McClure's Magazine/Volume 27/Number 4/The Lady Peddler and the Diplomats

BY

MRS. WILSON WOODROW

ILLUSTRATION BY F. WALTER TAYLOR

RS. EVANS gave a final tap with her hammer to the wheel of an old buckboard which she had just succeeded in patching together with rude skill, and then stepped back to view the result of her labor.

"I guess that's good for several trips yet," she remarked with evident satisfaction, "if that mule just holds out," turning a doubting eye on an old gray horse with spavined knees and a blind eye, now sunk in relaxed and listless slumber.

"Oh, he'll get along all right, and I'll go with you to hist him up whenever he stumbles," replied Mrs. Nitschkan, who leaned comfortably against a huge, pink boulder on the rocky hillside behind them.

"He'd better hold out," Mrs. Evans bestowed a menacing glance at the animal. "How'd ever I get 'Vitina' fer man an' beast, applied external and internal, to all the poor sufferers through this camp an' up an' down these mountains if he don't?"

As she stood, with hands on hips, considering the question, she formed a complete contrast to her friend. A wide sombrero was thrust jauntily on one side of her sleek, brown head and a trim gingham gown of starched freshness was belted tightly about her compact, little waist. A determined, bird-like creature with quick, darting movements, she seemed the very embodiment of force and energy.

Mrs. Nitschkan, on the other hand, was a sturdy, devil-may-care daughter of the mountains; her very costume expressing her complete indifference to all prevailing conventions.

Her dress consisted of a man's coat thrown loosely over a man's flannel shirt open at the throat, and a short skirt which entirely failed to conceal her heavy miner's boots. A soft hat was pushed far back on her curly, brown head, and in her sun-burned face twinkled a pair of bright, blue eyes, while her frequent smile displayed small, milk-white teeth.

"I guess we'd best climb up and try that seat," suggested Mrs. Evans. "If it's goin' to give way with us, I'd rather it'd do it here than any old place along the road, probably just in front of the post-office."

They were about to attempt this somewhat hazardous feat when, hearing shouts, they turned quickly to see two of their friends hastening down the mountain road and gesticulating in such a manner as to convey the fact that they bore news of especial importance.

"Well, what do you think?" cried Mrs. Thomas as she drew near, her round pink-and-white face all aglow with excitement.

"Yes, vat you tink?" echoed Mrs. Landvetter, a huge feather pillow of a woman, spotlessly Dutch. "What?" exclaimed both women.

"There ain't nothin' happened to Sile at the Mont d'Or Mill is there?" breathlessly from Mrs. Evans.

"Nor to Jack in the Gold Bug?" from Mrs. Nitschkan.

"Oh, Land, no! Get your men folks out of your heads fer onc't. It's just this," fluttered Mrs. Thomas, "I seen Rufe Hayes, that drives the hack up from the station, an' he says that a lady peddler's jus' come up on the train. Rufe says she was peart as could be, talkin' to every one on the hack an' offerin' 'em free samples of medicine."

"Medicine!" for a moment, Mrs. Evans's face fell, then her unfaltering courage expressed itself in a firmer set of the lips. "What kind?" she demanded briskly.

"All kinds," explained Mrs. Thomas volubly. "A black case full of 'em. She says that this thing of givin' one kind of medicine fer all diseases is clean out of date. She says, this peddler does, that different diseases require different remedies."

"She does," repeated Mrs. Evans with superior scorn. "Well, it's plain to be seen that she's not on to the newest thing in medicine, and," with some heat, "if anybody's goin' to get out of this game, it ain't me, an' you can tell her so with my compliments. It's a matter of principle with me. I know I got a good thing in 'Vitina,' an' something that the folks here needs. That's the only reason that I took the agency fer it. It's the best medicine fer man an' beast that ever was put up. You girls know what a way we got to live here. The nearest doctor seven miles off over the Pass, an' us either dead or got well by the time he gets here.

