Part 47 (1/2)

”You hear?” Stott turned to Wallie furiously. ”He did it on purpose. I demand that you discharge this fellow!”

Mr. Hicks' fingers caressed the stove-wood while he waited Wallie's answer.

Wallie squirmed between the two of them.

”It was reprehensible, Mr. Stott, I am more distressed than I can tell you. I have no excuse to offer for Hicks' action, but the truth is, as he knows and has taken advantage of it, I cannot replace him and it is impossible to get along without a cook with so large a party.”

”You will, then, not discharge him?” Stott demanded.

”I am helpless,” Wallie reiterated.

Hicks grinned triumphantly.

”In that case,” Mr. Stott declared in a tone which implied that a tremendous upheaval of some kind would follow his decision, ”my wife and I will leave your party and continue through the Park by motor.”

Wallie felt that it was useless to argue with any one so determined, so he made no effort to persuade Mr. Stott to remain, though the deflection of two more persons was a serious matter to him and Pinkey.

Without waiting to say good-bye to the others, the Stotts paid their bill and departed, walking so erect in their indignation as they started down the road toward the Lake Hotel that they seemed to lean backward.

It was not yet dark when Mr. Stott, stepping briskly and carrying his Gladstone bag, raincoat, and umbrella in a jaunty manner, came into camp announcing breezily that he had decided, upon reflection, not to ”bite off his nose to spite his face.” He declared that he would not let the likes of Ellery Hicks upset his plans for touring the Yellowstone, and while his wife refused to return he meant to carry out his original intention.

But the real reason for Mr. Stott's decision, as Wallie suspected from the frequency with which he had discovered him sitting upon a log in secluded spots counting his money, was that the hotel rates and motor fare were far higher then he had antic.i.p.ated.

Mrs. Stott's absence did not leave the gap which she had antic.i.p.ated. In fact, after the first evening her name was never mentioned, and Mr.

Stott's marital ties rested so lightly upon him that a stranger would never have known they existed. He gravitated toward Miss Gaskett with a prompt.i.tude which gave rise to the suspicion that he had had his eye upon her, and Miss Gaskett responded so enthusiastically that it was a matter for gossip.

It was noted that she took to doing her hair up at night on ”wavers” and used her lipstick with greater frequency, and whereas she had vowed she meant never again to get in the saddle she now rode with Mr. Stott daily.

The ladies who had known Miss Gaskett for twenty-five years, and nothing to her discredit, were not prepared to say that she was a huzzy and a vampire without further evidence, but they admitted to each other privately that they always had felt there was something queer and not quite straightforward about Mattie.

Miss Gaskett, who looked like a returned missionary that had had a hard time of it carrying the Light into the dark places, seemed rather elated than depressed at the aspersions cast upon her character, and by the time they reached the ”Paint Pots” she was flaunting Mr. Stott shamelessly, calling him ”Harry” before everybody, and in the evening sitting with him by the camp-fire on the same saddle-blanket.

At Mammoth Hot Springs Mrs. Budlong showed her disapproval by refusing to speak to Miss Gaskett, and Miss Gaskett replied by putting on a peek-a-boo blouse that was a scandal.

But Mrs. Budlong herself was not in too high favour, since to the sin of gluttony she had added that of lying and been caught at it. It was a small matter, but, as Mrs. Appel declared indignantly, it is trifles that betray character, and Mrs. Budlong was treated with marked coldness by the ladies to whom she had prevaricated.

It was known beyond the question of a doubt that Mrs. Budlong had purchased food and kept it in her teepee. Therefore, when asked for something to ward off a faint feeling before dinner and she had denied having anything, they were outspoken in their resentment.

”There she stood and lied to our faces,” Mrs. Appel declared to her husband afterward, ”while her mouth was s.h.i.+ning. I could smell sardines on her and a big cracker crumb was lying on her bosom. Indeed, it's a true saying they have in this country that to know people you must camp with them. I never would have thought that of Hannah Budlong!”

It was because of this incident, and the strained relations which resulted from her perfidy, that none of her erstwhile friends responded to her invitation to join her in a bath in a beaver dam of which Mr.

Hicks told her when they camped early the next afternoon.

Mrs. Budlong's phlegmatic body contained an adventurous spirit, and the delights of a bath in a beaver dam in the heart of a primeval forest appealed to her strongly.

To Mr. Hicks, who sought her out purposely to tell her about it, she confided:

”Hicks, underneath my worldly exterior I am a Child of Nature. I love the simple, the primitive. I would live as a Wild Thing if I could choose my environment.”

Mr. Hicks nodded sympathetically and understandingly, and returned the confidence.