Emerson's Wife and Other Western Stories Read online

  THE STORY, OF A CHINEE KID

  "Little Ah Sid Was a Chinee Kid, A cute little cuss, you 'd declare, With eyes full of fun And a nose that begun Right up at the roots of his hair." --M. C. SPEER.

  This Chinee Kid was not Ah Sid, but another one whose name was Ah Wing.He was a Chinee Kid only so far as he was n't a Boy, and just how muchof him was Chinee Kid and how much was Boy is difficult to say.Sometimes he seemed to be mostly all one, and sometimes just as muchthe other, and, again, he was a harmonized mixture of the two.

  Wing's father and mother were both Chinese, but Wing had been born andhad lived all his nine years in the town of Tobin, which is inCalifornia, on the overland road, far enough up the Sierra climb forthe east-bound trains to have always two engines when they pass itsdepot. He wore Chinese clothes, except upon his head, whereoninvariably reposed the time-honored hat of the American village boy,that always looks the same whether it is one week or one year old--thehat that is dirty gray in color, conical as to crown, sloping as tobrim, and dilapidated as to general appearance, the hat that isirrefragable proof that its wearer is a Boy. This head-gear he woreover the queue of his forefathers, braided, ebony, shining, and hanginghalf-way down his little legs.

  Wing could jabber Chinese as shrilly and rapidly as any of hisplaymates of the Chinese quarter, and with his young friends of thewhite race he could reel off amazing vocabularies of American slang.And he could swear, and frequently did so, with all the nonchalance ofa Chinaman and the intensity and picturesqueness of an American. Hecould, if the occasion seemed to demand it, drop his eyelids and "_Nosabe_" as stupidly as any Celestial who ever entered the Golden Gate.But with any man, woman, or child whom he chose to favor with hisconversation he could talk volubly in fairly good English. And hislungs were just as capable, and just as frequently put to the test, asthose of any white boy in Tobin, of the ear-splitting shouts and yellswithout which boys' games cannot be played and boys' thoughtscommunicated to one another.

  Wing had such an amazing ability to seem to be everywhere at the sametime that he was nicknamed "Wings." But no one ever called him that tohis face who wanted him to answer a question or pay any attention towhat was said to him. The first time it was tried he protested, withall the dignity of George Washington insisting on his title ofPresident, that his name was Wing. After that he merely met thenickname with a blank, solemn, "_No sabe_" stare, as uncompromising andas impenetrable as a stone wall. It was impossible to look out ofdoors at any time or in any part of Tobin without seeing Wing. He wasalways going somewhere and was always in a hurry, but he was alwaysready to stop and chat for a moment with any one, large or small, whoaddressed him without giving offence.

  Everybody knew him, residents and summer visitors alike. The men allteased him and the women all petted him. Nobody knew or cared in whichone of the dozen houses of the Chinese quarter Wing's father and motherlived, nor whether his father had a laundry, a store, or a garden.They were nobodies; but Wing was a public character.

  Wing's chief daily function was to assist at the arrival of theeast-bound passenger train. The west-bound, having only one engine,was of less consequence. But at the passing of the other he nevermissed a day, Sundays, holidays, or rainy season. He inspected theengines, counted the wheels, considered the possibility of getting aride on the pilot of the second engine, dodged around through thecrowd, ran against people, had his toes trodden on, saw everybody whowent away, stared at all who came, capered up and down the car-steps,put pins on the rail to be flattened by the wheels, stood with one footinside the track until the train started, and, after it was all over,rode away triumphantly, hanging to the steps of the hotel omnibus.

  After a while he began to thrill with the desire to know how it wouldfeel to run backward on the track in front of the moving engine. Hehad had a brief glimpse of the possibility of that bliss as he crossedthe track one day when the train was coming in; and the more he thoughtabout it, the surer he felt that some day he would have to do it. Hewas well acquainted by that time with the engines, and the engineerstoo, and his trick of standing astride the rail and looking up withsparkling, defiant eyes at the engine's noble front was only a sort ofpreparation for other deeds.

  One day he had assisted at the dismounting of the passengers, had seenthe last departing traveller disappear inside the cars, had had hisqueue pulled by the news agent, and a narrow escape from being knockedover by the baggage man's trunk van, when he started off at top speedto get in front of the engine before the train should start. A youngwoman with a baggage check in her hand was standing near an omnibuswaiting for the driver to come. Wing's headlong speed would havecarried him safely past her, but a big man with two suit-cases wasrushing toward him, and as he veered to one side he struck heavilyagainst the girl. The blow knocked her against the steps of theomnibus and sent Wing sprawling in the dust.

