Under Handicap Read online

  CHAPTER IX

  That night Conniston sat up late, perched high on the corral fence,staring at the stars while he tore down and builded up the World.

  He had ridden to Rattlesnake Valley with Argyl, and had spent a bigpart of the day there with her. He saw scores of men at work withscrapers, picks, and shovels, and understood little enough of whatthey were doing. He rode with her into a town, a brand-new town, oftwenty small, neat houses, as alike as rows of peas. In one of thehouses he worked for Argyl, tacking down carpets in the empty rooms,moving furniture which he had uncrated in the yard. This was to be herfather's camp, she told him, where he would soon have to spend a partof each week superintending the work which Bat Truxton was pushingforward seven days out of the week. Then they had at last ridden hometogether, and he had left her at the house, going slowly back to thecorrals with the two horses. And now, his day's work done, he staredat the stars, rearranging the universe.

  He knew that he was William Conniston, the son of William Conniston ofWall Street. That fact was unchanged, unchangeable. But in some newway, vaguely different, it was not the all-important fact which it hadbeen. It was still something to be glad of, something which he was notgoing to forget or underestimate. But it was not everything.

  Sitting there alone, his pipe dead between his teeth, Greek Connistonasked himself many questions which had never suggested themselves tohis complacency before. And he answered them, one by one, without fearor favor. In what was he better than Brayley, than Toothy even? Was hea better man physically? No. Was he a better man morally? No. Was he abetter man intellectually? He had thought he was; now he hesitatedlong before answering that question. Certainly he had had an educationwhich they had missed. Certainly his intellect had been trained, in afashion, by great men, by learned university professors. But was itany keener than Brayley's and Toothy's; was it any stronger; was it,after all, any more highly trained? In a crisis now was his intellectany better than theirs? In his present environment was it any better?And finally he answered that question as he had answered the others.

  Was he a better man in the composite, in the grand total of manhood?Measured by all the standards by which men are measured, stripping offthe superficialities of surface culture and clothes, the thin veneerof education which in his case, as in the cases of the great majorityof young men who have been graduated from this or that university, hadimparted only a sort of finish, a neat, gleaming polish, and no greatmetamorphosis of the inner and true being, was he a better man? Ifthere was any one particular, no matter how small, in which GreekConniston was a better man than the men among whom he had moved withcareless contempt, he wanted to know what it was!

  "I have been a howling young ass!" he told himself, his contemptsuddenly swerving upon himself. "A conceited fool and a snob! Lordy,lordy, why didn't somebody tell me--and kick me? A snob--a d--d,insufferable, conceited snob!"

  Three weeks ago the things which Argyl Crawford had said to him wouldhave amused the very self-satisfied young man. A week later, whensomething of the truth had begun to filter in dimly upon him, he wouldhave felt hurt, insulted. Now he was ready to go to her, to thank her,to tell her that a fool was dead, that he hoped a man was being born.

  "And I would right now," he muttered to himself, "only I suppose thatanything I said would sound like the braying of a jackass!"

  The one thing which she had said to him which now returned withever-increasing significance was the reason, as she had explained it,why he had been chosen to go with her to Rattlesnake Valley. Out ofthe dozens of men who worked under Brayley's orders he was absolutelythe only one who could be spared from the day's work! Every other manhad a quicker eye, a stronger body, a firmer hand; every other man wasa better rider, a better herder, a better roper, a better all-roundman. When there was work that must be done, man's work, he was the onewho could be spared from it.

  By nature headlong, when Greek Conniston went into a thing he was inthe habit of going deep into it. When he drove a new car he drove itnight and day and at top speed. When he spent money he spent lavishly,generously, recklessly. When he wasted time he wasted it profligately.And now that he abandoned an old position he did it as thoroughly ashe had dissipated his father's money. He was plunging from what had solong seemed to him a great height. Plunging; not cautiously loweringhimself inch by inch down a dizzy precipice of self-respect, notlooking the while for the first ledge upon which he might rest;plunging headlong from the zenith of self-conceit to the nadir ofself-contempt. And the depths into which he hurled himself seemed tohim very deep, very black.

