"Gee!--that valley of the moon's goin' to be some valley," Billy
meditated, flicking a fly away with his whip from Hattie's side.
"Think we'll ever find it?"
Saxon nodded her head with great certitude.
"Just as the Jews found the promised land, and the Mormons Utah,
and the Pioneers California. You remember the last advice we got
when we left Oakland' ''Tis them that looks that finds.'"
CHAPTER XV
Ever north, through a fat and flourishing rejuvenated land,
stopping at the towns of Willows, Red Bluff and Redding, crossing
the counties of Colusa, Glenn, Tehama, and Shasta, went the
spruce wagon drawn by the dappled chestnuts with cream-colored
manes and tails. Billy picked up only three horses for shipment,
although he visited many farms; and Saxon talked with the women
while he looked over the stock with the men. And Saxon grew the
more convinced that the valley she sought lay not there.
At Redding they crossed the Sacramento on a cable ferry, and made
a day's scorching traverse through rolling foot-hills and flat
tablelands. The heat grew more insupportable, and the trees and
shrubs were blasted and dead. Then they came again to the
Sacramento, where the great smelters of Kennett explained the
destruction of the vegetation.
They climbed out of the smelting town, where eyrie houses perched
insecurely on a precipitous landscape. It was a broad,
well-engineered road that took them up a grade miles long and
plunged down into the Canyon of the Sacramento. The road,
rock-surfaced and easy-graded, hewn out of the canyon wall, grew
so narrow that Billy worried for fear of meeting opposite-bound
teams. Far below, the river frothed and flowed over pebbly
shallows, or broke tumultuously over boulders and cascades, in
its race for the great valley they had left behind.
Sometimes, on the wider stretches of road, Saxon drove and Billy
walked to lighten the load. She insisted on taking her turns at
walking, and when he breathed the panting mares on the steep, and
Saxon stood by their heads caressing them and cheering them,
Billy's joy was too deep for any turn of speech as he gazed at
his beautiful horses and his glowing girl, trim and colorful in
her golden brown corduroy, the brown corduroy calves swelling
sweetly under the abbreviated slim skirt. And when her answering
look of happiness came to him--a sudden dimness in her straight
gray eyes--he was overmastered by the knowledge that he must say
something or burst.
"O, you kid!" he cried.
And with radiant face she answered, "O, you kid!"
They camped one night in a deep dent in the canyon, where was
snuggled a box-factory village, and where a toothless ancient,
gazing with faded eyes at their traveling outfit, asked: "Be you
showin'?"
They passed Castle Crags, mighty-bastioned and glowing red
against the palpitating blue sky. They caught their first glimpse
of Mt. Shasta, a rose-tinted snow-peak rising, a sunset dream,
between and beyond green interlacing walls of canyon--a landmark
destined to be with them for many days. At unexpected turns,
after mounting some steep grade, Shasta would appear again, still
distant, now showing two peaks and glacial fields of shimmering
white. Miles and miles and days and days they climbed, with
Shasta ever developing new forms and phases in her summer snows.
"A moving picture in the sky," said Billy at last.
"Oh,--it is all so beautiful," sighed Saxon. "But there are no
moon-valleys here."
They encountered a plague of butterflies, and for days drove
through untold millions of the fluttering beauties that covered
the road with uniform velvet-brown. And ever the road seemed to
rise under the noses of the snorting mares, filling the air with
noiseless flight, drifting down the breeze in clouds of brown and
yellow soft-flaked as snow, and piling in mounds against the
fences, ever driven to float helplessly on the irrigation ditches
along the roadside. Hazel and Hattie soon grew used to them
though Possum never ceased being made frantic.
"Huh!--who ever heard of butterfly-broke horses?" Billy chaffed.
"That's worth fifty bucks more on their price."
"Wait till you get across the Oregon line into the Rogue River
Valley," they were told. "There's God's Paradise--climate,
scenery, and fruit-farming; fruit ranches that yield two hundred
per cent. on a valuation of five hundred dollars an acre."
