Page:Scribner's Monthly, Volume 12 (May–October 1876).djvu/214

208 no great market value; but they ain't goin' to extend the right hand of fellowship to me after running off their ringleader's mustang! Particularly when that animal's foundered and knee-sprung. No, sir!" Gabriel stared at his companion without speaking. "I was late coming back with Olly to Wingdam. I had to swap the horse and buggy for the mare without having time to arrange particulars with the owner. I don't wonder you're shocked," continued Jack mischievously, affecting to misunderstand Gabriel's silence; "but thet's me. Thet's the kind of company you've got into. Procrastination and want of punctuality have brought me to this. Never procrastinate, Gabriel. Always make it a point to make it a rule never to be late at the Sabbath-school!" "Ef I hed owt to give ye," said Gabriel ruefully, "a drop o' whisky, or suthin to keep up your stren'th!" "I never touch intoxicating liquors without the consent of my physician," said Jack gravely; "they're too exciting! I must be kept free from all excitement. Something soothing or sedentary like this," he added, striking his leg. But even through his mischievous smile his face paled, and a spasm of pain crossed it. "I reckon we'll hev to stick yer ontil dark," said Gabriel, "and then strike acrost the gully to the woods on Conroy's Hill. Ye'll be easier thar, and we're safe ontil sun-up, when we kin hunt another tunnel. Thar ain't no choice," added Gabriel apologetically. Jack made a grimace, and cast a glance around the walls of the tunnel. The luxurious scamp missed his usual comfortable surroundings.

"Well," he assented with a sigh, "I suppose the game's made anyway! and we've got to stick here like snails on a rock for an hour yet. Well," he continued impatiently, as Gabriel, after improvising a rude couch for him with some withered pine tassels gathered at the mouth of the tunnel, sat down beside him ; "are you goin' to bore me to death, now that you've got me here—sittin' there like an owl. Why don't you say something?"

"Say what?" asked Gabriel simply. "Anything! Lie if you want to; only talk!"

"I'd like to put a question to ye, Mr. Hamlin," said Gabriel, with great gentleness—"allowin', in course, ye'll answer, or no, jest ez agree'ble to ye—reckonin' it's no business o' mine, nor pryin' into secrets, on'y jess to pass away the time ontil sundown. When you was tuk bad a spell ago, unloosin' yer shirt thar, I got to see a picter that ye hev around yer neck. I ain't askin' who nor which it is, but on'y this—ez thet—thet—thet young woman dark-complected ez thet picter allows her to be?" Jack's face had recovered its color by the time that Gabriel had finished, and he answered promptly: "A derned sight more so! Why, that picture's fair alongside of her!"

Gabriel looked a little disappointed.

Hamlin was instantly up in arms. "Yes, sir; and when I say that," he returned, "I mean, by thunder, that the whitest-faced woman in the world don't begin to be as handsome. Thar ain't an angel that she couldn't give points to and beat! That's her style! It don't," continued Mr. Hamlin, taking the picture from his breast, and wiping its face with his handkerchief "it don't begin to do her justice. What," he asked suddenly and aggressively, "have you got to say about it, any way?"

"I reckened it kinder favored my sister Grace," said Gabriel, submissively. "Ye didn't know her, Mr. Hamlin? She was lost sence '49—thet's all!" Mr. Hamlin measured Gabriel with a contempt that was delicious in its sublime audacity and unconsciousness. "Your sister?" he repeated; "that's a healthy lookin' sister of such a man as you, ain't it? Why, look at it," roared Jack, thrusting the picture under Gabriel's nose; "why it's—it's a lady!"

"Ye mus'n't jedge Gracy by me, nor even Olly," interposed Gabriel gently, evading Mr. Hamlin's contempt. But Jack was not to be appeased. "Does your sister sing like an angel, and talk Spanish like Governor Alvarado? Is she connected with one of the oldest Spanish families in the State? Does she run a rancho and thirty square leagues of land, and is Dolores Salvatierra her nickname? Is her complexion like the young bark of the madrono—the most beautiful thing ever seen? Did every other woman look chalky beside her, eh?" "No!" said Gabriel, with a sigh; "it was just my foolishness, Mr. Hamlin. But seein' that picter, kinder—" "I stole it," interrupted Jack with the same frankness. "I saw it in her parlor, on the table, and I froze to it when no one