The Somerset reporter., 1902-07-03
BY IZOLA FORESTER
Copyright. 1901. by lola Forrester

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
1t was in July when Jack Coggins
came up the valley. There had been
no rem for a month, and the stage
driver said there was trouble all along
the line from Failing Deer.
There's a man on the front seat"
Jerry Holmes said when the white
covered wagon came slowly up Main
street. Main street was broad and
dusty, and Tom Holmes yellow dog
was sprawled out full length in its
center.
There's something else, too" added
Mrs. Holmes, shading her eyes with
her apron, "tumbled over in his lap"
The wagon drew up five minutes
later beside the yellow dog.
Got any water?" called the stranger
"We've come out from Nebraska"
He lifted the tumbed something ten
derby in his long, thin arms. A little
pink sunbonnet fell In the dust of the
road, and Toms yellow dog strolled
over and smelled of 1t interestedly.
Land, it's a baby girlw cried Mrs.
Holmes, stretching out her arms hun
grily.
Coggins lifted his head from the
water pail Tom had brought He had
drunk In deep drafts, like horse.
II had to leave her mother down
yonder," he replied as he bent over the
tangle Of moist light curls that lay
back YEARLY on his shoulder.
"There was another one, too-boy,
little bit of a skinny fellow, bout two
months old. Shed never been just well
since he came, but we thought maybe
the trip would do her good. So we sold
out and came up from West Chipco,
and there wasn't any water, and the
baby got SICK
He stopped and looked off over the
way he had driven.
Then what?" asked Tom bluntly,
staring up at the stranger with the
frank curiosity of ten years.
'Then one night they both died." re-
turned Coggins gently, down there
near the river, bout thirty miles or so.
been for this one." He twisted q
loose curl around his finger thought
fully. Names Sue" he added.
Mothers name too"
So Sue came to Rainbow Valley, and
she and her pink sunbonnet were loved
more than Tom and his yellow dog.
In ten years the boom struck the val
~, Io
and they call him the copper king in
New York now. By the time the full
news of the discovery reached the
country he owned every acre of the
claim and was buying town lots on
Main street. From end to end the val
ley filled, and fortunes were easy. A
hotel rose where Holmes general store
had stood and there came also a rail
road and theater and three churches
and a public fountain with red gerani-
UNI beds around it, splashed in the
center of Main street where Toms
yellow dog had sprawled.
But the little Coggins shack on the
side of Big Eagle remained the same,
and from end to end of the town Sue
and her pink sunbonnet were known
and loved. 1t was a larger sunbonnet
now and pinker one, and the face be-
meath was rosy and round checked and
dimpled, but there were the same loose
blond curls and the brown eyes that
had belonged to the tired baby girl who
had come up from Nebraska long ago,
Coggins was quiet and nonprogress-
i've as ever When the electric car
was put on between the mines and the
foot of Main street, he went to Holmes,
got the running of 1t and was content
ed.
Every day when the motor car made
its noon trip a dot of bright pink
flashed out at one window. There was
q little stool which stood beside the
controller box, and there Sue would
perch, watching Coggins as he worked
the lever with steady hand while he
whistled "Dixie Land" and all the
way from the mines to the depot the
men would raise their heads to watch
for the flash of pink, and they called
her Sunbonnet Sue.
The big strike came in the fall of
1899 When 800 workers faced old
Holmes with the demands of distant
ring of labor agitators, he laughed and
told them they had quit for good, so
far as he was concerned. That was
after they had tried to fire the mines
and had burned the freight sheds along
the track. When the rumor spread lat
er that a gang of Swedes and Poles
had been wired for from the east, the
old crowd started for the mines to find
Holmes.
When the long line of men passed
out of town, Sue stood watching the
dark masses fade away into the pur-
pie hill distances. Over in a cane seat
ed chair. tipped back lazily against the
kitchen wall, sat Cogglns, smoking.
"They won't hurt any one, will they,
fatherY Sue asked anxiously.
isn't any one there for them to hurt, ="
replied Jack contentedly. 81 guess they
haven't any dynamite anyway. They'll
Just walk around and talk"
Sue turned from him thoughtfully.
The faces of the men had looked as
though they intended doing more than
walking around and talking. All at
once shadow fell in front of the
kitchen door 1t was Mrs. Holmes
4. u 4 81.