  A slender, trim-looking young man, who had got off the train and wasabout to enter the omnibus of another hotel, saw the collision andsprang to her assistance. Helping her to her feet, he asked anxiouslyif she was hurt, and then seized Wing's arm and gave him a littleshaking.

  "You young rascal!" he exclaimed. "Why don't you look where you aregoing?"

  "Oh, don't scold him, please!" the girl pleaded. "He did n't intend todo it, and I 'm not hurt at all. Wing, how do you do? Did it hurtyou?"

  Wing was indignantly tearing himself loose from the young man's handand was looking wishfully after the departing train and the lostopportunity.

  "Lemme go," he demanded. "No, didn't hurt."

  The young woman blushingly thanked the stranger as he helped her intothe vehicle. Then, instead of returning to the other omnibus, whichwas waiting for him, he shook his head at the driver and stepped inafter her. As they rattled up the street he found it difficult to keephis eyes off her slender, supple figure and the shining glory ofgolden-red hair that aureoled the clear, soft brilliance of her pinkand white complexion. When she looked up once and caught his look ofadmiration she blushed deeply and endeavored to disguise herembarrassment in lively talk with some people who sat near her. Thenewcomer saw that they were evidently old friends and inferred that shewas a resident of the town. From scraps of their talk that reached hisears he learned that her name was Annie Millner, and that she was aphysician's daughter.'

  The young man inscribed his name on the hotel register, "RobertEllison, Worcester, Mass.," and then sauntered out to take a look atthe town. He watched the omnibus from which he had just dismounted, asit stopped in front of a pretty cottage set back in some pleasantgrounds on the slope of the opposite hill, until he saw Miss Millnerenter the gate.

  "I guess I 'll like it better here than I expected to," was his thoughtas his eye followed her figure. "This air feels good, the sunshine isfine, and that's a glorious blue sky. They say I 'm likely to becomean invalid if I try to live East any longer, and so that's cut out.Well, a fellow could have plenty of out-door life here, and enjoy it,if there are many days like this. It looks as if there 'd be money inthese orchards too. I reckon Dr. Millner must live in that cottage.What an inviting looking place it is! I guess I 'd better go back tothe hotel and ask the clerk about the physicians here. I might needone sometime."

  Discreet inquiry of the hotel clerk as to the population of the town,resident and floating, its general healthfulness, the number ofhealth-seekers, their success, and the number and relative skill of thephysicians it supported finally elicited for Ellison all theinformation his present interest desired concerning Dr. Millner and hisfamily.

  He also learned much about the history of Tobin. In its early days ithad been a mining camp and, as Tobin's Gulch, had been rich and famous.Then, as the mines petered out, it had dwindled to poverty and two rowsof houses. But, after a long while, new people had begun to come.Some of them had planted miles upon miles of orchards and vineyards,others had come to be cured of bodily ills by its climate, at oncebracing and caressing, and still others, th
ere for a brief summersojourn, had spread the knowledge that it was a pleasant andpicturesque retreat. So the town had dropped the plebeian "Gulch" fromits name and as "Tobin" counted with ever increasing pride the hundredsof cars that carried its fruit from ocean to ocean and the growingnumbers of its health-seekers and summer visitors.

  "It looks good to me," was Ellison's inward comment as he walked up thestreet again. "I think I 'll look into this fruit business. Thatwould give me an out-door life, and there seems to be money in it.That's a neat cottage of Dr. Millner's. I 'll walk past and look atthe grounds. Hello, here comes that Chinee Kid--what 'd she call him?Wing, wasn't it? Queer-looking little critter, but she seemed to likehim. Hello, Wing! Where are you flying to now? Got over your bumpsyet?"

  But the Chinee Kid cast one sober, stupid look at Ellison's sociablecountenance, opened his mouth just wide enough to grunt "_No sabe_,"and hurried on.

  Ellison looked after him with a foolish little smile and exclaimedaloud, "Well, I 'll be hanged! If that is n't a kid!"

  He heard the sound of a girl's laugh, and turning quickly, saw a merryface surrounded by golden-red hair disappearing from a window of theMillner cottage. He blushed furiously, frowned and muttered an angrylittle word, as he thought, "That kid needs to be spanked." But,although he was smarting a little with the feeling that the boy hadmade him seem ridiculous in her eyes, his glance covertly searched herwindows as he walked on, hoping for another glimpse of the girlishfigure and the glowing hair.