"Now if this peddler can work any such miracles in this camp as I've done with 'Vitina,' all right. I'm ready to make my bow and get out, but I guess my standin' 's such that folks here know I'm no faker." But in spite of a stiff upper lip, she was considerably perturbed in spirit. She knew her Zenith, as the little village far up in the Rockies was called, and Zenith was but an epitome of the fickle world, which lavishes its adulation upon the unfortunate objects of its interest only to cast them heedlessly upon the rocks or into the lions' den when a new favorite captures its attention.

Yet not for one moment did she show a shadow of turning. As the days went by, she importuned her customers as ceaselessly as ever, although her quick wits divined indifference in lieu of the enthusiasm with which "Vitina" had once been received; and slowly but surely was she forced to face the unwelcome truth that her rival was, as she expressed it, "fully on to her job."

Daily the tide set more strongly against her, but steadfastly, she refused to accept ultimate defeat. Fully awake to the necessity of some strategic manœuver, she attempted to enhance the attractions of "Vitina" by surrounding it with soaps, perfumes, essences, and a souvenir spoon thrown in now and then; but the ensuing revival of interest was merely temporary and quickly dissipated by a little hot shot from the enemy, to the effect that that particular kind of soap would crack open the hands, that the essences were poison, the spoons tin, and the perfumes of a variety whose vogue had long passed.

Knowing the intense and almost feverish rivalry which existed between the two vendors of medicine, it was with some trepidation that Mrs. Thomas addressed her friend, a month later, as the women climbed the mountain side leading the old horse whose strength was not equal to the task of drawing four of them. "Do you think you'll go to the church social in the Town Hall to-morrow night. Mis' Evans?"

It was a shimmering, sparkling morning and the road wound up over "the range" with the dim, purple vistas, where the eye plunged happily into the depths of deer-haunted shadow, and then glanced upward to white, majestic peaks towering remotely above them. Even purveyors of "Vitina," it would seem, must feel the awe and splendor of the scene and pay it the fleeting tribute of silence; but these mountain women were used to scenic interruptions.

"Do I think I'll go to the church social?" returned Mrs. Evans haughtily. "What for should I be driven from my own church social by a creature like that? Perhaps I ain't got a plaid silk waist an' a string o' pink beads knockin' against my knees every step I take, but my hair an' my teeth, an' my figure's my own, an' I guess one that's born a McKenzie can hold up her head with the best."

"You're all right, Evans," exclaimed Mrs. Nitschkan admiringly, "and if you get into a scrap with her, jus' give me a wink an' I'll do her up."

"They won't be no call for that," replied Mrs. Evans mysteriously. "I got other plans in my head."

"Ho! Ho! Ho!" laughed Mrs. Nitschkan. "Mis' Evans's got one of her little games on hand."

"An' right enough, too," sympathized Mrs. Thomas. "How'd ever us poor women"

"What plans you got to drive her out, Effie?" interrupted Mrs. Nitschkan with eager interest.

"She ain't a-goin' to be druv," replied Mrs. Evans with succinct emphasis.

"Ain't a-goin' to be druv!" echoed her companions in bewildered amazement.

"No, sir," Mrs. Evans paused in the roadway and thrust her arms akimbo, "she's a-goin' to stay right here an' get married."

"Get married! Who to?" chorused the listeners.

"Willie Barker over to Mt. Tabor," with nonchalant assurance. "He's got a nice drug store there, an' if he marries a dressy wife that's fond of spendin', he'll get that bee outen his bonnet that's always a-buzzin' to him to start a branch store here in Zenith."

"There ain't a man goin' to look at her," scoffed Mrs. Thomas, secure in her own opulent attractions, "a pinched-up wrinkled piece of scrawniness. Leastways," with a pouting expression of mutiny, "I don't think you've any call to hit on Willie Barker. There's others that haven't got his manners that'd do fer her. I never go to his store that he don't set up the soda-water or a sack of candy."

"Look here, Marthy Thomas," Mrs. Evans's voice was stern, "I've done a good turn for you now and again, and I'm callin' on you now to remember it. You're promised to Dan Mayhew, an' you can keep your eyes off Willie Barker."

