry it if I have to on my head!"

interrupted "Forty-niner," indignantly. But he added to himself: "I can chuck it into the first clump of mesquite I meet."

Jessica was upon Scruff, whose loss the small boys were bewailing far more than that of the girl herself. Without Scruff they would be compelled to stay within walking distance of the cottage, and this was imprisonment. Without Jessica--well, there were many things one could do better with Jessica away.

Mrs. Trent's face was pale but calm. n.o.body knew what this first parting with her helpful child was to her anxious heart, but it was her part to send the travelers outward in good cheer.

"Put the saddlebags on Scruff, in front of Jessica. He's strong enough to carry double, and they're not so heavy. Few girls, in my days at the East, would have set out upon an indefinite journey, equipped with only one flannel frock and a single change of underclothing."

"But the flannel frock is new and so is the pretty Tam that Elsa gave me last Christmas. What do I want more? specially when there's this warm jacket you made me take, for a cold night's ride. Isn't it enough, mother, dear?"

"Quite, I think, else I should have made you delay till I could have provided more. Be sure to write me, now and then. One of the men will ride to the post every few days and fetch any letters. Good-by, and now--go quickly!"

She added no prayers, for these were too deep in her heart for outward utterance; but she felt her own courage ebbing, and that if the parting were not speedy she could not at all endure it. Until that moment she had not realized how complete was her dependence upon Jessica's protecting tenderness; and turning, toward her home hid thus the tears she would not have her daughter see.

But neither could Lady Jess have seen them, because of the sudden mist in her own. All her eagerness for the journey was gone, and her courage was fast following it. If the start were not made at once it would never be.

"Good-by, mother. Good-by, all! Come, Ephraim! Go, go--Scruff!"

A moment later the travelers were disappearing down the sandy road, and upon those whom they had left behind had fallen an intolerable burden of foreboding and loneliness.

"Desolation of desolations! That's what this old ranch'll be till that there little bunch of human sunshine comes safely back to it. A crazy trip, a crazy parcel of folks to let her take it. That's what we are," said John Benton, savagely kicking the horseblock to vent his painful emotion.

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear! And I never remembered to put in that guava jell!"

moaned a voice of woe.

"Then, mother, just trot it out to us for dinner," said her son, "we'll take that burden off your mind."

"You will? Have you a heart to eat good victuals, John Benton, when that sweet child has just thrust herself into a den of lions, and lawyers, and liars, and--and--things?"

"Oh, hush! Lions! The notion!"

"Well, you can't deny there's bears, anyway," she retorted, with ready dolefulness. "Ephy's shot 'em himself in his younger days."

"And ended the crop. Now you go in; and if I hear you downhearting the mistress the least bit I'll make you take a dose of your own picra,"

said this much-tried man.

CHAPTER XIV

THE FINISH

It was a journey of something more than two hundred miles and they were almost a week on the way; riding for several hours each morning and evening; camping in some well-watered spot at midday; or, this failing, sharing the dinner of some friendly ranchman. Also, they slept at some little inn or ranch, and where their hosts would receive it, Ephraim delighted to make liberal payment for their entertainment.

Indeed, he felt a prince, with his well-filled purse, and would have forced all sorts of dainties and knickknacks upon his little charge, at each village they pa.s.sed through, save that she resolutely refused them.

"You generous Ephraim, no! What money we need for the trip and after we get to Los Angeles is all right. But you mustn't waste it. Hear! I am older than you in this thing."

"But--I want you to have everything nice in the world, Lady Jess. Any other of the 'boys' traveling with you----"

"Could not have been so kind and thoughtful as you. Not one. Dearly as I love them I'd rather have you to take care of me on this long journey than any other single one. So do be good and not extravagant. And isn't it lovely to find how almost everybody knew of my dear father? Or, if they didn't know him for himself, they'd heard of him and of something he'd done for somebody. It makes the way seem almost short and as if I'd been over the road before."