The Homesteaders by Stead Robert J C

Author:Stead, Robert J C [C, Stead, Robert J]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2009-04-20T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER XII

A WHIFF OF NEW ATMOSPHERE

Riles found the journey westward a tiresome affair. His was a soul devoid of enthusiasm over Nature's wealth or magnitude, and the view of the endless prairie excited in him no emotion other than a certain vague covetousness. It was his first long rail journey in over twenty years, but his thoughts were on the cost of travel rather than on the wonderful strides which had been made in its comfort and convenience. Riles indulged in no such luxuries as sleeping-car berths or meals served in the diner, and two nights in a crowded day-coach, with such hasty meals as could be bought for a quarter at wayside stations, made the journey a somewhat exhausting one. Back in the observation car, sleek commercial travellers, well groomed and well dressed and enveloped in comfortable self-satisfaction, gravely discussed politics, business or real estate, or exchanged the latest titbits of wit accumulated in their travels. Riles probably could have bought and paid for the worldly possessions of the whole group, and have still a comfortable balance in the bank. But a sleeper berth cost the price of two bushels of wheat, and even in a good year Riles' crop seldom exceeded ten thousand bushels.

As fate would have it, Riles selected as the base of his homestead operations the very foothill town to which Beulah Harris had come a few weeks before. He sought out the cheapest hotel, and having thrown his few belongings on the bed, betook himself to the bar-room, which seemed the chief centre of activity, not only of the hotel itself, but of the little town. Men were, lined three deep against the capacious bar, shouting, swearing, and singing, and spending their money with an abandon not to be found in millionaires. Riles was no great student of human nature; he had a keener eye for a horse than a fellow-man, but the motley crowd interested and, in a certain way, amused him. Land-seekers, some in overalls and flannel shirts, some in ready-mades with dirty celluloid collars and cheap, gaudy ties—big, powerful men with the muscles and manners of the horse—and others, lighter of frame, who apparently made an easier and a better living by the employment of their brains; cowboys in schaps and sun-burn and silk handkerchiefs; ranchers, stately English and French stock, gentlemen still five thousand miles from the place of their breeding; lumbermen and river-drivers, iron bodies set with quick, combative intellects; guides, locaters, freighters, land dealers, gamblers, sharks, and hangers-on wove back and forth plying the shuttle from which the fabric of a new nation must be wrought.

Riles debated with himself whether the occasion justified the expenditure of ten cents for a drink when a hand was placed on his shoulder, and a voice said, "Have one with me, neighbour." He found himself addressed by a man of about his own age, shorter and somewhat lighter of frame and with a growing hint of corpulence. The stranger wore a good pepper-and-salt suit, and the stone on his finger danced like real diamond.

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