"I'm 'fraid," mused Mrs. Nitschkan doubtfully, "that it's goin' to be the toughest job we ever tackled."

"My Gawd, Sadie Nitschkan," exclaimed Mrs. Evans wearily, "an' you can say that, knowin' men as you'd ought to! They're jus' like a flock o' sheep. Now what us girls's got to do is to talk her up grand. Make the boys think she runs 300 to the ounce."

Mrs. Landvetter clicked her lace needles. "Vell, you can't neffer tell," she remarked, somewhat vaguely. "Ven you talks it, it sounds great; but ven you tink how she look, it sounds bad."

The next evening, Miss Polk attended the social in company with the woman at whose house she lodged. They had arrived early, and the three horny-handed musicians were but tuning up their instruments when the lady peddler took her seat in one of the chairs ranged about the wall. Tall, gaunt, slightly gray, but eternally kittenish, with the trained vivacity of the experienced sales-woman, she sat gazing out upon the highly waxed but uneven floor illumined by glass lamps about the walls, with a set smile of anxious anticipation. This faded into an expression of intense surprise as Mrs. Evans bustled up to her, and grasping her hand voiced her pleasure at seeing Miss Polk present.

"Thanks," responded the lady peddler, recovering her vivacity. "Thanks Mis' Evans, you an' me ought to have a lot in common, both in the same line of business."

The little woman she addressed cocked her bird-like head and looked up with quick, cool eyes. "In business!" with light surprise, "you're clean off, Miss Polk. I got a husband to support me, an' a house and children to look after. I ain't got no time fer peddlin' pills. I jus' accommodate a few of my friends with 'Vitina,' the best remedy fer man an' beast applied internal and external that ever was invented."

A certain shrewd sparkle suddenly shone in Miss Polk's eyes and there was a slight squaring of the jaw beneath her good-natured smile.

"Well, it's my work an' I like it," she affirmed, "but bein' as it's jus' play to you I'd like to rent your horse and cart for the summer. There's such a demand for my pills that I just can't get around to folks fast enough."

This return fire was so rapid and effective that to Mrs. Nitschkan, at her friend's elbow, "a scrap" seemed inevitable; but although Mrs. Evans's lips compressed to a thin scarlet line, and there were white dents about her nostrils, she held herself well in hand.

"Oh, Mr. Evans wouldn't never hear of that," lightly. "An' now, Miss Polk, us girls want to do all we can to give you a good time in Zenith. Have you met all the boys yet?"

Miss Polk ran her eyes hastily over the groups of miners standing about the hall. "Mercy no!" with a little gasp, "not half of 'em."

"Well, us girls'll see that you do" announced the tiny woman. "Wait till I get Elzevir down," depositing the sleeping child on a chair, "an' I'll bring some of 'em up." With that, she bustled away. "Here, Jim," accosting the first man she met, "I want you to come an' meet the lady peddler, she's a mighty nice girl."

"Girl!" echoed the reluctant miner.

"Oh, well, she ain't so young and perhaps not to say pretty," admitted Mrs. Evans, with frankness, "but Jim, she's certainly got style. Kind o' citified lookin' you know, an' yet she don't put on no airs."

"An' she's so bright, too," cooed Mrs. Thomas, joining them. "She jus' keeps me in the giggles all the time. Here Tom," stopping a sturdy fellow as he passed them, "you want to hurry up quick an' get a dance promised with the lady peddler. Them Mt. Tabor folks'll be here in a minute, an' Willie Barker'll like as not take every dance. You know they'll have so much in common, all their different pills to talk over."

Tom's expression of reluctance vanished. There was a feud of long standing between Willie Barker and himself. "Well, Willie Barker won't get nary a dance, if I can help it," truculently. "Anyways," moved by a chivalrous instinct, "if all you ladies say is true, she must be better'n she looks."

So well did the little band employ their energies in arousing an interest in Miss Polk, that long before the party arrived from Mt. Tabor the lady peddler knew for the first time in her existence the excited joy of halving her dances.

Having sown the seed, Mrs. Evans was naturally anxious to discover whether it had fallen upon fertile soil, so on the homeward way she inquired of Mr. Evans his impressions of Miss Polk.