  He ignored considerations by the way. That he had been handicapped inthe race did not suggest itself to him to comfort him. He merely sawthat the race was on and that he was far in the rear, choked with thedust of the going. He saw, and saw clearly, that of all the men whotook their dollar a day from John Crawford he, Greek Conniston, didthe least to earn his. That he was not only not the best man on therange, but that he was the poorest man. He was just his father's son._A man's son, not a man!_

  He had not eaten supper, had forgotten that he had not eaten. Long hesat in the thickening night, alone, feeling the part of a man maroonedby his dawning understanding upon a desert island, vast, impassable,restless seas between him and his race. He watched the stars come outuntil they were thick set in the black vault above him, flung insprays, flashing and scintillating down to the low horizons about him.His brooding eyes ran out across the floor of the plain towardRattlesnake Valley.

  He remembered that he had promised to call to see Argyl to-morrownight, to tell her then what he had decided. What was he going todecide? The obvious thing was not clear to him yet. He would work overit half the night. Out of the confusion into which he had been hurledtwo things alone stood out to him now as he tried to review them; twothings gathered the light which abandoned all other considerations todarkness. The first thing, the clearest thing, the most importantthing in all of the new world which was being built up about him wasthat he loved Argyl Crawford.

  Loved her, not as Greek Conniston would have loved yesterday, couldhave loved then, but with the love which was a part of the GreekConniston who was being born to-night. Loved her, not with the shallowaffection which would have been the tribute of a Greek Conniston ofyesterday, but with that deeper, eternal urge of soul to soul which istrue love. Loved her gravely, almost sternly, as a strong man loves.

  Upon only two days had it been given him to speak with her. He thoughtof that, but he knew that made no iota of difference. For he knew herbetter than he knew any woman with whom he had danced or driven orattended theaters and dinners. In that first glimpse from the Pullmanwindow he had seen the purposeful character of her. To-day he had seenit again. To-day he knew that he knew Argyl Crawford, that she hadbeen herself to him, unaffected, honest, womanly. Her nature wassimple, straightforward, open, unassuming. Its beauty struck one asthe beauty of a Grecian temple, its lines pure and noble, the wholeedifice the more wonderful in that it depended upon itself alone andneeded no adornment.

  She had shaken hands with him last night when he left her at thehouse, not perfunctorily, but firmly, as the strong-handed cowboysshook hands, and had said to him, simply:

  "I wish you luck, Greek Conniston, in the fight you are about tomake."

  He remembered the hand-clasp. She seemed unable to do anything, nomatter how small, without putting her whole self into it, herfrankness, her sincerity, her eagerness. And Conniston of to-night,scowling at the match which he had swept across his thigh to light hispipe and now let die down to his fingers, muttered, not without cause,that he had his nerve with him even to think about her.

  The other thing which was clear to him was that he must "lick"Brayley. If he did nothing else in all of his futile life, if he quitwork or were fired the next minute, he must "lick" Brayley. It did notstrike him as amusing, as even strange, that these two things andthese alone should be the only things of which he was sure. He merelyaccepted them as inevitable. He felt no particular re
sentment towardBrayley. The man had treated him fairly enough since that first nightin the bunk-house. He looked upon the matter calmly, almostimpersonally, as a duty to which he must attend. And he was not goingto wait for an excuse. An opportunity would do.

  It was half-past ten, and very late for cow-puncher land, when Greekstrode away through the darkness to the bunk-house.

  When morning came it happened that Brayley rose fifteen minutes early,Conniston fifteen minutes late. The foreman left immediately for a farcorner of the range, and Conniston, having made a quick breakfast,went about his own work. In the corral he selected a horse whichheretofore he had carefully left alone, knowing the brute's half-tamedspirit and not caring to trust to it. But now it was different. Hewaited his opportunity before throwing his rope. Then, as the horse,seeming to know that he had been singled out, shot by him, he cast hislasso. And there was a grim light, but at the same time a light ofdeep satisfaction in Conniston's eyes as he saw that his whirlingnoose had gone unerringly, settling as Toothy's rope would have done.

