Sanders and the Dream Lady

by Roy Norton

 

SANDERS and the DREAM LADY

by Roy Norton

McCARTHY, superintendent of the Golconda, big, bluff, and burly, was unhappy. He stood at the station waiting for the belated train that was to bring with it the special car containing the wife and daughter of the president. McCarthy disliked the waste of time and the role of entertainer for women.

“Most of the women I have known have been a nuisance,” he said audibly, in his growing annoyance.

“Me, too, Mack,” piped up a small voice beside him.

McCarthy turned and swore. His oath was answered with such an emphatic string of profanity that it almost drowned the whistle of the incoming train.

The superintendent looked reprovingly at his companion, Sanders, the stage-driver. The latter, nearly four feet in height and thirteen years old, returned the gaze unblinkingly from a pair of wise-looking Irish-American eyes which belied his age, meanwhile wrinkling his freckles into a mass that served as a harmonious fresco below his red hair. Again he gave speech.

“Most women,” he said, “is like ore-wagons; take up too much room on the trail.”

The train groaned and creaked along the rails, and came to a whining, perspiring halt.

Sanders dove frantically through the crowd, swearing with earnestness as he went, and planted himself before the platform. Down the steps surged prospectors, miners, commercial travelers, and women, bumping each others’ legs with bales, bundles, and bags, and all in a hurry. But it was not Sanders’ day. There was none who knew him—and those who were attracted by his shrill voice crying “Stage-line to Horne,” paid small heed to his appeal, and trafficked with his rival. He dodged to and fro to avoid being trampled upon, and tried to gain a fare from that other stage-driver. The rival looked the part, thought Sanders enviously, as he gazed with animosity at the six feet of brawn surmounted by a slouch-hat, and listened to the voice which came with a hoarse bellow.

Sanders turned disconsolately toward his own stage, and in emulation of his elders of the wilder mining-camp up in the hills from which he came, again swore with proficiency.

“Here, you, Sanders,” hailed McCarthy’s voice from the diminishing crowd, “here are some passengers for you.”

The wise-looking little, old face brightened up hopefully, and he came forward unabashed, but colored with self-consciousness before the outburst of merriment of the most beautiful lady he had ever seen. He recalled instantly a story his father used to tell him before he went to rest back up there in the hills, and from then on she became to him the “Dream Lady.”

But it wouldn't do to blush, he thought furiously. He must play the part, because, after all, he was a real stage-driver. He braced his feet widely apart, assumed a hoarse voice, and in answer to her question, “Are you a stage-driver?” vociferated, “You bet your damn life I am.”

The Dream Lady laughed with such abandonment that the superintendent’s sharp reproof was unuttered.

McCarthy led the way to the stage, assisted the president’s wife and daughter to a seat, and then deposited his own huge bulk beside the driver’s cushion.

Sanders crawled up to his place, using the spokes of the wheel as a ladder, clutched the reins in his small hands, tripped the brake with much effort, and started his horses with a yelp. He reasoned over the intricacies of the situation, and decided that he had been jested with, humiliated, set upon, and ridiculed. It hurt because the Dream Lady was so beautiful and had such shining eyes.

It was too much, and as a big lump came suddenly into his throat, Sanders almost swallowed the ample chew of tobacco that distorted the contour of his face. Hitherto he had felt the pride of position. Why shouldn’t he joy in his independence? He had always made his own way and had been no mark for humor. Why, even when he wanted to go into the stage business after Old Patch, owing to too many stops at the road-house, had simultaneously lost his hold on the reins of horses and of life by falling from his seat, the miners had not treated him as a joke. With great gravity they had subscribed for the purchase of the outfit and had called him “Mister Sanders.” True, some of them had winked and grown red in the face when they put their names and their money down, but they had not laughed at him broadly as the Dream Lady did.

Sanders recalled that entry into stagedom with a warmth in his heart for McCarthy, who was so outspoken with all men and whom so many feared. The big man, he remembered, had read the list without a change of expression and had even taken the pains to test his ability, or, as the boy said, “tried him out.” Sanders well remembered that trial. The superintendent had hailed an ore-wagon with “Here, Jim; take this boy up there by you, let him take the ribbons and drive to the bottom of the hill. Watch him closely and tell me if you think he can handle ’em.”

