Part 13 (2/2)
”Yes,” remarks Ollie. ”It arrived just in time to save mamma from a fainting fit.”
”And you did not communicate it to my father?”
”No,” returns Mr. Livingston; ”that was impossible. He was not at the station here. At all events, I did not see him, as I would undoubtedly have, if he had been waiting for you.”
”Then he cannot have been in town,” cries Erma, her pretty lips pouting with disappointment, for Mr. Livingston is very well acquainted with Mr.
Travenion by sight, having seen that gentleman on some of his visits to New York.
While this colloquy has been going on, Ferdie and Harry have been conversing apart. Miss Travenion now turns to them, and seeing that Ollie does not recognize her protector of the night before, says, rapidly, but earnestly, ”Mr. Livingston, you must remember Captain Lawrence on the train. He was very kind to me last night and took good care of me. You should thank him also.”
The latter part of this speech has been made in some embarra.s.sment, for the young men are looking at each other with by no means kindly eyes.
Its last sentence makes them enemies, for Livingston, who had already been slightly jealous of the attentions of the Westerner to the young lady he regards even now as his _fiancee_, becomes very jealous, and Lawrence, who has somehow formed the shrewd idea that there is some connection between Miss Travenion and the son of her chaperon, interprets the ”You should thank him also,” for indication of engagement and future marriage between the pair, and from this moment takes that kind of a liking to Mr. Livingston a man generally has for a rival who is more blessed by circ.u.mstance and position in matters pertaining to his suit--which generally means envious hate.
Being compelled to social truce, at least in the presence of the young lady, the two men are obliged to recognize each other and acknowledge the re-introduction. This Livingston does by a rather snarly ”How are yer?” and Lawrence by a nod of indifference.
Then Miss Travenion gives an additional pang to Mr. Livingston, for she says: ”Captain, another request. You know Salt Lake very well? You are acquainted with some of the journals?”
”One only,” remarks Harry. ”The Salt Lake _Tribune_,--the Gentile newspaper.”
”Then you can do me a favor,” returns Erma. ”My father apparently has not received my telegram. Would you take care that a notice of my arrival is inserted prominently in that paper, so that if papa is in town, he will see it; if in any of the mining camps or settlements about here, it may reach his eye. The sooner I behold him, the happier I shall be.”
”Any request from you will be a command to me,” says Lawrence, eagerly.
”The announcement shall be made in the _Tribune_, but it cannot be until to-morrow morning. If I can aid you in any other way, please do not fail to call upon me.” To this he adds hurriedly: ”I shall leave town early this afternoon for Tintic Mining District, but shall return in three days.”
”Very well,” answers the young lady. ”Do not forget that we stop at the Townsend House, where I shall always be most happy to see you.” She emphasizes her invitation by so cordial a grasp of the hand, and Harry returns it so heartily, that Mr. Oliver Livingston pulls down his immaculate s.h.i.+rt-cuffs in anguish and rage.
This is not decreased by Ferdie's admiring remark: ”Ain't the Cap a high stepper!” as the party step into the carriage and drive away.
They are soon at the corner of West Temple and South Second Streets, and find themselves in front of a rather rambling two-story house with an attic attachment, at this time the princ.i.p.al hotel in Salt Lake City, for in 1871 the Walker House is not yet built. It has a generally yellow appearance, though its windows are protected from the sun by green Venetian blinds.
Alighting here, Miss Travenion is informed that Mrs. Livingston is not yet up, and going to her room, lies down, it being still quite early in the day, while her maid unpacks her trunks and arranges her dresses.
Though fatigued by her long railroad trip, sleep does not come to Erma, for thoughts of her father are upon her; and after a little, growing anxious on this subject, she springs up, and says: ”I'll look for him!”
So, making a hasty but effective toilet, robed in a dainty summer dress, the girl stepping to the window, looks out and cries: ”How pretty!” for she is gazing upon Salt Lake City on an October day, which is as beautiful as any day can be, save a May day, when there is a little less dust on the streets and a little more water in the rivulets that course through them.
All round her are houses embowered in green foliage, and broad streets, also planted with trees, and streams of living water, fresh from the melting snows of the Wahsatch, coursing by their sidewalks where gutters would be in ordinary towns.
In these streets there is a curious, heterogeneous life, the like of which she has never seen before. Immediately below her, in front of the hotel, men of many climes lounge about the unpaved sidewalk, most of them seated, their feet against the trees that line its side, each man smoking a cigar, the aromas of which, as they float up to her, seem to be pleasant.
Most of these are mining speculators from California, the East, and Europe; as their voices rise to her, she catches tones similar to those she has heard in Delmonico's from travelling Englishmen. For the Emma mine is in its glory; and much British capital has floated into this Territory, to be invested in the silver leads of the great mountains that cut off her view to the east, and the low ranges that she can see to the south and west; a good deal of it never to return to London again; for, of all the speculators of many nations who have invested in American securities, stocks, bonds, mining properties and beer interests, none have so rashly and so lavishly squandered their money as the speculators of merry England. These have sometimes been allured to financial discomfort by Yankee shrewdness, but more often have been betrayed by the ignorance or carelessness or rascality of those whom they have sent from their native isle to represent them, who have judged America, Western mines and Yankee business methods by England, Cornish lodes and the financial conditions that prevail in Thread-Needle Street.
Two or three hacks and carriages, such as are seen in the East, stand in front of the hotel, while in the street before her move some big mule teams, laden with bars of lead and silver, from some smelter on the Jordan, and a little further on is a wagon of the prairies, covered with the mud and dust of long travel, driven by some Mormon who has come up from the far southern settlements of Manti, or Parowan, or the pretty oasis towns of Payson or Spanish Fork or some other garden spot by the side of the fresh waters of Utah Lake, to go through the rites of the Endowment House, and take unto himself another wife; paying well for the ceremonies in farm produce.
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