  He blindfolded the big, belligerent horse to mount him. When his feetwere securely thrust into his stirrups he leaned forward and with aswift jerk snapped the handkerchief from the horse's eyes. For amoment the animal's sides between his knees trembled and throbbed likean overtaxed engine. Then there was the sudden jerk which told of amighty bunching of muscles, a gathering of force. And as Connistonshot his spurs home, with the reins gripped tight in his left hand sothat the horse could not get his head down, the forelegs were liftedhigh in air as the animal reared. A quick blow of the quirt and theforelegs sought earth again, and Conniston began to realize what itwas to ride a bucking bronco.

  A series of short jumps, every one threatening to unseat him, everyone jerking him so that his body was whipped this way and that, sothat he had much ado to keep his feet from flying out of the stirrups,and could hardly hold his right hand back from going to the horn, from"pulling leather." The bucks came so close together that it seemed tohim that he did not rest a second in the saddle; that each time thebig brute struck the ground with his four feet bunched together, topause for a breathless moment, gathering every ounce of strength towrench, leaping sideways, he must surely be thrown. But in spite ofall he did not pull leather, he did not cease to ply spur and quirt,and he was not thrown. It was a perfectly quiet horse he rode awayacross the fields only three minutes later.

  He did a man's work that day, all that day, until long after the redsun had gone down. And when he came up from the corral to his supper,if he was tired, if the muscles of his body ached, it did not show inhis steady stride or in his quiet eyes.

  The suit-case which he had left in Indian Creek had been brought outlast week. He shaved himself and changed his clothes, putting on thefirst white silk shirt he had worn for many a day. He even found anold can of shoe-polish and touched up the pair of dusty shoes. Andthen, laughing at the looks the men turned upon him, at the fewjesting remarks which they chose to make, he walked through the treesand to the range-house.

  The glow of electric lights through the wide-opened front doors ranout across the lawn to meet him. Striding along the walk, his heelscrunching in the white gravel, he again marveled at the comfort, theluxury even, which John Crawford had brought across the desert. He ranlightly up the broad steps. Before he could ring Argyl was at thedoor, her eyes quick to find his searchingly. He knew what they soughtto find in his. And when she put out her hand to him, swiftly,impulsively, he trusted that they had found what they sought.

  He followed her through the big front room and into the library. Herethere were many deep, soft leather chairs, here there was a blueatmosphere of tobacco smoke, and here Mr. Crawford, immaculate inwhite flannels, rose to meet him, his hand outstretched.

  "How do you do, Conniston?" Mr. Crawford took his hand warmly, thefine lines of his stern old face softening genially. "I was mightyglad when Argyl told me that she had asked you over. Sit down, sitdown. Have something to smoke. Tell us about yourself, and how"--thedeep-set eyes twinkling--"you like the work?"

  Conniston saw that Argyl had seated herself and dropped into one ofthe big chairs himself, his whole body enjoying the luxury of it. Athis elbow was a little table with cigars and cigarettes. Mr. Crawfordlaughed when he saw that Conniston, having glanced at the table, drewout his own cheap muslin bag of tobacco and rough, brown papers.

  "I'm getting used to them," Greek apologized. "And do you know thatI'm beginning to like to roll my own 'cigareet'?"

  Argyl clapped her hands, laughing with her father.

  "I told you so, daddy!" she cried, merrily. "Didn't I say that Mr.Conniston was born to be a good cow-puncher!"

  "And I'm half persuaded that you are right, Argyl," came from behindthe dense cloud of cigar-smoke. "But you haven't told us how you likethe work, Conniston."

  "If you had asked me a week ago I should have had to ask to be excusedfrom trying to tell you in the presence of ladies. I would have quitif I hadn't been too much of a coward. But now--"

  "Now?" asked Argyl, quickly.

  And it was to her that he made his answer, not to her father.

  "Now I like it. And I am going to stick--unless I get fired forincompetency!"

  "I like that," said Mr. Crawford, slowly. "Yes, I like that. I wasafraid that it was rather too much for you. It's hard work, Conniston,and long hours and little pay. But Brayley tells me that you have themakings of a rattling good cow-hand."

  "Thank you, sir. It was very decent of Brayley."

