Still Jim Part 30

"What use?" insisted Suma-theek. "People down in valley they much swear at you. Big Sheriff at Washington, he much swear at you. You much lonely. Much sad. Why you stay? What use? Much old Suma-theek wonder at that. Why old Iron Skull work on this dam? Why you, so young, so strong, no have wife, no have child, marry dam instead? You tell old Suma-theek why."

Jim had learned on the Makon that while war and hunting might have been an Indian's business in life, his avocation was philosophizing. He had learned that many a pauperized and decrepit old Indian, warming his back in the sun, despised of the whites, held locked in his marvelous mind treasures of philosophy, of comment on life and living, Indian and white, that the world can ill afford to lose, yet never will know.

Jim struggled for words. "Back east, five sleeps, where I was born, there are many people of many tribes. They fight for enough food to eat, for enough clothes to wear. When I was a boy I said to myself I would come out here, make place for those people to come."

"But," said Suma-theek, "the dam it will no keep whites from fighting.

They fight now in valley to see who can get most land. What use?"

"What use," returned Jim, "that you bring your young men up here and make them work? I know the answer. You are their chief. It is your business to do what you can to keep their stomachs full and their backs warm. You don't ask why or the end."

The Indian rolled another cigarette. He was like a fine dim cameo in the starlight. "I sabez!" he said at last. "Blood of man, it no belong to self but to tribe. So with Injuns. So with some whites. Not so with _hombres_."

Again the eagle, disturbed by voices, dipped across the canyon. "See, Suma-theek, make the story for me," said Jim. "There are the eagle and the flag so young and the Elephant so old. Make the story for me."

There was a long silence once more. The desert wind sighed over the two men. The noise of building came up faintly from below but the radiance of the stars was here undimmed.

Finally Suma-theek spoke:

"Long, long, many, many years ago, before whites were born, Injuns lived far away to the west, maybe across the great water. All Injuns then had one chief. He very great, very wise, very strong. But he no have son. He heap wise. He know, man no stronger than number of his sons. He get old.

No have son. Then he call all young men of tribe to him, and say: 'That young man shall be my son who shows me in one year the strongest thing in world, stronger than sun, stronger than wind, stronger than desert, than mountains, than rivers at flood.'

"All young men, they start out to hunt. All time they bring back to old chief strong medicine, like rattlesnake poison, like ropes of yucca fiber, like fifty coyotes fastened together. But that old chief he laugh and shake his head.

"One day young buck named Theeka, he start off with bow and arrow. He say he won't come back until he sure. Theeka, he walk through desert many days. Injuns no have horses then. Walk till he get where no man go before. And far, far away on burning sand, he see heap big animal move.

It was bigger than a hundred coyotes made into one. Theeka he run, get pretty close, see this animal is elephant.

"And he say to self, 'There is strongest thing in world.' And he start follow this elephant. Many days he follow, never get closer. The more he follow, the more he want that elephant. One morning he see other dot move in desert. Dot come closer. It woman, young woman, much beautiful.

She never say word. She just run long by Theeka.

"All time he look from elephant to her. All time he feel he love her.

All time he think he no speak to her for fear he lose sight of elephant.

By'mby, beautiful girl, she fall, no get up again. Theeka, he run on but his heart, it ache. By'mby he no can stand it. He give one look at elephant, say, 'Good-by, you strongest thing! I go back to her I love.'

Then his spirit, it die within him, while his heart, it sing.

"He go back to girl. She no hurt at all. She put her arms round Theeka's neck and kiss him. Then Theeka say, 'Let strongest thing go. I love you, O sweet as arrow weed in spring!'

"And beautiful girl, she say: 'I show you strongest thing in world.

Come!' And she take him by hand and lead him on toward elephant. And that elephant, all of a sudden, it stand still. They come up to it. They see it stand still because little To-hee bird, she circle round his head, sing him love songs.

"'O yahee! O yahai!

Sweet as arrow weed in spring!'

sing that little bird to Elephant. And he stop, stop so long here by river while that little bird build her nest in his side, he turn to stone and live forever.

"Then Theeka, he sabez. He lead his beautiful girl back to chief and he say to chief: 'I have found strongest thing in world. It is love.'

"And chief, he say: 'You and your children's children shall be chiefs. I have not known love and so I die.'"

Suma-theek's mellow voice merged into the desert silence. "But the eagle and the flag?" asked Jim.

"Injuns no understand about them," replied the old chief. "You sabez the story old Suma-theek tell you?"

"I understand," replied Jim.

"Then I go home to sleep," said Suma-theek, and he left Jim alone on the Elephant's back.

