Part 40 (1/2)
He paused as she neared him, his jaw sagging at the apparition of a dainty, richly dressed, strange female alone on the street of Topaz.
”Good-morning. You're Mr. Ryder, aren't you?” she smiled.
”That's me, Ma'am.” He pulled off his soft-brimmed hat, revealing a wide expanse of s.h.i.+ning pink scalp, fringed with a scanty growth of grizzled hair.
”The proprietor of the Palace Hotel tells me that you are one of the oldest inhabitants left, Mr. Ryder, and I wonder if you would mind telling me something of the people who used to live in Topaz Gulch years ago. I am trying to locate some lost relatives.”
”I'll be glad to tell you anything I can, Ma'am.” His round face quickened with interest. ”I keep bachelor house, but if you don't object to walking through the bar--it's empty now--there's a room back where we can talk.”
He led the way and Willa followed him. Bare and ramshackle as it was, the sight of the bar and the little tables fronting it brought acutely to her memory a like room, larger and more resplendent, with baize-covered tables and flaring oil lamps; a tall, spare figure inexpressibly dear to her memory replaced for a moment the rotund one before her and the veil of the past seemed lifted. She was back once more in the Blue Chip.
The vision was dispelled, however, when she found herself in the little back room, scarcely more than a closet, with room enough only for the rusty stove, table and chairs.
”Private poker-room,” Mr. Ryder announced with pride. ”Enough coin's changed hands here to buy the greatest gold-mine in Nevada! Make yourself comfortable, Ma'am. Now, who was it you was looking for?”
”Do you recall Jake's place, the dance-hall that was burned down?”
Willa began.
”Like as if it was yesterday!” The little man seated himself in the chair opposite and put his hat on the floor beside him. ”Topaz was a roaring gehenna in them days and one night Red-Eye Pete started in to shoot out the lamps at Jake's. One of 'em exploded and it was all over in no time. Red-Eye himself and Ray Clancy, the pianner-player, and two o' the girls was lost. I got a busted arm and most o' my hair singed off going in after 'em, but 'twarn't no use.”
”You knew the--the girls?” Willa had difficulty in controlling her voice.
”Sure I did! Blonde Annie and Miss Violet. Annie was just a--a girl like you'd expect, Ma'am, but Miss Violet, she was a regular lady.
Young widder with a toddling baby and a voice like an angel.--Say, that's funny!” He broke off, staring at her. ”It ain't about her that you've come, is it?”
Willa nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
”Well, don't that beat--beat everything!” Mr. Ryder recovered himself in some confusion. ”Two or three years ago a lawyer shark from New York City--a man named North, I remember--come here asking an all-fired lot o' questions, and only last fall another feller turned up on the same game. I told 'em all I knew, which warn't much. They called themselves Murphy, Miss Vi and her husband did, but I guess that warn't their right name. Nice young feller he was, but quiet and sickly.
When he died we wanted to pa.s.s round the hat for the widder, like we always do, but she wouldn't have it; she got work instead at Jake's, singing and dancing, but she kept everyone in their place and there warn't a man here that wouldn't have stood up for her till the last gun fired.”
”And the baby--do you remember it at all?”
”Little Billie?” Mr. Ryder laughed. ”There ain't enough babies around a mining camp to make you forget any one of 'em, and you couldn't rightly forget Billie if you tried. Fat and curly-headed she was, and the s.p.u.n.kiest little critter you ever see, always falling down hard and scrambling up again by herself and laughing to beat four of a kind.
Her ma tried to keep her home, but there warn't a chance; she went wherever her little legs would carry her, and the whole town looked out for her. She must be a woman grown, now.”
”I don't suppose you would recognize her if you should see her,” Willa observed wistfully.
”Me? Lord, no!” he exclaimed. ”Babies grow up into most anything, as far as looks go! She was about four when her ma was burned, and Gentleman Geoff, the gambler, adopted her and took her away. The whole town wanted to keep her, but in them days Topaz was no place for a girl to grow up in and there wasn't a woman here of her mother's kind.”
”It is possible that a woman might remember her where a man wouldn't.”
Willa was following her own train of thought. ”The proprietor of the Palace spoke of two women left who were here at that time; a Mrs.
Atkinson and Klondike Kate. Would they be able to tell me anything more, do you think?”
”Not the widder!” Mr. Ryder responded with emphasis. ”She put Miss Vi to work in her hash-house for a week when young Murphy died; starved her, slammed the kid around and drove her till she fainted. She warn't used to hard work, Miss Vi warn't, and the Widder Atkinson would have killed a horse. When Miss Vi took to doing turns at Jake's instead, the Widder 'lowed she was no better than she'd ought to've been, and near got lynched in consequence. You've only got to mention Miss Vi to her even now to have her r'ar right up on her hind legs. She wouldn't tell you nothing if she could.”
”The other one, Klondike Kate. Did she know this Miss Violet?”
”Sure. She was one o' the girls at Jake's, like Blonde Annie and the rest. I guess you ain't ever come in contact with that kind, Ma'am, but it wouldn't hurt you to talk to her once and if anyone could help you maybe she could. That kind don't get much forbearance from other women, but Miss Vi was good to her and nursed her through a spell o'
sickness and Klondike Kate just about wors.h.i.+ped her and the baby.