CHAPTER XTHE MAN FROM SEATTLE“Someone is coming,” announced Grace, when, half an hour later, her keen ears detected a sound, faint, though unmistakable. She was the only one of the party to hear it at that instant, though a moment later the guide nodded.The Overlanders saw him hitch his revolver holster into convenient position as he stood up and leaned easily against a tree.“As I was saying,” he began. “Sometimes it rains and sometimes it snows, and—”“Hands up!” rang out a sudden command. “Put ’em up till I look you over.”Stacy Brown was the only one of the party that obeyed the command. The Overlanders were too much interested in the newcomer to obey the command, for he was fantastically clad. The fellow was holding two revolvers which he kept moving from side to side, his keen eyes regarding the party appraisingly as well as alertly. It was his clothing that attracted most attention, for the man was dressed like a Mexican rancher, with the velvet jacket, embroidered with silver, the broad sombrero, likewise embellished with silver, and the faint metallic tinkle of silver spurs was heard as he shifted his position.The keen expression in his eyes changed to a twinkle.“Well, well, who would have thought it!” he exclaimed. “A bunch of foozleheads.”“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Stacy Brown. “Foozleheads! That is a brand new one. Emma, he is looking at you.”The newcomer lowered his weapons and shoved them into their holsters.“Well, who are you?” demanded Ham White. “You appear to be a new specimen up here.”“Who, me? Haven’t you heard of me? I’m Jim Haley, sole representative of the International Peanut Company in the State of Washington. I’m known as the Man from Seattle, and I’ll have peanuts in every home, in every bandit cave in the great preserves of the State, and all over the rugged peaks of the Cascades if I hold out long enough. Peanuts are a great civilizer; they are the oil on troubled waters, and if the wild men up here were to eat enough of them I’ll guarantee that they never would hold up another unfortunate traveler.”“Bandits?” questioned the guide, regarding the visitor narrowly.“Yes. They’ve held me up twice in twenty-four hours, and the last time they took my horse away.”“It strikes me that you are quite handy with hold-up methods yourself,” observed Hippy Wingate.“Peanuts? Peanuts?” demanded Stacy eagerly. “Got any with you?”“It will be my everlasting regret that I have not. You see I ate up most of my samples, then the bandits took the rest of them. This is a rotten country. I had to get food, and when I smelled your smoke I took a chance, not knowing whether or not I was running into another bunch of bandits, and here I am, safe and sound. Luck is with the Man from Seattle, the greatest peanut salesman in the world. I’ll have a cup of coffee, if you please, and anything else that’s lying around loose, then I shall be delighted to take your orders for peanuts to be delivered at your homes, freight paid, and an extra bag gratis for good luck.”“Why, certainly, you shall have something to eat,” promised Grace. “Girls, help me rustle some grub for our caller. Were you lost?”“Lost? Why, I’ve never found myself since I came into the forest. How could a man, who never has known where he was at, be lost? Been held up by these mountain ruffians yet?”The Overlanders shook their heads.“They are so sudden. Why, they wouldn’t even give me an opportunity to demonstrate—”“Demonstrate!” cried Emma with sudden interest. “Do you demonstrate, Mr. Hart—”“Haley, if you please,” interjected the newcomer.“Really, do you, Mr. Haley?”“Of course I do.”“Isn’t that perfectly lovely! You see, girls, I am not the only one that demonstrates to ward off trouble. Just think, think hard, that something you desire very much, will be, and it will be.”The Man from Seattle looked puzzled for a moment, then he laughed heartily.“Demonstrate a bag of peanuts for me, then,” spoke up Stacy Brown.“That’s it, young man—it’s peanuts that I demonstrate. I’ll see that you get a fair sample when I get back to Seattle,” promised Haley.“Oh, fudge! Everything is food with you, Stacy Brown. Why can’t you be less gross, and more spiritual?” complained Emma.“I presume it is the company I keep, and—”“Your supper is ready, Mr. Haley,” called Grace.The peanut man did full justice to the meal prepared for him, and, while he ate, the Overlanders plied him with questions. Ham White sat back and regarded their guest with interest. White was keen, and little escaped his alert eyes.“That fellow is bluffing!” was his mental comment. “I wonder what his game is.”“Now that you have no horse, what are you going to do?” asked Hippy.