The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1920-07-24
CHAPTER VII.
The Mud Hen.

The Mud Hen.
The Boss stood in the cabin door
smoking. Once he glanced around at
his companion glazing out through
the trees upon the slope, He dimly
sensed the cause that narrowed his
eyes; frightened his lips; but ventured
no word asked no questions. Among
the river men a mans past is his
own.
The Boss stepped back from the
door.
'"The Blue Moon" he said. Hit orta
be putt away SAFE
AS if the statement recalled
thoughts that had strayed far the
young man reached in his pocket and
drew forth the pearl. still rolled in the
bit of white cloth, and laid it in the
others hand.
The two days of ripening and the
chafe of the cloth had greatly en-
HANGED it's brilliance. The eyes of the
Boss were drawn to it as the needle
to the pole. To the quest Of such
pearl he had given the active years of
a lifetime-years that had craven his
face, that had slowed his step. He
stood stirring it about in the cloth
and muttering over it as a mother to
child-the child of his dreams; wife
and child and cheerful hearth. The
lure of it . hnd cost him that-that;
and more. And now the years had
come upon him--the years that cheat
ed him-had crept up behind him to
twit him with his bargain. Among
river men there is a saying that if.
man hasn't found his pearl at forty,
he'll never find. And he was fifty.
The sudden realization of the fact
brought a,-queer sort of emptiness to
his heart.
There lay the pearl in his hand
the pearl-at last! Only a life stood
betweeni What of it! He had al
ready given his life for it-or such as
it.. A flame came alive in his breast;
mounted to his face and drove off the
frankQess. A heat kindled in his
eyes, unit lthey shone like the glare
Of freight upon copper.
Clutching up the pearl in his hand,
with bound he sprang to where his
shotgun stood by the door, snatched
it up and stood glowering toward his
companion, his breath short and
quick, his eyes fixed1a man start1-
ingly transformed, sudden overcome
by the strange mania known among
river men as "gem lust!"
The Pearlhunter whirled. For the
instant he thought the Boss joking,
but one glance into the flaming face
and he knew better. The lust of the
freebooter was on him. Men think
fast at a time like that-if they think
a tall. Generally the act comes first
and the thinking afterward. The
Pearlhunter stood still, subconscious-
ly calculated the distance between
him and the two black holes of the
shotgun muzzle, and watched for the
slightest move of the Boss's hands.
A tense half minute followed, when
the Boss dropped the gun and%set it
back against the wall. Like a man
half dazed he rasped his hand across
the wiry stubble of his lace; threw up
his head and laughed. The Pearlhun-
ter was actually startled at that laugh
"a groan would have been more
heartening. But mirthful or not, it
to relieve the tension to
which the old river man was strung,
to vent the unholy flame that had
well-nigh swept him away.
well, I'll be damned! Wusnt that
a devil Of fix for man t git in!
He'll! Here, take it; an don't let me
ever clap eyes on it ag'in."
The Pearlhunter suffered him to
stuff the jewel back in to his palm.
at the shaking fingers
something no man had ever seen the