Jim sat long alone on the night stars. The sense of failure was heavy upon him. Wherein, he asked himself, had he failed? How could he find himself? Was his life to be like his father's after all? Had he put off until too late the mission he had set himself so long ago, that of seeking the secret of his father's inadequacy? For a few wild moments, Jim planned to answer the Secretary's letter with his resignation, to give up the thankless fight and return--to what?

Jim could not picture for himself any work or life but that which he was doing; could not by the utmost effort of imagination separate himself from his job. His mind went back to Charlie Tuck. He wondered what Charlie would have said to the Secretary's letter. It seemed to Jim that Charlie had had more imagination than he. Perhaps Charlie would have been able to have helped him now. Then he thought of Iron Skull and of that last interrupted talk with him. What had Iron Skull planned to say?

What had he foreseen that Jim had been unable to see? It seemed to Jim that he would have given a year of his life to know what advice had been in his old friend's mind.

A useless death! A life too soon withdrawn! Suddenly Jim's whole heart rose in longing for his friend and in loyalty to him. His death must not be useless! The simple sweetness of the sacrifice must not go unrewarded. His life would not be ended!

Jim looked far over the glistening, glowing night and registered a vow.

So help him G.o.d, he would not die childless and forlorn as Iron Skull had done. Some day, some way, he would marry Penelope. And somehow he would make the dam a success, that in it Iron Skull's last record of achievement might live forever.

Strangely comforted, Jim went home.

The Secretary's letter remained unanswered for several days. The next morning Henderson reported that a section of the abutments showed signs of decomposition. At the first suggestion of a technical problem with which to wrestle, Jim thrust the Secretary's elusive one aside. He started for the dam site eagerly, and refused to think again that day of the shadow that haunted his work.

In excavating for the abutments a thick stratum of shale had been exposed that air-slaked as fast as it was uncovered. Jim gave orders that drifts be driven through the stratum until a safe distance from possible exposure was reached. These were to be filled with concrete immediately. It was careful and important work. The concrete of the dam must have a solid wall to which to tie and drift after drift must be driven and filled to supply this wall. Jim would trust no one's judgment but his own in this work. He stayed on the dam all the morning, watching the shale and rock and directing the foremen.

At noon he went to the lower mess where he could talk with the masonry workers. Five hundred workmen were polishing off their plates in the great room. Jim chuckled as he sat down with Henderson at one of the long tables.

"If I could get the _hombres_ to work as fast as they eat," he said, "I could take a year off the allotted time for the dam."

The masonry workers and teamsters at whose table Jim was sitting grinned.

"There's only one form of persuasion to use with an _hombre_," commented Henderson, gently. "There's just one kind of efficiency he gets, outside of whisky."

"What kind is that?" asked a teamster.

"The kind you get with a good hickory pick-handle across his skull,"

said Henderson in a tender, meditative way as he took down half a cup of coffee at a gulp. "I've worked hombres in Mexico and in South America and in America. You must never trust 'em. Just when you get where their politeness has smoothed you down, look out for a knife in your back. I never managed to make friends for but one bunch of hombres."

Henderson reached for the coffee pot and a fresh instalment of beef and waited patiently while Jim talked with the master mason. Finally Jim said: "Go ahead with the story, Jack. I know you'll have heartburn if you don't!"

"It was in Arizona," began Henderson. The singing quality in his voice was as tender as a girl's. "I had fifty hombres building a bridge over a draw, getting ready for a mining outfit. No whites for a million miles except my two cart drivers, Ryan and Connors. The hombres and the Irish don't get on well together and I was always expecting trouble.

"One day I was in the tent door when Ryan ran up the trail and beckoned me with his arm. I started on the run. When I got to the draw I saw the fifty hombres altogether pounding something with their shovels. I grabbed up a spade and dug my way through to the middle."

Henderson's voice was lovingly reminiscent. "There I found Ryan and Connors in bad shape. Connors had backed his cart over an _hombre_ and the whole bunch had started in to kill him. Ryan had run for me and then gone in to help his friend. I used the spade freely and then dragged the two Irishmen down to the river and stuck their heads in. When they came to, they were both for starting in to kill all the hombres. I argued with 'em but 'twas no use, so I had to hit 'em over the head with a pick-handle and put 'em to sleep. Then I went back and subdued the hombres to tears with the same weapon."

"Did you ever have any more trouble?" asked a man.

"Trouble?" said Henderson, gently. "They didn't know but a word or two of English, but from that time on they always called me 'Papa'!"

Jim roared with the rest and said as he rose, "If you think you've absorbed enough pie to ward off famine, let's get back to the dam."