  A year went by, and Ellison, brown and athletic-looking, was building apretty cottage on the crest of a gently sloping hill just outside thetown. Annie Millner, wearing a new ring and carrying a great happinessin her heart, went often to see how the cottage was progressing and howthe trees were growing. For the hill-slope was covered with thegray-green of young olive trees, the dense, dark foliage of youngoranges, and the stunted, scraggy boughs of the Japanese persimmon.His fruit ranch promised well, the day for their bridal was set, andthey were hopeful, glad, and happy.

  But Wing was the young man's implacable enemy. He neither forgot norforgave the shaking he had received at their first meeting, and herevenged himself for it as much as lay in his small power whenever hefound opportunity. He succeeded occasionally in making Ellison lookfoolish in his own eyes; and he, in consequence, disliked the child anddisapproved of the universal petting that was given him. Itparticularly annoyed him that Annie showed his small enemy so muchfavor, and he would sometimes think angrily, when irritated by sometrick of the Chinee Kid, that if she had more regard for his feelingsshe would not join in the general encouragement that was given to theheathen brat in being a public nuisance.

  As for Wing, if he had known, or could have understood what happinesshis childish sport had been instrumental in bringing to these twopeople, it is probable that his antipathy to Ellison would haveextended even to Annie, whom, as it was, he considered one of his bestfriends. But he could not know, nor could they, that he was theirkismet and that his small brown hands wound and unwound, tangled andstraightened, the threads of their lives.

  One day they were all three at the depot again. Wing, of course, wasthere in the discharge of his usual duties. Annie had walked down towelcome a friend whom she expected, and Ellison had come because itgave him an opportunity to be with her. As the railroad approached thetown from the west it passed through a deep cut, from which it came outon a low embankment, and rounded a sharp curve before it reached thestation, a few yards beyond. The roar of the oncoming train was borneto them on the wind and before it emerged from the cut a ridiculouslittle figure darted out of the crowd on the platform and raced downthe track to the curve. It was dressed in a Chinese blouse andtrousers of faded and dirty blue denim, while a pair of old Chineseslippers, partly covering the feet, left in full view two bare, brownheels.

  "There goes Wing!" exclaimed one man to another. "That kid 's going toget killed at this little trick of his some day."

  The train rushed at the curve with a shout that was thrown back fromthe hills, and the people on the platform held their breath--though tomany of them it was nothing new--as with flying feet and monkey-likeagility the Chinee Kid danced backward on the track. There was a briefvision of a pair of big, blue sleeves waving in the air, of a black,flying queue, and of a pair of twinkling feet, and then with sparklingeyes, a triumphant countenance and a loud "Ki-yi!" Wing leaped to theplatform, the engine scarcely a yard behind him.

  "Is it lots of fun, Wing?" said Annie, smiling at him indulgently.

  "Bet your boots it is!" he shouted as he darted off to inspect thedismounting passengers.

  "See here, Wing," said Ellison, putting his hand in a kindly way on theboy's shoulder, "you mustn't do that! You'll get killed at it someday."

  Wing looked up at him with an uncomprehending stare, wriggled fromunder his detaining hand, stopped long enough to shake his head with astolid "_No sabe_," and then dodged away.

  Annie had heard the little dialogue and now turned to Ellison with amerry laugh. Her friend had not come, and as they walked back togethershe began to rally him about Wing's refusal to understand anything hesaid. It nettled him slightly and he replied that people made entirelytoo much of the little ape, and that if they would teach him bettermanners instead of petting him so much, it would be a good thing forhim as well as for the public comfort.

  Then Annie took up his case rather warmly and declared that he was acute little thing, and that his manners were all right if he wastreated with good manners in the first place. The consequence was thatby the time they reached her gate they were deep in the luridentanglements of a lovers' quarrel.

  The previous day she had taken a horseback ride with a man of whomEllison strongly disapproved. He had intended to explain the matter toher calmly and tell her just what kind of man the other was, and why itwas unwise for her to accept his attentions. But in the heat of temperengendered by their quarrel about Wing, he lost his bearings, and whathe had meant should be a request for her not to show the man any favoragain became very like an explicit command.