Jim had grinned as he handed the boy the reins, and Sanders smiled exultantly as he remembered how he had gritted his teeth, throwing the big horses back into line with a jerk, and, because of his own shortness of leg, had ordered Jim to set the brakes. Oh, no—he hadn’t passed all his thirteen years around mining-camps and ore-teams and horses for nothing.

That was a triumph worth while when the big superintendent gravely recognized his drivership and subscribed more than all the others put together, saying as he did so: “A kid that has got that much nerve isn’t a kid; he’s a man, and shall have a man’s chance.”

That wasn’t all that McCarthy had done. He had stopped the miners from laughing at him openly, and had always thrown all the patronage to Sanders’ line that he could. McCarthy had a fine scorn for appearances, and invariably climbed up and took a place by the boy’s side on the front seat, from which post of vantage he smoked and watched the handling of the horses. Once, when Sanders had gone to sleep on the way up the long grade, because he had been up all night when the baby brother died and joined father, McCarthy, who happened to be a passenger that day, had put his arm around him and had driven through before the boy knew it. McCarthy never laughed at him, and McCarthy was a big man. A real superintendent who worked many men and who was a king up there where all those men worked. McCarthy was a trump.

But the Dream Lady, in the seat behind him, had laughed. Sanders felt that he hated her, but with it all there was a wistfulness and a wish that she would not laugh at him again, because it hurt. There was something so like music in it that it made Sanders wish she would take him in her arms.

The stage-driver’s mind went rambling away to the stories he had read in the ten-cent books he had secured from the miners, where the heroine was always a beautiful young lady who always fell in love with the hero, who, if not a stage-driver, was a brave young detective. They always married, and, as far as he could recollect, lived happily ever after. Sanders wasn’t quite sure that he wanted to marry the Dream Lady and live happily ever after, but he was quite positive that if she would give him a chance he would love her—would love her very much indeed.

Why didn’t Mack McCarthy, who was so big and so strong, and who had such dark eyes and whose black hair was fringed with gray, marry the young lady? He would ask him. He did.

McCarthy’s pipe almost dropped from his mouth in astonishment, and his only reply was “Huh!” Then he smoked again, and somehow Sanders felt rebuffed.

It really seemed like a very short drive that day, and when the stage rolled up to the front of the superintendent’s office, which had been prepared as a temporary home for the visitors, Sanders was quite surprised at the speed they had made.

The Dream Lady relented as she alighted, and showed appreciation by smiling at him and saying: “Why, you are a real stage-driver, after all, aren’t you!” Sanders felt his bosom swell with gratified pride, but to play the part well felt compelled to gaze at her nonchalantly, take a fresh chew of tobacco, and make no reply.

The days changed for Sanders. There was no longer a weariness in the drag up-hill from the American to the Golconda. This was because of the Dream Lady. Really, if he could only talk to her when he went there and saw her, it would be different; but speech left him with abruptness in her presence, and he felt that all he could do to preserve his dignity was to refrain from grinning broadly, even though he could not answer her questions. His warmth toward the big man increased, because he alone understood. He was a real friend.

There was something odd about it all, he pondered. McCarthy took more pains than he used to, because he shaved every day, and had a new hat that he wore when not going through the mine. The Dream Lady, too, showed signs of the summer’s progression. She looked at the superintendent differently, and there was something in the look that led Sanders to know that she saw in this white-hatted, silent man a master of men and things. Ah! he could love her for that.

The Dream Lady didn’t seem to be as happy as she had been, and there was trouble between her and her mother. The boy wondered at that, and spent his idle time in vain speculations. True, he had heard but little, but it was a certainty that the Dream Lady and her mother were not on good terms. So he hated the mother.

Worst of all, McCarthy somehow seemed to feel the change, and Sanders’ heart ached for him with a dull, sympathetic hurt which required constant repression. Of course he couldn't talk to the man—that would never be understood; besides, there wasn’t the same camaraderie that there had been, because the man was quieter, if possible, than he used to be, and he spent more time working underground, as if avoiding something. The boy felt aggrieved. The Dream Lady was very fine, but there was no one too good to be friends with McCarthy, and she must have said something to have changed him so.

Another sore spot was that “Big Stiff” of a yard-boy up at the Golconda, whom Sanders hated because he had winked one day when the superintendent and the Dream Lady were talking together in front of the big shaft-house. Sanders waited his chance, all his turbid blood aflame with a desire for retaliation, not for an offense against his own person, but against his hero.