“Sell peanuts! I’ll take your orders now.”The peanut man did, and when he had finished, each member of the party had given him an order for a bag of peanuts, Stacy being the only one whose order was a gift. From then on until bedtime the visitor rattled on, keeping the party convulsed with laughter. In the conversations that followed the evening’s entertainment, Jim Haley succeeded in drawing from them the story of their experiences in the brief time that they had been out, and discovered that he was not talking with greenhorns.Mr. Haley was particularly interested in Miss Briggs’ experiences with the bandits at the ranger cabin, and questioned her in detail as to the appearances of the riders.“Probably the same fellows that held me up,” he observed, stroking his chin. “You say the old prospector had something that they wanted to get possession of?” he asked, turning to Elfreda.She answered with a slight incline of the head.“What was it?” The question was direct and incisively put.“Being a lawyer, and having my client’s interests at heart, I decline to permit her to answer,” returned Elfreda, which brought a hearty laugh from the party, Jim Haley laughing more loudly than any of the others.Hamilton White’s face hardened ever so little.“Your questions are rather personal, and I must ask you to be more discreet,” he rebuked.“A thousand pardons!” bowed the visitor. “For this indiscretion, I shall include some handsome oil paintings, which we give only to big jobbers with large orders for International Peanuts Products, when I fill the orders you have been so magnanimous as to favor me with.”“That’s a mighty indigestible word, that magnanimous thing. Don’t put anything like that in the shipment with my peanuts,” declared Stacy.“You don’t mean to say you don’t know the meaning of that word?” exclaimed Nora.“Can’t say that I do,” answered Stacy carelessly. “What does it mean, Emma?”“Your education has been neglected. Any schoolboy ought to know the meaning of a word so common as that,” returned Emma airily.“All right, you tell us. I’ll swallow whatever you say—once!”“Why, magnanimous means—it means—it means—Pshaw, I know what it means perfectly well, but somehow I can’t properly explain it.” Emma’s face was growing red. “Oh, Hamilton, you tell my ignorant companion what—”“Ha, ha, ha!” chortled the fat boy. “You tell him, Hamilton.”Grace and Elfreda were laughing immoderately, and Hippy was chuckling to himself. All knew that Miss Dean knew the meaning of the word, but that Stacy, with his question, had confused her.“I believe the dictionary explains it as being elevated in soul,” answered the guide smilingly.“Oh, Hamilton, isn’t that wonderful?” breathed Emma. “It sounds so utterly poetic.”“You wouldn’t think so were you to swallow it with a bag of peanuts,” grumbled the fat boy.And after the laughter had subsided, Grace announced that she was tired and said she would turn in.“Do we make an early start in the morning, Mr. White?” she asked, turning smilingly towards the guide.“Yes, if that is agreeable to you, Mrs. Gray,” was the courteous reply. The easy grace of this man, and the evident culture that was beneath the surface, had puzzled Grace Harlowe from the beginning. There was that about him that was mysterious, unfathomable. These thoughts were in the Overland girl’s mind as she turned towards the little tent which she and Elfreda occupied together.“By the way, Mr. Haley,” she added, halting at the tent opening, “Mr. White will fix you up for the night with a blanket. If you will bunk in with Lieutenant Wingate, there is room. Mr. White prefers to sleep in the open.”“So do I. In the vast open, with the ambient atmosphere enveloping me like a blanket, I can ponder over the psychology of merchandising peanuts better than when I am shut in. All nature assists, the saplings sap and seep into my brain, into my subconscious being, and the leaves leave their native habitat to come to my aid, and—”“One can’t blame them so much for that,” observed Emma. “Good-night, Mr. Haley; good-night, Hamilton; good-night, all.”“Either that man is a lunatic or else he is a big fraud,” declared Elfreda, entering the tent. “Which is it?”“Just another mystery, that is all,” answered Grace good-naturedly. “Why worry about him?”“I don’t. I have sufficient troubles of my own to keep me from sleeping soundly.”By this time the others were turning in; the visitor had already rolled himself up in a blanket with feet to the fire, and Ham White was out seeing that the ponies were secure for the night. He remained out there for a long time, looking up at the tree tops, dimly discernible in the faint light. At the same time he appeared to be listening, now and then glancing back at the silent figure of Jim Haley.At last the guide turned and strode back into camp, and threw his blanket down beside Haley. But White did not lie down at once. Instead, he crouched down beside the visitor and peered down into the man’s face. A pair of twinkling eyes were gazing up at him.