"Gee!" Billy said, when he had driven on out of hearing; "that's
too rich for our digestion."
And Saxon said, "I don't know about apples in the valley of the
moon, but I do know that the yield is ten thousand per cent. of
happiness on a valuation of one Billy, one Saxon, a Hazel, a
Hattie, and a Possum."
Through Siskiyou County and across high mountains, they came to
Ashland and Medford and camped beside the wild Rogue River.
"This is wonderful and glorious," pronounced Saxon; "but it is
not the valley of the moon."
"Nope, it ain't the valley of the moon," agreed Billy, and he
said it on the evening of the day he hooked a monster steelhead,
standing to his neck in the ice-cold water of the Rogue and
fighting for forty minutes, with screaming reel, ere he drew his
finny prize to the bank and with the scalp-yell of a Comanche
jumped and clutched it by the gills.
"'Them that looks finds,'" predicted Saxon, as they drew north
out of Grant's Pass, and held north across the mountains and
fruitful Oregon valleys.
One day, in camp by the Umpqua River, Billy bent over to begin
skinning the first deer he had ever shot. He raised his eyes to
Saxon and remarked:
"If I didn't know California, I guess Oregon'd suit me from the
ground up."
In the evening, replete with deer meat, resting on his elbow and
smoking his after-supper cigarette, he said:
"Maybe they ain't no valley of the moon. An' if they ain't, what
of it? We could keep on this way forever. I don't ask nothing
better."
"There is a valley of the moon," Saxon answered soberly. "And we
are going to find it. We've got to. Why Billy, it would never do,
never to settle down. There would be no little Hazels and little
Hatties, nor little . . . Billies--"
"Nor little Saxons," Billy interjected.
"Nor little Possums," she hurried on, nodding her head and
reaching out a caressing hand to where the fox terrier was
ecstatically gnawing a deer-rib. A vicious snarl and a wicked
snap that barely missed her fingers were her reward.
"Possum!" she cried in sharp reproof, again extending her hand.
"Don't," Billy warned. "He can't help it, and he's likely to get
you next time."
Even more compelling was the menacing threat that Possum growled,
his jaws close-guarding the bone, eyes blazing insanely, the hair
rising stiffly on his neck.
"It's a good dog that sticks up for its bone," Billy championed.
&nb
sp; "I wouldn't care to own one that didn't."
"But it's my Possum," Saxon protested. "And he loves me. Besides,
he must love me more than an old bone. And he must mind
me.--Here, you, Possum, give me that bone! Give me that bone,
sir!"
Her hand went out gingerly, and the growl rose in volume and key
till it culminated in a snap.
"I tell you it's instinct," Billy repeated. "He does love you,
but he just can't help doin' it."
"He's got a right to defend his bones from strangers but not from
his mother," Saxon argued. "I shall make him give up that bone to
me."
"Fox terriers is awful highstrung, Saxon. You'll likely get him
hysterical."
But she was obstinately set in her purpose. She picked up a short
stick of firewood.
"Now, sir, give me that bone."
She threatened with the stick, and the dog's growling became
ferocious. Again he snapped, then crouched back over his bone.
Saxon raised the stick as if to strike him, and he suddenly
abandoned the bone, rolled over on his back at her feet, four
legs in the air, his ears lying meekly back, his eyes swimming
and eloquent with submission and appeal.
"My God!" Billy breathed in solemn awe. "Look at it!--presenting
his solar plexus to you, his vitals an' his life, all defense
down, as much as sayin': 'Here I am. Stamp on me. Kick the life
outa me.' I love you, I am your slave, but I just can't help
defendin' my bone. My instinct's stronger'n me. Kill me, but I
can't help it."
Saxon was melted. Tears were in her eyes as she stooped and
gathered the mite of an animal in her arms. Possum was in a
frenzy of agitation, whining, trembling, writhing, twisting,
licking her face, all for forgiveness.
"Heart of gold with a rose in his mouth," Saxon crooned, burying
her face in the soft and quivering bundle of sensibilities.