"Oh, she's all right," he replied indifferently, "the boys didn't seem to think she was pretty; but kind o' citified and stylish and she don't put on no airs." His wife smiled triumphantly in the darkness.

"An' she's bright, too," continued Evans with more warmth in his tone, and a reminiscent chuckle, "why, when you was a-waltzin' with Willie Barker her'n me most died laughin'. I thought she'd choke. She said: 'That's the funniest thing I ever saw. How Mrs. Evans is able to keep her feet on the ground with him takin' them kangaroo hops is more'n I can understand.'"

Mrs. Evans compressed her lips. "So you couldn't find nothing better to do, Sile Evans, than to sit there pokin' fun at your own wife an' Willie Barker. Maybe Willie Barker does dance kind o' funny; but I guess in the sight of the Lord, his dancin's as good or better'n yours. You needn't get set up 'cause the lady peddler talked to you ten minutes, and she needn't get set up 'cause the boys paid her a little attention, for she's goin' to marry Willie Barker."

"Marry Willie Barker!" exclaimed Evans.

"Yes, marry Willie Barker. Here was I workin' up a trade an' it was doin' good, too, an' I was savin' up toward that piece of black silk in Swanstrom's window, an' havin' the children's teeth fixed, an' I ain't goin' to have it snatched out of my hands." "How do you know Willie will want her, or she'll want Willie?" asked Mr. Evans stupidly.

"How'd I know anything? if you don't believe me, you just sit still and watch how things go."

Apparently, things went very well. The entertaining became very brisk; Zenith was evidently in the throes of a social season, such as it had never known before, and Miss Polk received enough attention to turn her head, a result which Mrs. Thomas declared had been achieved. "I talked Willie Barker up to her as good as the best," said that lady aggrievedly, "an' what did I get?"

"'Oh,' she says, tossin' her head 'I  couldn't think of lettin' anything interfere with my c'reer.'" "What's a c'reer?" asked Mrs. Nitschkan.

"It seems to be some kind of dinky work you're doin' when you ain't got no show to get married," responded Mrs. Thomas cautiously, as one not sure of her ground. "You talk a lot about it, an' how you wouldn't give it up for nothin'."

"There's a lot in the askin'," said Mrs. Evans sententiously. "Things certainly is goin' well; but I mos' wish I'd been born a atheist. They can go round an' enjoy themselves with no thought of their responsibilities or the Judgment Day; but for a Christian an' a perfesser it's different. You got to manage things fer folks an' bear their burdens till the cows come home."

"You certainly are a manager, Evans," admired Mrs. Nitschkan.

"Some has to be," with a resigned sigh. "I often think that when I reach the other shore, I'll get a good deal of comfort out of comparin' notes with Noah. I know what a time he had herdin' those animals into the Ark."

But in spite of her skill in adjusting the affairs of others, Mrs. Evans was about to make a startling and disconcerting discovery. For the first time in her experience, she was to learn how powerless we are to control the forces we lightly set in motion.

If Miss Polk's belleship had in a sense been thrust upon her, and had been achieved by press agents and spurious methods, the woman herself was possessed of sufficient shrewdness and mother wit to see her opportunity and make the most of it. This hard-working, old-young, neglected creature had blossomed under the sunshine of masculine approbation, into a maturity far more attractive than her starved, sharp-angled, disappointed youth had ever been. She did not lose her head, neither did she adopt the capricious wiles of youthful coquetry. On the contrary, in this atmosphere of new and exotic appreciation, her individuality seemed to broaden, develop and expand, and the qualities she possessed were those that won their way with the mountain people. She had a gift of give and take repartee, eminently good-natured, without bitterness or sarcasm; she was sympathetic and tactful, and a shrewd knowledge of human nature gained by her years of canvassing had supplied her with a fund of humorous anecdote.

Consequently, during the long summer months, the porch of the cabin where she lodged was usually filled to overflowing. It had become the natural and accepted thing for Miss Mayme Polk to entertain from twenty to thirty young miners every evening.