“You are awake, eh? I rather thought you would be. Now who are you, and what is your game? Out with it or out you go!”“Who am I? I am G 16, and I want to talk with you!” Haley’s voice sank to a whisper as he made the mysterious announcement.Ham White uttered an exclamation, then, quickly collecting himself, he lay down on his blanket close to the peanut salesman, and for the next half hour the two men spoke in earnest tones, tones too low for the Overlanders to hear.It was long after midnight, when, had one been awake, he might have discovered a shadowy figure slinking along at the rear of the camp. It first paused at the tent occupied by Hippy and Stacy, then crept on all fours to the one in which Grace and Elfreda were sleeping. These little tents were open at both ends, though they could be closed in the event of a storm, and a person at either end, by peering closely, could see the heads and faces of the occupants.Inch by inch the shadow, now flat on the ground, wriggled towards the two sleeping girls. A lean hand reached cautiously under, first Grace’s pillow, then under Elfreda’s. The pillows were pneumatic pillows that were filled with air before retiring, and were soft and comfortable, as well as sensitive to the touch.The pressure of the shadow’s hand under the pillow disturbed Elfreda Briggs, and her eyes slowly opened, but she did not move, believing that the hand belonged to her companion. A sidelong glance, however, told her that Grace’s back was towards her, therefore the hand could not belong to her. Elfreda’s next thought was that Stacy Brown was trying to play pranks on her.In the meantime the hand crept slowly about under the pillow. It was time to act, and Miss Briggs, half raising herself on one elbow, made a grab for it. She grasped a bare muscular arm.“Overland!” cried the girl, and the familiar thrilling call of distress awakened every person in the camp with the exception of Stacy Brown. Then darkness overwhelmed Elfreda and she knew no more.Grace, awakened by the cry, threw her arms about the neck of her companion.“Elfreda! Elfreda! What is it?”There was no reply.“Overland! Quick! Something has happened to Elfreda!” she cried, springing from her blanket, as the quick, sharp report of a revolver smote the ears of the campers.
“Someone is coming,” announced Grace, when, half an hour later, her keen ears detected a sound, faint, though unmistakable. She was the only one of the party to hear it at that instant, though a moment later the guide nodded.
The Overlanders saw him hitch his revolver holster into convenient position as he stood up and leaned easily against a tree.
“As I was saying,” he began. “Sometimes it rains and sometimes it snows, and—”
“Hands up!” rang out a sudden command. “Put ’em up till I look you over.”
Stacy Brown was the only one of the party that obeyed the command. The Overlanders were too much interested in the newcomer to obey the command, for he was fantastically clad. The fellow was holding two revolvers which he kept moving from side to side, his keen eyes regarding the party appraisingly as well as alertly. It was his clothing that attracted most attention, for the man was dressed like a Mexican rancher, with the velvet jacket, embroidered with silver, the broad sombrero, likewise embellished with silver, and the faint metallic tinkle of silver spurs was heard as he shifted his position.
The keen expression in his eyes changed to a twinkle.
“Well, well, who would have thought it!” he exclaimed. “A bunch of foozleheads.”
“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Stacy Brown. “Foozleheads! That is a brand new one. Emma, he is looking at you.”
The newcomer lowered his weapons and shoved them into their holsters.
“Well, who are you?” demanded Ham White. “You appear to be a new specimen up here.”
“Who, me? Haven’t you heard of me? I’m Jim Haley, sole representative of the International Peanut Company in the State of Washington. I’m known as the Man from Seattle, and I’ll have peanuts in every home, in every bandit cave in the great preserves of the State, and all over the rugged peaks of the Cascades if I hold out long enough. Peanuts are a great civilizer; they are the oil on troubled waters, and if the wild men up here were to eat enough of them I’ll guarantee that they never would hold up another unfortunate traveler.”
“Bandits?” questioned the guide, regarding the visitor narrowly.
“Yes. They’ve held me up twice in twenty-four hours, and the last time they took my horse away.”
“It strikes me that you are quite handy with hold-up methods yourself,” observed Hippy Wingate.
“Peanuts? Peanuts?” demanded Stacy eagerly. “Got any with you?”