  "I ought not to mix business into a social call, I know, but I want totell you personally that I am very much pleased with the way you aretucking in. You asked if any one needed a good man the day you came.We all do. I do. Why, I always want more of them than I can find. Ayoung man like you, with your advantages, your education--there areall kinds of opportunities. Yes, right with me. The West is the placefor young men--provided simply that they are men! That's as trueto-day as it was in forty-nine. And truer. Opportunities are greater,the need of men is more urgent. Right now, right to-day, I am lookingfor a man, a young man, who knows a thing or two about engineering,who can build bridges and cut irrigation ditches and save me moneydoing it." He threw out his hands. "And I can't get him!"

  "Will you tell me about the position?" asked Conniston, with keeninterest in voice and eyes alike.

  "Certainly. I am running four cattle-ranges, using close to eightythousand acres doing it, too. That, of course, you know. But that isgetting to be a side issue with me. I am doing something else which isgoing to be a thousand times bigger--ten thousand times more worthwhile. Have you been to Crawfordsville?"

  "No. I have been within a couple of miles of it. I saw it one day fromBlue Ridge."

  "Well, then you know something of it. It is in a valley ten miles longwhich has always been one of the richest valleys I ever saw; shelteredby the mountains, watered by the springs which create the source ofIndian Creek. The climate is like that of the California foothills.And the soil is fertile--anything will grow there. I saw that twentyyears ago. I knew that the place was made for a town-site--and I madethe town. There are a lot of smaller valleys about it; there areorchards there now and vineyards. There are mines, paying mines. Thereis no end to the herds of cattle running through the valleys and atthe bases of the hills. The town has a railroad, a narrow-gage fromBolton on the Pacific Central & Western. Building such a town, givingit railroad connection, electric lights, and all the things which gowith unlimited water-power was simple enough."

  Conniston sat back and watched the man who spoke of city building asof the making of a summer home. Mr. Crawford was leaning forward inhis chair, his cigar between his fingers, his eyes very steady uponConniston's.

  "But now," he went on, his eyes clear, but his brows drawn over them,"we come to something different--entirely different. Out yonder in thelap of the desert is what they call Rattlesnake Valley. It is novalley at all, merely a great depression, a sort of natural sink. Itis twenty miles wide, forty mil
es long. I have found no drop of waterwithin thirty miles of it, no single spring, no creek. It is nothingbut sand--dry, barren, unfertile sand--five hundred square miles ofit, to look at it. And right there, in the heart of that sink, I amgoing to build a town."

  He spoke quietly, his voice low, no hint of boastfulness in his tone,no hint of doubt. He spoke as a man who has studied his ground and whoknows both the difficulties which lie ahead of him and thepossibilities. Conniston, seeing only the impossibility, the madnessof such a project, looked questioningly from him to the girl. Argyl'sface was flushed, her eyes were very bright with an intense eagerinterest.

  "It sounds so big," Conniston hesitated, his gaze coming back to theolder man's face. "So daring, so impossible!"

  "It is big! Bigger than I have even hinted at. It is daring. Ofcourse, I take a chance of sinking everything I have out there andfinding only failure in the end."

  He shrugged his shoulders, and Conniston noticed for the first timehow big and broad they were.

  "But it is not impossible. It is merely the repetition of such work ashas been done successfully in the Imperial Valley. The stuff whichlooks to be sand--barren, unfertile sand--is the richest soil in theworld. Put water on it and you can raise anything. Reclamation work isa fairly new thing with us, Conniston. Men have been contentheretofore to squat in the green valleys and let the desert placesremain the haunts of the horned toad and coyote. But now the greenvalleys are filling up, and there are hundreds of thousands of squaremiles like the country you rode over from Indian Creek to the HalfMoon which are calling to us. To redeem them from barrenness, to dothe sort of work which our friends have done in the Imperial Valley,is pioneer work. The pioneers ever since Adam, be it the Columbuses ofearly navigation or the Wrights of aerial navigation, have alwaystaken the long chances. They are the ones who have suffered thehardships, and who, often enough, have been forgotten by the world inits mad rush along the trail they have opened. But they are the menwho have done the big things. The pioneers are not yet all gone fromthe West, thank God! And their work is reclamation work!"

  "And it's for the work over there that you want an engineer?"