As regularly as the clock ticked, Willie Barker drove over from Mt. Tabor; and when the sun slowly sank behind the peaks, Rufe Hayes might be seen starting from his lonely cabin on Corona Mountain to begin his sheer three-mile walk to the village.

The dances became more frequent; picnics were the order of the day: Miss Mayme Polk was enjoying such a belleship as she had never dreamed of in her most ecstatic moments.

"It do beat all," said the village Solon, squinting his eyes at the distant peaks from the window of the assayer's office, "it do beat all, how men an' brothers 'll go crazy in bunches over some piece of bone and gristle that's begun to grow yellow behind the ears. An' the reason is this. Take a girl, she shows her preferences right off. 'I'm fer Jack,' says she, 'the rest kin go hang.' But you take a old thing like this one, an' she's the same to all, to Harry that's flat broke, an' to Dick that's got the best showin' of ore in the camp; but all the time she's doin' some tall thinkin'."

Mrs. Evans's smile of elation at the success of her plans had gradually grown less confident. Something of puzzle, almost of bewilderment had crept into it and a tiny network of perplexed lines was showing on her smooth brow.

In the meantime Miss Polk's sale of drugs was phenomenal, record breaking. The miners bought steadily, consumingly, and the "hack" was so overloaded with the boxes of medicine which came up from Denver each day, that the passengers were seriously incommoded.

In fact Miss Mayme Polk's popularity was something of a landslide, and Mrs. Evans was beginning to feel as if she might be crushed beneath the avalanche.

For the first time she was tasting the bitterness of success. Obedient to her will, events had arranged themselves—with a mathematical precision. Everything had turned out exactly as she had planned. Willie Barker stood ready to offer the lady peddler his hand and heart, and all his worldly possessions, and not only Willie Barker but Rufe Hayes, Jimmy Johnson and a score of others; but the taste of her fruit of fulfilment was as dust and ashes in Mrs. Evans's mouth.

It was upon this scurvy jest of fate that she pondered, one evening, as she lighted the lamp, and drew out the contents of her mending basket; but not long was she left to her own meditations. Presently there was a knock upon the outer door, and it swung open to admit her three friends and counselors.

"Gee!" exclaimed Mrs. Nitschkan fanning herself with her hat. "It's a warm night. There ain't scarce a breath from the peaks stirrin'. Well, Mis' Evans," gazing admiringly at her friend, "you certainly done it. I jus' come past Mis' T. R. Warden's an' I'm a-tellin' you true, the porch is jus' black with the boys."

Mrs. Thomas's round, good-humored face did not relax from the faintly displeased lines into which it had recently fallen.

"It sure looks as if she might get Willie Barker after all," advanced Mrs. Evans with a rather nervous assumption of impatience.

"Gosh A'mighty, woman!" Mrs. Nitschkan's tones were more robust than usual, "Willie Barker? Why, she's got her pick of the whole camp. They're hers at bargain prices. She kin take 'em or leave 'em as she chooses."

Mrs. Thomas twisted pettishly in her chair. "The boys in this camp are clear gone crazy." Then with cutting emphasis, "I guess. Mis' Evans, you've gone too far—I guess you've done more'n you bargained for this time. A woman's place is the home, but you can't never be contented with your speere. You're always tryin' to play Gawd."

For once Mrs. Evans's habitual, cool self-control deserted her. She threw her work to the floor with a gesture of despair. "I never see anything like it," she exclaimed. "I expected to realize on my 'Vitina' this summer so's I could get that piece of black silk in Swanstrom's window, an' Celora's teeth fixed—an' what's happened? Folks is so took with this lady peddler's pills that 'Vitina's' jus' fell dead. You can't give a bottle away, an' that mule's in the shed eating his head off, an' now"—bursting into shrill tears—"Sile's took to going down to see this Polk about three evenings a week. He sits here for 'bout an hour after supper, an' kicks his feet up an' down on the stove an' then makes some excuse about havin' to see one or 'nother of the boys about the ore or about some haulin' to the mill or something, an' then he comes home here three or four hours later lookin' as good humored as you please, an' sayin' the only place he could find the boys was at Warden's. An'," with a final burst of tears, "I jus' sit round here, an' can't do nothin'. I ain't got no inventiveness. I don't know what's come to me; but I ain't got no inventiveness."

