Sally of Missouri | Page 4

voice and manner had remained true.
"I wonder," said Steering, almost sighing, "if you will mind a little of
my company. The road is terribly lonely, sir. The country is terribly
lonely in fact."

"Yes, sair, a tr-r-ue word that. It is lonely. But sair, what will you of
this particulaire portion? It is vair' yong in the Tigmores. It cannot be
populate' in a day, a year. You, sair, come from the East, hein? Sair,
relativement, effort against effort, they have not done as much in the
East in feefty years as we have done in the Southwest in
twenty,--believe that, sair." It was that same feeling for the State, that
quick, leaping passion of nativity that Steering had thus far found in
every Missourian with whom he had come in contact.
"You are a Missourian, I see," said Steering, to keep his companion
talking along the line of this enlivening enthusiasm.
"Indeed, sair, yes. From that Saint Louis--François Placide DeLassus
Bernique, at your service."
"Thank you. My name is Steering, from New York, if you please, but
very deeply interested in Missouri just now, sir."
From that on they made easy progress into acquaintance. Bernique
proved talkative, full of anecdotes about Missouri's past, and full of
belief in her future. In his rich loquacity he roamed the history of the
State painstakingly for the edification of Steering, as one who stood at
Missouri's gates, inquiring of her true inwardness. He told Missouri's
history back to Spain and France, forward to unspeakable splendour.
He was intelligent, naïve, unusual. Steering, responsive to the attraction
that was by and by to hold them strongly together, listened delightedly.
"Yessair,"--through Bernique's speech ran a reminiscence of his native
tongue, faint, sweet, fleeting, like the thought of home,--"yessair, it is I
know the fashion in the eastern States to considaire all the West as vair'
yong countree, and it is tr-r-ue, sair, that you, par example, have come
upon the most yong part of thees gr-r-eat State of Missouri, but it is to
be remembaire that this Missouri is not all rocks and wood, uncultivate',
standing toward the future, but that her story date back to a remoter
period and a fuller and finer civilisation, in that day when France and
Spain held sway over the province of Louisiana, than does the story of
many of the eastern States who hold this countree new, raw, uncivilise'.
I myself,"--continued the speaker, spreading out one slender hand with

an exquisite grace,--"have gr-r-own up in this State of Missouri, at that
St. Louis, with the most profound convincement, aftaire much travel
and observation, that for elegance we have in that city the most to it
belong people in the United States of America, yessair!"
"Ah, well," admitted Steering, borne along rapidly on the vehement
current of Bernique's ardour, "with your sort of spirit in the people of
Missouri, whatever she was and whatever she is can be but a mighty
promise of what she will become----"
"Ah, there you have it, the note!" interrupted François Placide
DeLassus Bernique eagerly, "What she will become! That is the
gr-r-and thought, sair. I who say it have preserve' my belief in what she
will become through the discouragement ter-r-ible. I who speak have
prospec' this land from end to end. I know her largesse. Believe me,
sair, the tr-r-easures that were sought by the Castilian knights of old
through all thees parts are indeed to be found here,--not the white
silvaire of Castilian dreams, but iron! Coppaire! Lead! Zinc!"
"I suppose," ventured Steering, "that it would be foolish to hope for
deposits in this part of the State similar to the deposits about Joplin, and
all through the thirty-mile stretch?"
"Pouf!" Old Bernique made one of his pretty gestures, but said nothing.
"You have," went on Steering, "you have to the west here the Canaan
Tigmores, Mr. Bernique?"
"Eh? Yessair, the Canaan Tigmores," repeated old Bernique, looking
out over the ridges of hills and the flats listlessly; so listlessly that, by
one of those flashes of intuitive perception that light us far along
waiting paths, Steering knew suddenly that he had to deal with a man
whose experience had somehow crossed the Canaan Tigmores.--"And
also, Mistaire Steering, we have to the far south the Boston Range, in
Arkansas, and far to the west the Kiamichi, in the Territoree."
"Yes, but about these Canaan Tigmores, Mr. Bernique," insisted
Steering, not at all deflected by Bernique's effort, "what about your

Canaan Tigmores, Mr. Bernique?" Steering's experience with the
French Missourian had been too fragmentary for anything but
conjecture to come of it, and his own plans were too immature and too
heavily conditioned for him to project them directly, but he had a
feeling that he should want to know Bernique better some fine day,