“It will be my everlasting regret that I have not. You see I ate up most of my samples, then the bandits took the rest of them. This is a rotten country. I had to get food, and when I smelled your smoke I took a chance, not knowing whether or not I was running into another bunch of bandits, and here I am, safe and sound. Luck is with the Man from Seattle, the greatest peanut salesman in the world. I’ll have a cup of coffee, if you please, and anything else that’s lying around loose, then I shall be delighted to take your orders for peanuts to be delivered at your homes, freight paid, and an extra bag gratis for good luck.”
“Why, certainly, you shall have something to eat,” promised Grace. “Girls, help me rustle some grub for our caller. Were you lost?”
“Lost? Why, I’ve never found myself since I came into the forest. How could a man, who never has known where he was at, be lost? Been held up by these mountain ruffians yet?”
The Overlanders shook their heads.
“They are so sudden. Why, they wouldn’t even give me an opportunity to demonstrate—”
“Demonstrate!” cried Emma with sudden interest. “Do you demonstrate, Mr. Hart—”
“Haley, if you please,” interjected the newcomer.
“Really, do you, Mr. Haley?”
“Of course I do.”
“Isn’t that perfectly lovely! You see, girls, I am not the only one that demonstrates to ward off trouble. Just think, think hard, that something you desire very much, will be, and it will be.”
The Man from Seattle looked puzzled for a moment, then he laughed heartily.
“Demonstrate a bag of peanuts for me, then,” spoke up Stacy Brown.
“That’s it, young man—it’s peanuts that I demonstrate. I’ll see that you get a fair sample when I get back to Seattle,” promised Haley.
“Oh, fudge! Everything is food with you, Stacy Brown. Why can’t you be less gross, and more spiritual?” complained Emma.
“I presume it is the company I keep, and—”
“Your supper is ready, Mr. Haley,” called Grace.
The peanut man did full justice to the meal prepared for him, and, while he ate, the Overlanders plied him with questions. Ham White sat back and regarded their guest with interest. White was keen, and little escaped his alert eyes.
“That fellow is bluffing!” was his mental comment. “I wonder what his game is.”
“Now that you have no horse, what are you going to do?” asked Hippy.
“Sell peanuts! I’ll take your orders now.”
The peanut man did, and when he had finished, each member of the party had given him an order for a bag of peanuts, Stacy being the only one whose order was a gift. From then on until bedtime the visitor rattled on, keeping the party convulsed with laughter. In the conversations that followed the evening’s entertainment, Jim Haley succeeded in drawing from them the story of their experiences in the brief time that they had been out, and discovered that he was not talking with greenhorns.
Mr. Haley was particularly interested in Miss Briggs’ experiences with the bandits at the ranger cabin, and questioned her in detail as to the appearances of the riders.
“Probably the same fellows that held me up,” he observed, stroking his chin. “You say the old prospector had something that they wanted to get possession of?” he asked, turning to Elfreda.
She answered with a slight incline of the head.
“What was it?” The question was direct and incisively put.
“Being a lawyer, and having my client’s interests at heart, I decline to permit her to answer,” returned Elfreda, which brought a hearty laugh from the party, Jim Haley laughing more loudly than any of the others.
Hamilton White’s face hardened ever so little.
“Your questions are rather personal, and I must ask you to be more discreet,” he rebuked.
“A thousand pardons!” bowed the visitor. “For this indiscretion, I shall include some handsome oil paintings, which we give only to big jobbers with large orders for International Peanuts Products, when I fill the orders you have been so magnanimous as to favor me with.”
“That’s a mighty indigestible word, that magnanimous thing. Don’t put anything like that in the shipment with my peanuts,” declared Stacy.
“You don’t mean to say you don’t know the meaning of that word?” exclaimed Nora.
“Can’t say that I do,” answered Stacy carelessly. “What does it mean, Emma?”
“Your education has been neglected. Any schoolboy ought to know the meaning of a word so common as that,” returned Emma airily.
“All right, you tell us. I’ll swallow whatever you say—once!”
“Why, magnanimous means—it means—it means—Pshaw, I know what it means perfectly well, but somehow I can’t properly explain it.” Emma’s face was growing red. “Oh, Hamilton, you tell my ignorant companion what—”
“Ha, ha, ha!” chortled the fat boy. “You tell him, Hamilton.”
Grace and Elfreda were laughing immoderately, and Hippy was chuckling to himself. All knew that Miss Dean knew the meaning of the word, but that Stacy, with his question, had confused her.