There came a day, as the summer waned, when his chance was upon him, and being one of action he seized it. There was none in sight, as the stage came to a halt near the blacksmith-shop, save the “Big Stiff.” Sanders crawled deliberately down from his perch, took off his much-patched coat, laid his hat on top of it, and before the “Big Stiff” was aware of forthcoming trouble, lashed into him wildly with both fists. This was his day, he thought jubilantly, so he fought grimly, using teeth, feet, and hands with equal effect, and heeding not his adversary’s shrieks and lamentations.

Oh! it ended ignominiously for Sanders! Before he was really at the acme of his work, McCarthy came up from behind, seized both belligerents by the slack of their clothing, tore them apart, and held them in the air exactly as he would a pair of puppies. Sanders continued with set teeth and blazing eyes to kick and strike wildly, although held high in the air. The “Big Stiff” wailed with much anguish, and in loud tones protested his innocence.

“Sanders, you little devil,” the superintendent said, “you are a fighting little brat, I have heard, but it won't go here. When you come to this mine you come peaceably, or you will have to”—and then, observing the hurt look in Sanders’ eyes, his own softened, and he concluded lamely—“have to fight me.”

Of course it wouldn’t do to tell the cause of the enmity against the yard-boy—that would have been squealing; but the martyr game was a hard one, and Sanders sympathized with himself for many days. But there was worse yet. Sanders’ mother heard of the fight when she came to the mine to get the mending. McCarthy was as great a hero to her as to her son. It was this dark-eyed, quiet man who had made life so much easier for her after her husband’s death and had put the boy “in the sthage biziniss like a rale casthle Oirishmon in the ould counthry. No jantin-ca-ar, but a rale hack, to be shure!”

That night Sanders had another battle, and when it ended his mother cried while he stood sullenly by, feeling that had he not been ashamed to fight with her, she could lay no claim to physical superiority.

The tamaracks changed color and the grass on the open spaces grew gray with age. The stream was a small river now and the grouse in the hills changed plumage. The big peaks put on winter caps of whiteness and the mornings were cold. Another summer was dead.

So, with the flight of warmth, the stage-driver came to the mine one morning and found the Dream Lady and her mother waiting for the down stage.

McCarthy was trying to look unconcerned, but his eyes were very deep and lonely. The Dream Lady had a veil over her face, and no longer laughed as gaily as when she came to the hills for the summer. Only her mother talked—talked volubly and sharply and unceasingly as Sanders took them aboard.

The superintendent stood awkwardly by the wheel. “Some day we shall meet again,” Sanders heard him say. The Dream Lady turned away without a word and looked toward the mountain-tops as though bidding them farewell.

The man did something very unusual that day, something unprecedented. He walked all the way around the team, tightening up a strap or testing a buckle here and there. Then, when the others were busy adjusting their belongings in the narrow space, he said: “Sanders, my boy, drive very carefully down the Turn Again grade. It’s a bad place. Be a game little cuss, and hold the reins tight. Always remember to be careful there.” Sanders wondered at the admonition as the horses swung out and down the hill.

The Dream Lady’s mother became a dragon in the stage-driver’s air-castle, perhaps because above the clanking of the vehicle and the clicking of the shod heels her voice arose in scolding tones at regular intervals.

Once the Dream Lady rebelled, and said: “Oh, mother, please stop. I am old enough to understand.” Then there was silence.

The horses felt the coolness of the morning, and were mettlesome. Their hoofs rang spitefully on the frost- hardened roads, and they tugged at the bits until Sanders’ tough little arms ached with the persistent pull. They surged against the lines or jumped, as if frightened, away from familiar objects. The driver’s legs straightened out like small pillars, to the brake that had been made long enough for his foot to reach; but to-day it didn’t seem to hold well.

A weed blew airily across the road, and the off-horse shied—shied so violently that Sanders swore under his breath and gave a quick jerk. The horse felt that Sanders was nervous. Up the short rise they went, and then swung over the brow and down on the crooked reach of Turn Again grade, while far below them, and alongside, the river whipped its foamy way over the boulders.

“What the devil ails you?” yelled Sanders, as the off-horse suddenly broke into a run. Sanders’ foot struck out madly for a greater purchase on the brake, a defective bolt snapped somewhere, and he nearly fell from his seat. The team wildly plunged forward.