"Mother is sorry. She'll never bother you again that way. There,
there, little love. See? There's your bone. Take it."
She put him down, but he hesitated between her and the bone,
patently looking to her for surety of permission, yet continuing
to tremble in the terrible struggle between duty and desire that
seemed tearing him asunder. Not until she repeated that it was
all right and nodded her head consentingly did he go to the bone.
And once, a minute later, he raised his head with a sudden
startle and gazed inquiringly at her. She nodded and smiled, and
Possum, with a happy sigh of satisfaction, dropped his head down
to the precious deer-rib.
"That Mercedes was right when she said men fought over jobs like
dogs over bones," Billy enunciated slowly. "It's instinct. Why, I
couldn't no more help reaching my fist to the point of a scab's
jaw than could Possum from snappin' at you. They's no explainin'
it. What a man has to he has to. The fact that he does a thing
shows he had to do it whether he can explain it or not. You
remember Hall couldn't explain why he stuck that stick between
Timothy McManus's legs in the foot race. What a man has to, he
has to. That's all I know about it. I never had no earthly reason
to beat up that lodger we had, Jimmy Harmon. He was a good guy,
square an' all right. But I just had to, with the strike goin' to
smash, an' everything so bitter inside me that I could taste it.
I never told you, but I saw 'm once after I got out--when my arms
was mendin'. I went down to the roundhouse an' waited for 'm to
come in off a run, an' apologized to 'm. Now why did I apologize?
I don't know, except for the same reason I punched 'm--I just had
to."
And so Billy expounded the why of like in terms of realism, in
the camp by the Umpqua River, while Possum expounded it, in
similar terms of fang and appetite, on the rib of deer.
CHAPTER XVI
With Possum on the seat beside her, Saxon drove into the town of
Roseburg. She drove at a walk. At the back of the wagon were tied
two heavy young work-horses. Behind, half a dozen more marched
free, and the rear was brought up by Billy, astride a ninth
horse. All these he shipped from Roseburg to the West Oakland
stables.
It was in the Umpqua Valley that they heard the parable of the
white sparrow. The farmer who told it was elderly and
flourishing. His farm was a model of orderliness and system.
Afterwards, Billy heard neighbors estimate his wealth at a
quarter of a million.
"You've heard the story of the farmer and the white sparrow'" he
asked Billy, at dinner.
"Never heard of a white sparrow even," Billy answered.
"I must say they're pretty rare," the farmer owned. "But here's
the story: Once there was a farmer who wasn't making much of a
success. Things just didn't seem to go right, till at last, one
day, he heard about the wonderful white sparrow. It seems that
the white sparrow comes out only just at daybreak with the first
light of dawn, and that it brings all kinds of good luck to the
farmer that is fortunate enough to catch it. Next morning our
farmer was up at daybreak, and before, looking for it. And, do
you know, he sought for it continually, for months and months,
and never caught even a glimpse of it." Their host shook his
head. "No; he never found it, but he found so many things about
the farm needing attention, and which he attended to before
breakfast, that before he knew it the farm was prospering, and it
wasn't long before the mortgage was paid off and he was starting
a bank account."
That afternoon, as they drove along, Billy was plunged in a deep
reverie.
"Oh, I got the point all right," he said finally. "An' yet I
ain't satisfied. Of course, they wasn't a white sparrow, but by
getting up early an' attendin' to things he'd been slack about
before--oh, I got it all right. An' yet, Saxon, if that's what a
farmer's life means, I don't want to find no moon valley. Life
ain't hard work. Daylight to dark, hard at it--might just as well
be in the city. What's the difference? Al' the time you've got to
yourself is for sleepin', an' when you're sleepin' you're not
enjoyin' yourself. An' what's it matter where you sleep, you're
deado. Might as well be dead an' done with it as work your head
off that way. I'd sooner stick to the road, an' shoot a deer an'
catch a trout once in a while, an' lie on my back in the shade,
an' laugh with you an' have fun with you, an' . . . an' go
swimmin'. An' I 'm a willin' worker, too. But they's all the
difference in the world between a decent amount of work an'
workin' your head off."
