Rocky Ford enterprise., 1913-06-06


to the bar opened and men pressed
into the aperture. Mrs. Perley came
up from the kitchen, wiping a dish.
Cora appeared in the dining-room
doorway, and in answer to Miss Can
mons inquiringly-lifted eyebrows,
called across the hall:
Its the Murphysville stage on the
down-trip to Rocky Bar. l guess they
thought they couldn't make it. The
driver don't like to run no risks and
so he's brought 'em round this way
and dumped 'em here. There ain't
but two passengers. That's them.
She indicated the two men who.
standing by the hall stove, were d.
vesting themselves of their wraps.
One of them was a tall upright old
man with a sweep Of griZzled beard
covering his chest, and gray hair fall
ing from the dome of bald head.
The other was much younger. tall
also, and spare to leanness. He wore
gray fedora hat, and against it's
chill, unbecoming tint, his face, its
prominent, bony surface nipped by
the cold to raw redness, looked sal
low and unhealthy. With an air Of
solicitude he laid his overcoat across
a chair, brushing off the snow with a
careful hand. Buttoned tight in q
black cutaway with the collar turned
up about his neck, he had an appear
ance of being uncomfortably COM
pressed into garments too small for
him. His shiny-knuckled, purplish
hands, pinching up the shoulders OF
his coat over the chair back. were in
keeping with his general suggestion
of a large-boned meagerly covered
lankness. The fact that he was
smooth-shaven, combined with the un-
usual length of dark hair that ap-
peared below his hat-brim. lent him
suggestion of something interest
ingly unconventional, almost artistic.
In the region where be now found
himself he would have been variously
| set down as gambler, travelling
clergyman, an actor, or perhaps only
n vender of patent medicines who had
some odd attractive way of advertis-
ing himself, such as drawing teeth
with an electrical appliance, or play
ing the guitar from the tailboard OF
his showman's cart.
Now, having arranged his coat to
its best advantage. he turned to Per-
ley and said with a curiously deep
and resonant voice:
And, mine host, stove in my
bedroom. stove in my bedroom or
perish"
Cora giggled and threw across the
hall to Miss Cannon a delighted mur-
mur of:
"oh, say. amt he Just the richest
thing?"
you've got us trapped and Gagged
here for spell. 1 guess" said the
older man. ANY one else IN the
same box?"
"Oh, you'll not want for compan!
said Perley. pride at the Importance
of the announcement vibrating in his
tone. We've got Willoughby here
from the Bella X. with his four set
ter dogs. and Bill Cannon and his
daughter up from the coast"
bill Cannon!"-the two men stared
and the younger one said:
bill Cannon, the Bonanza King
from San Francisco?"
That's him all right" nodded Per-
ley. up here to see the diggings at
Greenhide and showed in same as
you"
Here Rose, fearing the conversa-
tion might turn upon herself. slipped
from the doorway into the passage
and up the stairs to her own room.
An hour later as she stood before
the glass making her toilet for sup
per, knock at the door ushered In
Cora. already curled, powdered and
beribboned for that occasion, a small
EarOcana In
bare room, its gloom only partly
dispelled by the light from a similar
lamp on the bureau and the red
CLEAN from the stove. Miss Cannon
was revealed in the becoming half
dusk made by these imperfectly-
blending illuminations, a pink silk
! dressing-gown loosely enfolding her,
lightly brushed-in suggestion of fair
hair behind her ears and on her
shoulders. Her comb was in her hand
and Cora realized with an uplifting \
thrill that she had timed her visit
correctly and was about to learn the,
mysteries of Miss Cannon's coiffure.
Il brung you another lamp" she
said affably. setting her offering down
on the bureau. "One amt eriodgh
light to dress decently by. have
three" and she sank down on the side
of the bed with the air of having
established an intimacy. woman to
woman. by this act of generous con.
sideration.
Them gentlemen" she continued,
ARE along on this hall with you and
your pa. The old ones Judge Wash
burne, of Colusa, pioneer that used
to know Mr.. Perley's mother way
back in Sacramento In the fifties, and
knew your pa real well when he was