Sanders couldn’t remember all that happened when he thought it over afterward, because it took so long. There came to him vaguely the screams of the Dream Lady’s mother, regrets that if he had to have a runaway it should come on this, of all days, and all the time there was the battle with the horses. The wayside was no longer familiar. It was a mere panorama of looming gray rocks that rose up suddenly and swept past in a blur. The road was a living, twisting thing, that tried all the time to evade him; and before him, with outstretched heads and sinewy bodies straining for ever greater reaches, were two terribly insane animals, bent on destruction.

Down the deadly hill, lurching, swaying from side to side, or violently jumping over boulders, they went, but Sanders sat firm, with his browned hands twisted desperately into the lines. In his ears rang again and again the words: “Be a game little cuss, and hold the reins tight.”

At the top of his shrill voice he called to the horses, trying vainly to check them—called them by name, cursed, appealed, or commanded, and all with no effect. Through him there ran the realization that there was but one chance to save the Dream Lady, and that was to keep his way in the road, at least until the frightful grade of “Turn Again” stretched smoothly out over the shallows of the lowland, away from the river and from the high bank. And in this time of stress his unselfish little heart recked not of the harm or death that might be his own lot, but dwelt on the hurt that might come to the girl, or on the sorrow that would fall upon the superintendent’s head. He thought of his mother, and, what would happen to her if he failed to survive, and of the end of all his glorious career. And the drumming of the hoofs whipped ever faster and faster as the pace increased.

Up from below, with bells tinkling on the leaders, and driven by one who carelessly whistled, came an ore-wagon. The whistle stopped abruptly, and the driver was startled into action, but too late. Sanders had seen the danger, and made instant choice. It was that his own viciously running horses must be swung up into the bluff to avoid being hurled into the river below. He reached far out, and caught a tenacious twist in the line nearest the bank, gritted his teeth, and with a sudden jerk threw his entire weight back in one mad fling. The rapidity of previous panoramas was outdone. Many things happened at once. There was a sharp crash, which reverberated back into the hills, the splintering of wood, and a confusion of struggling horses. Sanders felt himself hurled high into the air, heard the whistle of the wind shrilling in his ears, accompanied by the groans and screams of the maimed animals. He had a vision of wildly striking, kicking hoofs, into which he plunged as though shot from a catapult, and then it grew dark, very dark.

 

Sanders thought something smelled bad—just as the hospital did that time when father was taken there. He tried to raise his arm, but there was some big wooden thing on it, and it hurt. He rested a while, trying to remember what had happened.

Then he decided to open his eyes, but one was blind, because there was a cloth wrapped around his head. Finally he looked out with the other one with much effort, and discovered, to his amazement, that he was in the superintendent’s office; only it didn’t look natural—there were so many bottles and things around on tables.

Well, it wasn’t worth while thinking and puzzling about it, so he would take another short sleep. The Dream Lady came to him vaguely at intervals, and there were many whisperings.

Sanders tried to sit up, but a cool hand restrained him. “Not yet, dear boy,” said the Dream Lady, and then his mind became active, and he wanted to know where the stage was.

“You are through with the stage, my little driver,” said the Dream Lady. “As soon as I can take you, you are going home with us, away back into the East, where there are no stages, but only schools and other little boys to play with. Where you will not have to work, but just become a man. You are going with me.”

“Not by a damn sight,” said Sanders, relapsing into his old-time emphasis. “I’ve got to stick with Mack. I ain't goin’ to leave him. I’m goin’——” and then before Sanders’ voice could become a mere broken wail, he heard another and a deeper voice as it came to the bedside. It was on the side where the obnoxious bandage was, and somehow he couldn’t turn his head to see; but with the other eye he saw a man’s hand reach out across him and grasp the hand of the Dream Lady, saw a smile of tenderness break over her face, and saw her blush as the big voice went on: “Sanders, you are going East, but it won’t be long until I am there to see you, and maybe some time we will all come back out here together.”

Sanders smiled, but, desiring the full approbation of the big man, murmured: “I done my best, Mack, but they runned away. And I held on like a game little cuss. You know I did, don’t you?”

And the big voice had a note of laughter in it as it rumbled: “Yes, you did, little partner.”