Saxon was in full accord. She looked back on her years of toil
and contrasted them with the joyous life she had lived on the
road.
"We don't want to be rich," she said. "Let them hunt their white
sparrows in the Sacramento islands and the irrigation valleys.
When we get up early in the valley of the moon, it will be to
hear the birds sing and sing with them. And if we work h
ard at
times, it will be only so that we'll have more time to play. And
when you go swimming I 'm going with you. And we'll play so hard
that we'll be glad to work for relaxation."
"I 'm gettin' plumb dried out," Billy announced, mopping the
sweat from his sunburned forehead. "What d'ye say we head for the
coast?"
West they turned, dropping down wild mountain gorges from the
height of land of the interior valleys. So fearful was the road,
that, on one stretch of seven miles, they passed ten broken-down
automobiles. Billy would not force the mares and promptly camped
beside a brawling stream from which he whipped two trout at a
time. Here, Saxon caught her first big trout. She had been
accustomed to landing them up to nine and ten inches, and the
screech of the reel when the big one was hooked caused her to cry
out in startled surprise. Billy came up the riffle to her and
gave counsel. Several minutes later, cheeks flushed and eyes
dancing with excitement, Saxon dragged the big fellow carefully
from the water's edge into the dry sand. Here it threw the hook
out and flopped tremendously until she fell upon it and captured
it in her hands.
"Sixteen inches," Billy said, as she held it up proudly for
inspection. "--Hey!--what are you goin' to do?"
"Wash off the sand, of course," was her answer.
"Better put it in the basket," he advised, then closed his mouth
and grimly watched.
She stooped by the side of the stream and dipped in the splendid
fish. It flopped, there was a convulsive movement on her part,
and it was gone.
"Oh!" Saxon cried in chagrin.
"Them that finds should hold," quoth Billy.
"I don't care," she replied. "It was a bigger one than you ever
caught anyway."
"Oh, I 'm not denyin' you're a peach at fishin'," he drawled.
"You caught me, didn't you?"
"I don't know about that," she retorted. "Maybe it was like the
man who was arrested for catching trout out of season. His
defense was self defense."
Billy pondered, but did not see.
"The trout attacked him," she explained.
Billy grinned. Fifteen minutes later he said:
"You sure handed me a hot one."
The sky was overcast, and, as they drove along the bank of the
Coquille River, the fog suddenly enveloped them.
"Whoof!" Billy exhaled joyfully. "Ain't it great! I can feel
myself moppin' it up like a dry sponge. I never appreciated fog
before."
Saxon held out her arms to receive it, making motions as if she
were bathing in the gray mist.
"I never thought I'd grow tired of the sun," she said; "but we've
had more than our share the last few weeks."
"Ever since we hit the Sacramento Valley," Billy affirmed. "Too
much sun ain't good. I've worked that out. Sunshine is like
liquor. Did you ever notice how good you felt when the sun come
out after a week of cloudy weather. Well, that sunshine was just
like a jolt of whiskey. Had the same effect. Made you feel good
all over. Now, when you're swimmin', an' come out an' lay in the
sun, how good you feel. That's because you're lappin' up a
sun-cocktail. But suppose you lay there in the sand a couple of
hours. You don't feel so good. You're so slow-movin' it takes you
a long time to dress. You go home draggin' your legs an' feelin'
rotten, with all the life sapped outa you. What's that? It's the
katzenjammer. You've been soused to the ears in sunshine, like so
much whiskey, an' now you're payin' for it. That's straight.
That's why fog in the climate is best."
"Then we've been drunk for months," Saxon said. "And now we're
going to sober up."
"You bet. Why, Saxon, I can do two days' work in one in this
climate.--Look at the mares. Blame me if they ain't perkin' up
already."
Vainly Saxon's eye roved the pine forest in search of her beloved
redwoods. They would find them down in California, they were told