The Hills of Refuge Part 13

"My relatives, no," Charles said. "I've thought often of writing back to dear old Mike, but don't think it would be quite safe. If I had any way of communicating with him other than the mails I would let him know where I am. I could trust him with my life."

"How about letting me go to Boston? I could see him on the quiet and tell him about you."

"No, that would be out of your way," Charles protested. "Never mind. It is better as it is. I'd like to hear from Mike, but he belongs to the past with all the rest. Let's go to the car and pack."

CHAPTER II

The two friends parted at the train that night. Charles felt a pang of loneliness as his companion was borne away. He had his bag with him and he wondered what he had better do. There was a small hotel near by and he went into the office and asked for a room. The clerk handed a pen to him across the counter and turned the register around for him to inscribe his name. Charles hesitated for barely an instant, then decided to make use of his own name. It looked strange to him, for he had not written it since he left home.

"C. Brown," he smiled. "Too common to attract notice. I've given up everything else; I will stick to my name. I can't always be lying about it."

A negro porter showed him his room. It was on the second floor and looked out toward the circus-grounds. The windows were up and he could hear the band and the clapping of hands by the audience. The air of the room was hot, and so he threw off his coat and tried to be comfortable, but he was restless and had no inclination to sleep. He knew, from the changing airs of the band, every act that was on in the ring. He could hear the familiar voice of the clown, the crack of the ringmaster's whip, and the clown's comical cry of pain, followed by the moss-grown jests Charles had heard hundreds of times.

Finding that he could not sleep, he put on his coat and went out. The street below was quite deserted. The stores were all closed. Everybody had gone to the circus. He walked to the end of the street, then turned eastward and climbed a hill in the edge of the town. He had the square and the diverging streets before him, and an odd sense of part ownership in it all crept over him.

"It is mine, it is mine!" he whispered. "I'll live here or close by.

I'll make a home of it."

The performance was over under the vast canvas. He knew it from the ceasing of the music and the far-away hum of voices as the crowd filtered back to the town. One by one the tent lights went out. He heard the rumble of the wheeled animal cages, the gilded band-wagon and gaudy chariots, as they were rolled on to the flat cars; the loud shouts of teamsters; the roar of a disturbed lion. He heard the clatter of the seat-boards and supports as they were taken down and hauled to the train, the crash of falling tent-poles, the familiar oaths of the foreman of the gang he had just left. Soon the lights were all out save those moving about the train. The bell of the locomotive was ringing a hurry signal. Charles had a mental picture of his former companions tumbling, half undressed, into their berths in the dimly lighted cars.

There was a sound of escaping steam from the locomotive, a clanging of its bell. The train was moving. Charles waved his hat in the still air as the train was pa.s.sing the foot of the hill.

"Good-by, boys!" he said, with feeling. "I'll never see you again."

The train moved on and disappeared in the distance. Charles sat down on a boulder. For a year past he had longed for just that sort of freedom, but, now that it was within his reach, it somehow lacked the charm he had expected. Suddenly he felt averse to the thought of sleeping in the room he had taken at the hotel. He wanted to lie on the gra.s.s there in the starlight, and greet the rising of the sun upon his new life. But he told himself that he had better go to the hotel. Not to occupy a room after engaging it might arouse suspicion, so he went back to the deserted square.

The clerk was behind the counter and gave him his key, "You was with the circus, wasn't you?" he asked.

"Yes, but how could you tell?" Charles answered.

"Oh, by your clothes," the young man replied. "All of you fellers look different from common folks, somehow; your hats, shirts, shoes ain't the sort we-all wear. Then you are as sunburnt as gipsies. You've quit 'em, I reckon!"

"Yes," Charles told him. "I'm going to try something else. I want to work on a farm if I can get a job."

"Easy enough, the Lord knows," said the clerk, smiling broadly.

