Analy High School - Azalea Yearbook (Sebastopol, CA)

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“Say, boy, do you know where I can get room and board for awhile! ” ‘Gee, I sure wish we could give it to you, but our house is so little now that Sis hasn’t enough room,” was the reply, followed by a deep sign. “Say, pard,” he drew the name out unfamiliarly— “That’s right, kid. I’m your Pard.” “I’ll tell you,” he continued. “Mrs. Valade has a room and she only lives two doors from us. The guy that lived tnere got killed in a tight on the range about a week back and he said he’d leave his room to the next stranger that hit this town. Old Colonel’s son killed him.” “Great; lead me to it.” A few hours later “P,ard” was settled. The boy was there doing little favors to help his new friend. “Well, kid, we’re done,” and the rider sat down on the edge of his bed. The boy sat down on his roll of blankets and they looked at each other for a moment. Then, for the first time, the man analyzed the fine features of the child. Big, blue eyes; golden, curly hair; rosy, rounded lips and a fair complexion. “H’m; did you say something about a sister!” he asked slowly of the lad. “Yes, Sis is older than 1 am, lots older, and she is so good to me.” Then his face brightened and he .added, smiling: “Gee, but she hates to see me fight, though.” Next day little Dan was up to see the stranger. “Gee, but it’s lonesome down at our house, Pard. Won’t you come down?” This question greeted “Pard” as soon as he .appeared on the scene. The rider was the kind who never went where he wasn’t invited, un¬ less he had to, but this time he had to, and anyhow Dan had invited him. He must see that sister. He accepted the child’s invitation, and in a few moments was taking long strides toward the white gate, with the boy at his side. The introduction that the child gave the two when they met proved the careful bringing up that his sister was giving him. After a pleasant evening on a neat little porch, the man took his leave. Through little Dan they felt very well acquainted. “Come down whenever you wish,” the girl told him; “you know that you’re welcome.” He took it for granted that he was welcome. Anyway, he did come back, the very next evening. Many an evening was passed there. Evenings were cool and the porch so inviting, especially when Ethel PAGE 15

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didn’t realize how great was the wrong done his mother and himself. It was the weight of that murder that whitened the beautiful crown of brown hair and bent her poor shoulders. Now he was on his way to avenge that deed, and he would. At dark the desert lay behind him and before him the foothills. When the moon rose it shed its light on a sm,all camp, a tired horse and a ranger. The cool air rested both horse and rider, and after a short sleep they were on their way. It was very early. The moon was still queen of the sky, but her light was waning. At sunrise he w x as near the town he had started for. Desert Pass was just in the edge of the foot-hills on the other side of the range of mountains. To him it looked uninteresting and uninviting. The rider dismounted at the general merchandise store. He dropped the reins of his horse and left him to nibble the grass of the spring rains, and entered the store. There were several people in the place, who stared at him until his back was turned upon them, and then buzzed away among them¬ selves. He paid no attention to anyone, b ut walked straight to the counter. He was not looking for friends or friendship, but for an enemy and trouble, and he usually got what he looked for. The store was small, dirty and behind it was a blacksmith shop. The odor of burning hoofs filled the air. A fat, dissipated man with small dark features entered from the blacksmith shop and came up to the counter. “Can you tell me where I can get a room and board!” the rider asked in his naturally pleasant way. The old fellow shrugged his heavy shoulders and sneeringly answered, “I ain’t a selling board and room; I’m a sellin’ groceries an’ terbaecer.” “You’re not selling anything to me,” returned the rider, and with a look that shot fire, but had the effect of a chill on the storekeeper, he left the building. He paused on the platform and stamped his foot, t o shake the dust from his boot, then turning asked of a tousle-headed boy sitting by the hitching post: “Say, partner, who’s that fat brute in t 1 ere?” The boy smiled back with a sympathetic answer, “That’s old Colonel Gee; ain’t he an old crank, though?” The child had made a friend of the rider and asked, with his large blue eyes wide open: “What’s your name?” and in the same breath, “Do you ride that bay horse over there?” “You iust call me pard.” He knew it was best to keep his name to himself, with the business that he had before him. PAGE 14

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was queen there. The father was still in the mountains, working with Ins men at the saw mill. He would return in a few weeks. The visitor never entered the house; never even went higher than the second of the few steps on the front porch. Two weeks later, when the sun had just set, and a cool breeze was blowing the roses in the little garden, Ethel sat beside the man on the step. For about five minutes not a word was spoken. A bird fluttered to the ground near them and then flew up with a thread in his bill to a tree by the little white gate. Then the rider, no longer a stranger, looked at the golden head near him. Then he looked into two dark blue eyes that were turned immediately on his. Then he spoke— “Ethel, I’m getting in so deep, and it isn’t fair to you. You don’t know who 1 am or what I’m doing here. That evening that you would not tell me your last name unless I told you mine—well, 1 had a real reason. I’ll have to tell you some time and if you reject me on that ac¬ count—well, I don’t know what on earth I’ll do, but I must tell you anyway, so here goes’’— “Now you wait until 1 tell you something” the girl cut in quickly. “There is something I have to tell you first, and maybe you will be the one to change your mind about this,” and without waiting for another word she began: “Mv father did a great wrong when I was a baby. Still I can hardly blame him. A man, long before my father married mother, was an old sweetheart of hers. Mother told me how deeply in love those two were—he and mother. Then they were parted in their youth and they forgot during several years. Then when I was a baby this man met mother again. It all came back to them again, the love of some years back. Mother became discontented, and knowing that Walters was already married, and had been for several years, just seemed to lose her life in the thoughts of her past and her shattered future. She became thinner and so ill that she could not get out of her bed. Father stayed by her day and night until she was stronger. He was almost insane. One night he left with a gun and his saddle horse. He met Walters at his cabin door and shot him outright, Walters died a few hours later, telling his little son to avenge his death. Then my heartbroken mother lived, or rather existed, for eleven years longer. One night she was found dead in the river ove” there. I)an was only one year old. That’s all. I have raised Dan and kept house for father ever since. Now, if you can consider the daughter of a murderer, you are doing more than most men would.” PAGE 16