  "Yes. I want him bad, too. Do you happen to know one?"

  "I know one. I won't say how much good he is, though. I'm an engineermyself."

  "You!" It was Argyl's voice, surprised but eager.

  "My father is a mining engineer. He always wanted me to do somethingfor myself, you know." Conniston laughed softly. "He sent me tocollege, and since I didn't care a rap what sort of work I did, I tooka course in civil engineering to please him. Civil, instead ofmining," he added, lightly, "because I thought it would be easier."

  "Had any practical experience?" demanded Mr. Crawford. Conniston shookhis head. "It's too bad. You might be of a lot of use to me overthere--if you'd ever done anything."

  Conniston colored under the plain, blunt statement. There it wasagain--he had never done anything, he had never been anything. Histeeth cut through his cigarette before he answered.

  "I didn't suppose that you could use me." He still spoke lightly,hiding the things which he was feeling, his recurrent self-contempt."I don't suppose, that I know enough to run a ditch straight. I'vebeen rather a rum loafer."

  Mr. Crawford smiled. "I suppose you have. But you are young yet,Conniston. A man can do anything when he is young."

  There was the grinding of wheels upon the gravel outside, a man'svoice, and then a man's steps.

  A moment later Roger Hapgood, immaculate in a smartly cut gray suitand gloves, came smiling into the library, his hand outstretched, hismanner the manner of a man so thoroughly at home that he does not stopto ring. He did not at first see Conniston half hidden in his bigchair. But Conniston saw him, was quick to notice the air offamiliarity, the smile which rested affectionately upon Mr. Crawfordand ran on, no doubt meant to be adoring and certainly was very soft,to Argyl--and Conniston was seized with a sudden desire to take theingratiating Roger Hapgood by the back of the collar and kick him uponthe seat of his beautifully fitting trousers.

  "Good evening, Mr. Crawford. I ran in on a little business for Mr.Winston. Ah, Miss Argyl! So glad to see you."

  His little hand, which had been swallowed up in one of Mr. Crawford's,and which emerged rosy and crumpled, was proffered gallantly to thegirl. And then Hapgood saw Conniston.

  "Oh, I say," he stammered, a very trifle confused. "It's Conniston. Ididn't know--"

  His pale eyes, under nicely arched brows, went from father to daughteras though Roger Hapgood were willing to admit that anything which theythought fit to do was all very right and proper, but that he was nonethe less surprised to find them entertaining one of the hired men.

  "Yes, I'm still with the Half Moon," Conniston said, still nettled,but more amused, making no move to rise or put out his hand. "How areyou, Roger?"

  "How do, Conniston?" replied Mr. Hapgood, the rising young lawyer.Conniston idly wondered what had made his friend go to work. On thesurface the reason seemed to be Argyl. Yet Hapgood showed a new side,a determination most unusual in him. Later Conniston was to know, tounderstand.

  "And you like it?"

  "Immensely. You ought to try it, Roger!"

  Hapgood shuddered. "Couldn't think of it. A lark, no doubt, but Ihaven't the time for larks nowadays. I'm in the law." He turned to Mr.Crawford. "Thanks to you. Fascinating, and all that, but it does keepa man busy. I hated to disturb you to-night," with an apologetic smileat Argyl, "but Mr. Winston thought that the matter ought to be broughtup before you immediately."

  He was bursting with importance, some of which seemed to have poppedout of his inflated little being and now protruded from an insidepocket in the form of some very legal-looking papers.

  Mr. Crawford, upon his feet, said bluntly: "If we've got business,Hapgood, we'd better be at it. Let's go into the office. Argyl, youwill excuse us? And you, Mr. Conniston?"

  He went out. Hapgood tarried a moment for a lingering look at Argyl."You will excuse us, Miss Argyl? I'll hurry through with this as fastas I can."

  "I say, Roger," Conniston called after him, "I want to congratulateyou. I'm immensely glad that you have gone to work." He turned to thegirl who was watching them with thoughtful eyes. "Miss Crawford, whatdo you say to a little stroll out on the front lawn while these men ofbusiness transact their weighty affairs? It's the most wonderful nightyou ever saw."