  Annie asked him sarcastically if he thought he had bought with hisengagement ring a slave who was never to open her mouth unless he gaveher leave. Then, feeling a bit ashamed of his vehemence and mentallyfumbling for words of explanation, he began to say something about what"self-respecting girls" should do. Annie flashed a blazing look athim, slammed the gate, and left him alone on the sidewalk. A littlelater he saw the objectionable man making a bargain with Wing aboutcarrying a note, and with a sore and angry heart he watched the shabbyhat and the long queue travel up the hill to the Millner home.

  While he was at work among his trees that afternoon he saw them ridepast. He noted the defiant poise of Annie's head, which did not turnby so much as a hair's breadth toward the cottage and the trees andhim, but he was not near enough to see that her eyes were red and thatshe bit her lip to control its trembling. So he wrote a letter to herthat evening saying that evidently they had made a mistake; and an hourlater he had the engagement ring in his pocket and a great bitternessin his heart.

  Two days afterward, as Annie sat on the veranda of a friend's housenear the depot she saw the hotel omnibus coming down the street withEllison in it. "Why, there's Robert!" she exclaimed.

  "Yes," said her friend, looking at her curiously, "he 's going East.Did n't you know it?"

  Instantly all of Annie's pride gave way. She was in the wrong, shetold herself, and she would ask him to forgive her. She would send anote to him at the station and ask him not to go away without seeingher.

  "I 'll have time," she thought, "for they said the train is a fewminutes late to-day and I 'll get Wing to carry it over to the station.There he is now, waiting at the curve."

  She hurriedly pencilled a few words upon a scrap of paper and, foldingit as she went, ran down the steps and up a side street parallel withthe railroad, and then climbed the low embankment upon which the boystood.

  Wing was waiting in
the middle of the track for the train and theecstasy of his daily performance. In the meantime he was holding outat arm's length and considering with proud and satisfied eyes a big,artificial spider and web which had that morning been given to him byone of the ladies at the hotel.

  "Wing," she called, "I want you to run back to the station and givethis note to Mr. Ellison. You 'll see him there on the platform, or,perhaps, in the baggage room. You 'll have plenty of time, for thetrain 's late today. Please go quickly, Wing, for I want him to havethe note at once."

  The train was already rumbling in the deep cut just beyond the turn,but the wind was blowing strongly toward it, and neither of them heardthe fateful sound. The high wind caught her dress and blew it againstthe spider in the boy's hand. It tangled the toy in the folds andwrenched it from his fingers and then caught the hem of her gown uponthe splitting edge of a worn rail. As she stooped to loose it theterrible front of the engine appeared, rounding the curve.

  Wing looked in blank amazement at his empty fingers and then, as he sawhis plaything hanging to the folds of her dress, he sprang after itexclaiming, "My bug! My bug!" As he seized it again he saw theapproaching train, and, his mind bent on what he was intending to do,turned to begin his usual backward race. Annie, stooping to loose herdress, with her back to the approaching train, was not yet aware of theoncoming doom. Her gown blew again across his legs, and to freehimself he gave her a little push. With the warning shriek of theengine in her ears and darkness surging over her brain she fell justoutside the track and rolled down the sloping embankment as far as herskirt, held beneath the wheels of the engine, allowed.

  But for the Chinee Kid there was no such escape. The iron hoof of theengine was upon him as he made his first backward leap. When theypicked up his little, mangled body the spider was still grasped in hisbrown fist.

  The crowd on the station platform had seen it all--had seen him, as theengine rounded the curve, turn to Annie and push her off the track,thus saving her life at the cost of his own.

  The townspeople persuaded his parents to let them give him a publicfuneral, to which all Tobin turned out, with tears and flowers andresolutions praising the little boy in high-sounding words for hisheroic deed. A public subscription was taken up for the benefit ofWing's parents, to which Annie's father and lover and all her friendsand everybody who had liked and petted the child contributed soliberally that his father and mother took his remains and sailed backto China.

  When Ellison, from the platform, saw Annie's danger everything left hisheart save absorbing love for her, and with a white face andalarm-distended eyes he dashed across the track and had her in his armsbefore the others had recovered from their brief paralysis of horror.

  They were married as soon as Wing's obsequies were over. And now, ifyou ever pass through Tobin and will look for that sunny hillside withthe olive and orange trees climbing its slope and the pretty cottage onits crest, you will see a home in which Wing's memory is enshrined withall possible love and honor and gratitude.

  You see, they do not know that it was all on account of his "bug."Neither do they know that, small, brown, Chinee Kid though he was, hehad stood in their lives for Fate.