"Farm-hands are awfully scarce; n.i.g.g.e.rs all moving off. Now I come to think of it, I heard to-day of a job that is open. Miss Mary Rowland is stopping here in the house now. In fact, I think she came in town to catch some of the floating labor brought in by the show. I know she didn't go to either performance. She is a friend of Mrs. Quinby, the wife of the feller that runs this hotel, and when she comes in town she always puts up with us. She is a fine girl and a hard worker. The Rowlands are one of our oldest and best families, but run down at the heel, between you and me. Her daddy lost a hand in the Civil War, and can't work himself. He's got two boys, and take it from me they are the limit. The wildest young bucks in seven states. The old man don't know how to handle 'em, and Miss Mary has give up trying. If she can keep 'em out o' jail she will be satisfied."

Not being in the mood to enjoy the clerk's gossip, Charles sought his room and went to bed. It was somewhat cooler now and he soon fell asleep. He was waked at nine o'clock by the sound of some enormous trunks being trundled into the sample-room set aside for the use of commercial travelers across the hall from his own chamber, and, rising hurriedly, he went down-stairs. He was quite hungry and afraid that he might be too late to be served with breakfast. The same clerk was on duty; he smiled and nodded.

"I kept your breakfast for you," he said. "The dining-room is closed, but we make exceptions once in a while. Walk right in--just give the door a shove. I'll go in the kitchen and have you waited on. You take coffee, I reckon?"

Charles said he did, and went into the big, many-tabled room adjoining the office. The clerk followed and pa.s.sed into the kitchen through a screened door.

He appeared again in a moment. "It will be right in," he said. "You can set right here by the window. This seat ain't taken. We've got a lot of town boarders. It helps out, I'm here to state. They get a low cut rate by the month, but it brings in money in the long run. Say, you remember you said you were looking for a job on some farm? That young lady I was telling you about, Miss Mary Rowland, was at breakfast just now, and I told her about you. She was powerfully interested, for, between you and me, she is in a hole for want of labor out her way. She missed fire in every attempt she made yesterday. She trotted about town all day, and had to give it up. She begged me to see you. She went out about half an hour ago to do some trading at the dry-goods stores. She said tell you she'd be at Sandow & Lincoln's 'most all morning, and hoped you'd come in there. I'll tell you one thing--you will be treated right out there if you do go, and they will feed you aplenty and give you a clean bed to sleep in. You just tell her Sam Lee sent you--everybody about here knows Sam Lee--and if you just said 'Sam' it would do as well. I get up all the dances for the young folks here in this room. We shove the tables back ag'in' the wall, hire a n.i.g.g.e.r fiddler and guitar-picker, and have high old times at least once a month. You see Mrs. Quinby favors that because it makes a pile of drummers lie over here, and they pay the top rate. What do they care? Expense-account stretches to any size."

Charles promised to look Miss Rowland up, and, being needed in the office, Sam Lee hastened away. Charles enjoyed his breakfast. The food was an agreeable change from the fare of which he had grown tired in the dining-tent of the circus. The clean white plates and dishes appealed to him by contrast to the scratched and dented tin ones the canvasmen had been obliged to use. The eggs, b.u.t.ter, and ham seemed to be fresh from the mountain farms; the coffee was fine, clear, and strong; the cream was thick and fresh; the bread was hot biscuits just from the range.

CHAPTER III

After breakfast Charles went out into the street. It was a clear day, and the mountains in the distance, the near-by green hills, the blue sky, appealed to him. His morbid mood of the night before was gone. Life seemed to promise something to him that had not been within his reach since the hopeful days of his boyhood. He wondered if he was already becoming identified with a locality which he could regard as a permanent home. He smiled as he asked himself who would look for him here among these buried-alive people. How simple and quaint the farmers looked as they slowly moved about their produce-wagons in front of the stores of general merchandise! How amusing their drawling dialect as they priced their cotton, potatoes, chickens, and garden truck! The sign of Sandow & Lincoln's store hung across the sidewalk in front of him. He turned in there. A number of country women with their children stood along the counters on both sides of the narrow room, all being waited on by coatless clerks. A clerk approached Charles.

"Something to-day, sir?" he asked.

