HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSONS BAR.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17410, 12 December 1924, Page 15 (Supplement)

HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSONS BAR.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 14.) “ Gone up the canon on a little paesar. They're comirg back for me in a minit. I'm waitin' round for 'em. What are you starin’ at. Old Man?" he added with a forced laugh; “do you think I’m drunk?" The Old Man might have been pardoned the supposition, for Dick's eyes were humid and his face flushed. lie loitered and lounged back to the chimney. yawned, shook himself, buttoned up his coat and laughed. " Liquor ain’t so plenty as that. Old Man. Now don't you git tip," he continued, as the Old Man made a movement to release his sleeve from Johnny’s hand. “ Don't you mind manners. Sit jist whar you be; I'm goin’ in a jiffy. Thar, that’s them now." There was a low* tap at the door. Dick Bullen opened it quickly, nodded “ Good night " to his host, and disappeared The Old Man would have followed him but for the hand that still unconsciously grasped his sleeve. He could have easily disengaged it: it was small, weak, and emaciated, he changed his mind, and, drawing his chair closer to the bed, rested his head upon it. In this defenceless attitude the potency of his earlier potations surprised him. The room flickered and faded before his eyes, reappeared, faded again, went out., and left him—asleep. Meantime Dick Bullen, closing the door, confronted his companions. " Are you ready?” said Staples. “ Ready," said Dick; "what’s the time?" “Past twelve.” was the reply; "can you make it?—it’s nigh on fifty miles, the round trip hither and yon.” “ I reckon," returned Dick, shortly. “ Whar’s the mare?" “ Bill and Jack’s holdin’ her at the crossin’.” " Let ’em hold on a minnit longer." said Dick. He turned and re-entered the house softly. By the light of the guttering candle and dying fire he saw that the door of the little room was open. He stepped toward it on tiptoe and looked in. The Old Man had fallen back in his chair, snoring, his helpless feet thrust out in a line with his collapsed shoulders, and his hat pulled over his eyes. Beside him, on a narrow bedstead, lay Johnny, muffled tightlv in a blanket that hid all save a strip of forehead and a few curls, damp with perspiration. Dick Bullen made a step forward, hesitated, and glanced over his shoulder into the deserted room. Everything was quiet. With a sudden resolution he parted his huge moustaches with both hands ar.d stooped over the sleeping boy. But even as he did so a mischievous blast, lying in wait, swooped down the chimney, rekindled the hearth, and lit up the room with a shameless glow from which Dick fled in bashful terllis companions were already waiting for him at the crossing. Two of them were struggling in the darkness with some strange misshapen bulk, which as Dick came nearer, took the semblance of a great, yellow horse. It was the mare. She was not a pretty picture. From her Roman nose to her rising haunches, from her arched spine hidden by the stiff vnachillas of a Mexican saddle to her thick straight, bony legs, there was not a line of equine grace. In her halfblind but wholly vicious white eyes, in her protruding under lip, in her monstrous colour, there was nothing but ugliness and vice. "Now then," said Staples, "stand ebar of her heels, boys and up with you. Don’t miss your first holt oi her mane, and mind ve get your off stirrup quick. Ready!" There was a leap, a scrambling, a bound, a wild retreat of the crowd, a circle of flying hoofs, two springless leaps that jarred the earth, a rapid play and jingle of spurs, a plunge, and then the voice of Dick somewhere in the darkness, "All right!" “ Don’t take the lower road back on less ye’re hard pushed for time! Don't hold her in down hill. We’ll be at the ford at five. G'lang 1 Hoopa! Muia! GO! ' A splash, a spark struck from the ledge in the road, a clatter in the , rocky cut points beyond, and Dick was gone. Sing; O Muse, the ride of Richard Bullen! Sing, O Muse, of chivalrous men! the sacred quest, the doughty deeds, the battery of low- churls, the fearsome ride and gruesome perils of the Flower of Simpson’s Bar! Alack! she is dainty, this Muse! She will have none of this bucking brute and swaggering, ragged rider, and 1 must fain follow him in prose, afoot! It was one o’clock, ard vet he had only gained Rattlesnake Hill. For in that time Jovita had rehearsed to him all her imperfections and practised all her vices. Thrice had she stumbled. Twice had she thrown up her Roman nose in a straight line with the reins, and. resisting bit and spur, 1 struck out madly across country. Twice had she reared, and, rearing, fallen backward; and twice had the agile Dick, unharmed, regained his seat before she found her vicious legs again. And a mile beyond them, at the foot of a long hill, wars Rattlesnake Creek. Dick knew that here was the crucial test ol his ability to perform his enterprise, set his teeth grimly, put his knees well into her flanks, and charged his defensive tactics to brisk aggression. Bullied and maddened. Jovita began the descent lof the hill. Here the artful Richard j pretended to hold her in with ostentatious objurgation and well-feigned