"You ain't no call to do all the roarin', Mis' Evans," said Mrs. Thomas severely. "It's bad enough when husbands takes on that way, but what is it when the gentleman you're engaged to cuts up the same capers?" Then she, too, subsided into tears.

Mrs. Nitschkan looked from one to another of her weeping friends. "Gosh A'mighty!" with a low whistle. "So that's the way the wind blows!" Then the surprise on her face giving place to decision, she slowly rolled up her sleeve and felt of her great, swelling muscles. "Stop bawlin', girls," she continued authoritatively, "an' listen to me. I've heard the boys talk about this here what-do-you-call-it—diplomacy game, an' I've heard of the big stick, too. Now Mrs. Evans has been tryin' the diplomacy game, an' it ain't worked, so I'm a-goin' to see what the big stick'll do. Now, I'll tell you what. We'll jus' sit where we are till Miss Polk's callers is through callin' an' then we'll creep down there an' Miss Lady Peddler'll be given till the six o'clock train to-morrow morning to get out of Zenith."

But scarcely had she finished speaking when there came the sound of laughter and of footsteps without. Then a knock, and Miss Polk herself entered accompanied by a middle-aged, dark, pompous stranger.

To the women who rose suddenly to their feet, she appeared a vision of the style they adored. A poppy-strewn organdie, a poppy-wreathed hat, scarlet ribbons and long gloves completed a costume whose elegance awed them into momentary silence.

Miss Polk advanced smilingly. "Mr. Leffingwell, ladies," indicating the stranger in her wake. "I just ran off a minute," she continued volubly, "an' left Mis' T. R. Warden to entertain the boys; but you folks have all been so nice to me that I couldn't go away without telling you good-by."

"Good-by!" gasped the women.

"Yes," smiled Miss Polk. "My sales have been so awful good up here that Mr Leffingwell," smiling at that gentleman from under the poppy-wreathed hat, "has offered me a permanent agency."

"Then, you ain't a-goin' to marry Willie Barker, nor Rufe Hayes, nor none of the boys here?" faltered Mrs Evans.

"Oh, dear me, no," with a conscious giggle. "No, indeed," smoothing her gloves. "They're lovely gentlemen, every one of 'em; but I got my c'reer, you know."

Mr. Leffingwell coughed slightly, it may be significantly, for Miss Polk tossed her head and bridled.

"Yes, Mr. Leffingwell's got to leave to-morrow, and he wants me to go right down with him, an' take charge of the office—the work's pressing; but I will say, I'm sorry to leave, for as I said to Mr. Leffingwell coming up here, 'Well, of all the hospitable, kind-hearted ladies, Mis' Evans, and her crowd takes the cake. Why, these ladies, Mr. Leffingwell, have just turned themselves inside out to give me a good time." She spoke with evident sincerity. "And now, Mis' Evans, that I've got this chance, I want you to take up the agency for my pills—you could handle them right along with 'Vitina,'"

Mrs. Nitschkan slapped the lady peddler upon the back with a heartiness which set every poppy on the hat quivering.

"That's what I call white, woman dear, that's what I call white, and Effie Evans you ain't got no Christian spirit if you don't take up her offer."

But Mrs. Evans, too overcome to speak, had dropped into a chair and now sobbed audibly in her apron. "She'll take you up all right," assured Mrs. Thomas, soothingly. "it's just a touch of the strikes, from the shock-like of your goin' so sudden."

"Well, then that's settled, an' I got to run," replied Miss Polk, patting Mrs. Evans's shoulder. "Good luck to you all, and good-by." She gathered up her scarlet and white skirts and paused a moment in the doorway. "I will say, Mis' Evans, if there was more folks like you, always trying to help others an' make things pleasant for 'em. this world would be a better an' a happier place."