Charles told him what he wanted, and the clerk nodded. "Oh yes!" he said, "Miss Mary was talking about you just now. She said you might come in, but she wasn't at all sure. She is in the grocery department, next door. She said tell you to wait back in the rear, if you came. You will find a seat there. I'll tell her when she comes in. No, Mrs. Spriggs, we've quit handling nails." This to a gaunt young woman at his elbow, with a baby on her arm. "When the new hardware started up we agreed to go out of that line and sold 'em our stock. It is right across the street. You can't miss it."

Charles went back to the rear of the long room and took one of the chairs. A country girl came with several pairs of shoes in her arms, and sat down near him to try them on. It amused him to note the way she pulled them on over her coa.r.s.e stockings, and stood up on a piece of brown paper to prevent any scratching of the soles. Finally she made a selection, and went back with all the shoes in her arms. There was a long table holding suits of clothing against the wall, and a young farmer came back and began to pull out some of the coats and examine them.

Catching Charles's glance, he smiled. "Most of 'em moth-eaten," he said, dryly. "They've had 'em in stock ever since the war--mildewed till they smell as musty as rotting hay in a damp stack. Show feller, eh?"

"I was," Charles admitted.

"I heard the clerk talking about you just now," the man went on. "That was a good show, if I'm any judge. The best clown I think I ever saw.

How any mortal man can think up funny things and fire 'em back as quick, first shot out of the box, as that feller did in answering questions beats me."

Charles explained that both the questions and replies had been in use a long time, and the farmer stared in wonder.

"You don't mean it," he said. "That sorter spoils it, don't it? Well, every man to his own line, I reckon."

He might have asked more questions, but Miss Rowland was approaching from the front. As he rose to his feet Charles was quite unprepared for what he saw. He had pictured her as an elderly spinster, somewhat soured by work, misfortune, and family cares, but here was a graceful young girl hardly past eighteen, with a smiling, good-humored face that was quite pretty. She was slight and tall; she had small hands and feet, hazel eyes, and a splendid head of golden-brown hair.

"I think you are Mr. Brown," she began, smiling sweetly. "Mr. Sam Lee said he would speak to you about what I want."

"He sent me here," Charles answered. For the first time since his exile he was conscious of the return of his old social manner in the presence of a lady, and yet he knew there was much that was incongruous in it, dressed as he was in soiled and shabby clothing.

"I certainly am glad you came," she said, in that round, deep and musical voice which somehow held such charm for his ears. "I tell you I am sick and tired of trying to get help, and our cotton and corn are being choked to death by weeds. If you don't come I don't know what I'll do."

"I am perfectly willing," he half stammered, under the delectable thrall of her eyes and appealing mien of utter helplessness, "but I must be frank. I am ignorant of field work. My idea was to offer my help to some farmer who would be patient with me till I got the hang of it. Of course, I could not expect wages till--till--"

"Oh," she broke in, with a rippling laugh, "you wouldn't have any trouble in that respect! A child can cut out weeds with a hoe. I did it when I was a tiny thing. All you have to learn is the difference between corn and cotton and weeds. I can show you that in a minute. Oh, if that is all, we can fix that!"

"That is the only thing I can think of," Charles answered. "I am tired of the roving life I've been leading with the circus and I want to locate somewhere permanently."

"Then we may as well talk about the--the wages," the girl said. "The price usually paid is two dollars a day for six days in the week, and board thrown in. How would that suit you?"

"I am only afraid I won't earn it--at first, anyway," Charles said. "I think I'd better let you pay me according to what I am worth. Money is really not my chief object. I only want a place to live. It happens that I am all alone in the world--no kin or close friends."

"Oh," Mary cried, softly, "that is sad--very, very sad. I sometimes think that all my troubles come from having so many dear ones to bother about, but it must be worse not to have any at all. What a strange life you must have been leading! And you--you"--she hesitated, and then went on, frankly--"you seem to be of a sensitive nature. And yet, from what I've always heard of showmen--"

Seeing that she had paused, he prompted her. "You were saying--"

"More than I have any right to say on such a short acquaintance," she replied, coloring prettily, "but I'll finish. Of course, we don't know about such things, but we have the impression that showmen are rough and uneducated; but you are quite the opposite."