acid that Jovita instantly ran away. Xor need I state the time made in the descent; it is written in the chronicles of Simpson's Bar. Enough that in another moment, as it seemed to Dick, she was sp’ashing on the overflowed banks of Rattlesnake •reek. As Dick expected, the momentum she had acquired carried her beyond the poirt of baulking, and. holding her well together for a mighty leap, they dashed into the middle ot the swiftly flowing current. A few moments of kicking, wading, and swimming, and Dick drew a long breath on the opposite bank. The road from Rattlesnake Creek to Reel Mountain was tolerably level. Either the plunge in Rattlesnake C reek had dampened her baleful tire or the art which led to it had shown her the superior wickedness of her rider, lor Jovita no longer wasted her surplus energy in wanton conceits. Once she bucked, but it was from force of habit; once she shied, but it was from a new freshly painted meeting-house at the crossing of the country road. Hollows, ditches, gravelly deposits, patches of freshly springing grasses, flew from beneath her rattling hoofs. She began to smell unpleasantly, once or twice she coughed slightly, but there was not abatement of her strength or speed. By two o’clock he had passed Red Mountain and begun the descent to the plain Ten minutes later the driver of the fast Pioneer coach was overtaken and passed by a "man on a Pinto hoss,” —an event sufficiently notable for remark. At half-past two . Dick rose, in his stirrups with a great shout. Stars were glittering through

the rifted clouds, and beyond him, out of the plain, rose two spires, a flagstaff, and a straggling line of black objects. Dick jingled his spurs and swung his riata. Jovita bounded forward, and in another moment they swept into Tuttleville and drew up before the wooden piazza of The Hotel of All Nations.” What transpired that night at Tuttleville is not strictly a part of this record. Briefly I may state, however. that after Jovita had been handed over to a sleepy ostler, whom she at once kicked into unpleasant, consciousness, Dick sallied out with the barkeeper for a tour of the sleeping town. Lights still gleamed from a few saloons and gambling-houses; but avoiding these, they stopped before several closed shops, and by persistent tapping and judicious outcry roused the proprietors from their beds, and made them unbar the doors of their magazines ;\nd expose their wares. Sometimes they were met by curses, but ofter.er by interest and some concern in their needs, and the interview was invariably concluded by a drink. It was three o'clock before this pleasantry was given over, and with a small waterproof bag of indiarubber strapped on his shoulders Dick returned to the hotel. But there he was waylaid by Beauty,—Beauty opulent in charms, affluent in dress, persausive in speech, and Spanish in accent ! In vain she repeated the invitation in " Excelsior." happily scorned by all Alpine-climbing youth, and rejected by this child of the Sierras.— a rejection softened in this instance by a laugh and his last gold coin. And then he sprang to the saddle and dashed down the lonely street and out into the lonelier plain, where presently the lights, the black line of houses, the spires, and the flagstaff sank into the earth behind him again and were lost in the dstance. The storm had cleared away, the air was brisk and cold, the outlines of adjacent landmarks were distinct, but it was half-past four before Dick reached the meeting-house and the crossing of the country road. To avoid the rising grade he had taken a longer and more circuitous road, in whose viscid mud Jovita sank fetlock deep at every bound. It was a poor preparation for a steady ascent of five miles more; but Jovita, gathering her legs under her. took it with her usual blind unreasoning fury, and a half hour later reached the long level that led to Rattlesnake Creek. Another half hour would bring him to the creek. He threw the reins lightly upon the neck of the mare, chirruped to her. and began to sing. Suddenly Jovita shied with a bound that would have unseated a less practised rider. Hanging to her rein was a figure that had leaped from the bank, and at the same time from the road before her arose a shadowy horse and rider. " Throw up your hands," commanded this second apparition, with an oath. Dick felt the mare tremble, quiver, and apparently sink under him. He knew what it meant and was prepared. “ Stand aside. Jack Simpson. 1 know you, you d d thief. Let me pass, He did not finish the sentence. Jovita rose straight in the air with a terrific bound, throwing the figure from her bit with a single shake of her vicious head, and charged with deadly malevolence down on the impediment before her. An oath, a pistol-shot, horse and highwayman rolled over in the road, and the next moment Jovita was a hundred yards away. But the good right arm of her rider, shattered by a. bullet, dropped helplessly at his side. Without slackening his speed ■ he shifted the reins to his left hand. But a few moments later he was obliged to halt and tighten the saddle-girths that had slipped in the onset.. This in his crippled condition took some time. He had no fear of pursuit, but looking up he saw that the eastern stars were already paling, and that the distant peaks had lost their ghostly whiteness. and now stood out blackly against a lighter sky. Day was upon him. Then completely absorbed in a single idea, he forgot the pain of his wound, and mounting again clashed on toward Rattlesnake ‘reek. But now Jovita's breath came by gasps. Dick reeled in his addle, and brighter and brighter grew the sky. Ride. Richard; run, Jovita; linger. O dav!