“I believe the dictionary explains it as being elevated in soul,” answered the guide smilingly.
“Oh, Hamilton, isn’t that wonderful?” breathed Emma. “It sounds so utterly poetic.”
“You wouldn’t think so were you to swallow it with a bag of peanuts,” grumbled the fat boy.
And after the laughter had subsided, Grace announced that she was tired and said she would turn in.
“Do we make an early start in the morning, Mr. White?” she asked, turning smilingly towards the guide.
“Yes, if that is agreeable to you, Mrs. Gray,” was the courteous reply. The easy grace of this man, and the evident culture that was beneath the surface, had puzzled Grace Harlowe from the beginning. There was that about him that was mysterious, unfathomable. These thoughts were in the Overland girl’s mind as she turned towards the little tent which she and Elfreda occupied together.
“By the way, Mr. Haley,” she added, halting at the tent opening, “Mr. White will fix you up for the night with a blanket. If you will bunk in with Lieutenant Wingate, there is room. Mr. White prefers to sleep in the open.”
“So do I. In the vast open, with the ambient atmosphere enveloping me like a blanket, I can ponder over the psychology of merchandising peanuts better than when I am shut in. All nature assists, the saplings sap and seep into my brain, into my subconscious being, and the leaves leave their native habitat to come to my aid, and—”
“One can’t blame them so much for that,” observed Emma. “Good-night, Mr. Haley; good-night, Hamilton; good-night, all.”
“Either that man is a lunatic or else he is a big fraud,” declared Elfreda, entering the tent. “Which is it?”
“Just another mystery, that is all,” answered Grace good-naturedly. “Why worry about him?”
“I don’t. I have sufficient troubles of my own to keep me from sleeping soundly.”
By this time the others were turning in; the visitor had already rolled himself up in a blanket with feet to the fire, and Ham White was out seeing that the ponies were secure for the night. He remained out there for a long time, looking up at the tree tops, dimly discernible in the faint light. At the same time he appeared to be listening, now and then glancing back at the silent figure of Jim Haley.
At last the guide turned and strode back into camp, and threw his blanket down beside Haley. But White did not lie down at once. Instead, he crouched down beside the visitor and peered down into the man’s face. A pair of twinkling eyes were gazing up at him.
“You are awake, eh? I rather thought you would be. Now who are you, and what is your game? Out with it or out you go!”
“Who am I? I am G 16, and I want to talk with you!” Haley’s voice sank to a whisper as he made the mysterious announcement.
Ham White uttered an exclamation, then, quickly collecting himself, he lay down on his blanket close to the peanut salesman, and for the next half hour the two men spoke in earnest tones, tones too low for the Overlanders to hear.
It was long after midnight, when, had one been awake, he might have discovered a shadowy figure slinking along at the rear of the camp. It first paused at the tent occupied by Hippy and Stacy, then crept on all fours to the one in which Grace and Elfreda were sleeping. These little tents were open at both ends, though they could be closed in the event of a storm, and a person at either end, by peering closely, could see the heads and faces of the occupants.
Inch by inch the shadow, now flat on the ground, wriggled towards the two sleeping girls. A lean hand reached cautiously under, first Grace’s pillow, then under Elfreda’s. The pillows were pneumatic pillows that were filled with air before retiring, and were soft and comfortable, as well as sensitive to the touch.
The pressure of the shadow’s hand under the pillow disturbed Elfreda Briggs, and her eyes slowly opened, but she did not move, believing that the hand belonged to her companion. A sidelong glance, however, told her that Grace’s back was towards her, therefore the hand could not belong to her. Elfreda’s next thought was that Stacy Brown was trying to play pranks on her.
In the meantime the hand crept slowly about under the pillow. It was time to act, and Miss Briggs, half raising herself on one elbow, made a grab for it. She grasped a bare muscular arm.
“Overland!” cried the girl, and the familiar thrilling call of distress awakened every person in the camp with the exception of Stacy Brown. Then darkness overwhelmed Elfreda and she knew no more.
Grace, awakened by the cry, threw her arms about the neck of her companion.
“Elfreda! Elfreda! What is it?”
There was no reply.
“Overland! Quick! Something has happened to Elfreda!” she cried, springing from her blanket, as the quick, sharp report of a revolver smote the ears of the campers.