For the last few rods there was a roaring in his ears. Was it exhaustion from loss of blood, or what? He was dazed and giddy as he swept down the hill, and did not recognize his surroundings. Had he taken the wrong road, or was this Rattlesnake Creek? It was. But the brawling creek he had swam a few hours before had risen, more than doubled its volume, and now rolled a swift and resistless river between him and Rattlesnake Hill. For the first time that night Richard's heart sank within him. The river, the mountain. the quickening east, swam before his eves. He shut them to recover his self-control. In that brief interval, by some fantastic mental process. the little room at Simpson’s Bar and the figures of the sleeping father and son rose upon him. He opened his eyes wildly, cast off his coat, pistol, boots, arid saddle, bound his precious pack tightly to his shoulders. grasperl the bare flanks of Jovita with his bare knees, and with a shout dashed into the yellow water. A cry rose from the opposite bank as the head of a man and horse struggled for a few moments against the battling current, and then were swept away amidst uprooted trees and whirling drift-wood. The Old Man started and woke.. The fire on the hearth was dead, the candle in the outer room flickering in its socket, and somebody was rapping at the door. .He opened it. but fell back with a cry before the dripping half-naked figure that reeled against the doorpost. “ Dick?" Hush! Ts he awake vet?" Xo.--but Dick? “ Dry up. you old too!.’ Get me some whiskey quick!" The Old Man flew and returned with—an empty bottle! Dick would have sworn, but his strength was not equal to the occasion. He staggered, caught at the handle of the door, and motioned to the Old Man " Thar’s Ruthin’ in my pack yer for Johnny. Take it off. T can't." The Old Man unstrapped the pack, and laid it before the exhausted man. "Open it, quick!" lie did so with trembling fingers. It contained only a few toys,— cheap and barbaric enough, goodness knows, but bright with paint and tinsel. One of them was broken; another, I fear, was irretrievably ruined by water; and on the third—ah me! there was a cruel spot. “It don't look like much, that's a fact," said Dick, ruefully. . . “ But it’s the best we could do. . . . Take ’em, Old Man, and put ’em in his stocking. and tell him—tell him, you know —hold me, Old Man —" said Dick, with a weak little laugh,—" tel! him Sandy Claus has come." And even so, bedraggled, ragged, unshaven, and unshorn, with one arm hanging helplessly at his side, Santa F-:aus came to Simpson’s Bar and fell fainting on the first threshold. The Christmas dawn came slowly after, torching the remoter peaks with the

rosy warmth of ineffable love. And it looked so tenderly on Simpson’s . Bar that the whole, mountain, as if I caught in a generous action, blushed j to the skies. [