The Black Creek Stopping-House | Page 7

Curry's Landing, Fred and Evelyn Brydon, standing on the
narrow deck, felt the grip of the place and the season. Even the
captain's picturesque language, as he directed the activities of the
"rousters" who pulled the boat ashore, seemed less like profanity and
more like figure of speech.
The twins had made several unfruitful journeys to the Landing for their
brother and his wife, for they began to go two days before the
"Cheyenne" was expected, and had been going twice a day since, all of
which had been carefully entered in their account book!
Their appearance as they stood on the shore, sneering at the captain's
directions to his men from the superior height of their nautical
experience, was warlike in the extreme, although they were clothed in
the peaceful overalls and smock of the farmer and also had submitted to
a haircut at the earnest instigation of Mrs. Corbett, who threatened to
cut off all bread-making unless her wishes were complied with!
Evelyn, who had never seen her brothers-in-law, looked upon them
now in wonder, and she could see their appearance was somewhat of a
surprise to Fred, who had not seen them for many years, and who
remembered them only as the heroes of his childhood days.
They greeted Fred hilariously, but to his wife they spoke timidly, for,
brave as they were in facing Spanish pirates, they were timid to the
point of flight in the presence of women.

As they drove home in the high-boxed wagon, the twins endeavored to
keep up the breezy enthusiasm that had characterized their letters. They
raved about the freedom of the West; they went into fresh raptures over
the view, and almost deranged their respiratory organs in their praises
of the air. They breathed in deep breaths of the ambient atmosphere,
chewed it up with loud smacks of enjoyment, and then blew it out,
snorting like whales. Evelyn, who was not without a sense of humor,
would have enjoyed it all, and laughed at them, even if she could not
laugh with them, if she could have forgotten that they were her
husband's brothers, but it is very hard to see the humorous in the
grotesque behavior of those to whom we are "bound by the ties of
duty," if not affection.
A good supper at the Black Creek Stopping-House and the hearty
hospitality of Mrs. Corbett restored Evelyn's good spirits. She noticed,
too, that the twins tamed down perceptibly in Mrs. Corbett's presence.
Mrs. Corbett insisted on Fred and his wife spending the night at the
Stopping-House.
"Don't go to your own house until morning," she said. "Things look a
lot different when the sun is shining, and out here, you see, Mrs. Fred,
we have to do without and forget so many things that we bank a lot on
the sun. You people who live in cities, you've got gas and big lamps,
and I guess it doesn't bother you much whether the sun rises or doesn't
rise, or what he does, you're independent; but with us it is different. The
sun is the best thing we've got, and we go by him considerable.
Providence knows how it is with us, and lets us have lots of the sun,
winter and summer."
Evelyn gladly consented to stay.
Mrs. Corbett, observing Evelyn's soft white hands, decided that she was
not accustomed to work, and the wonder of how it would all turn out
was heavy upon her kind Irish heart as she said goodbye to her next
morning.
A big basket of bread and other provisions was put into the wagon at

the last minute. "Maybe your stove won't be drawin' just right at the
first," said Maggie Corbett, apologetically. As she watched Evelyn's hat
of red roses fading in the distance she said softly to herself: "Sure I do
hope it's true that He tempers the wind to the shorn lamb, tho' there's
some that says that ain't in the Bible at all. But it sounds nice and kind
anyway, and yon poor lamb needs all the help He can give her. Him
and me, we'll have to do the best we can for her!"
Mrs. Corbett went over to see her new neighbor two or three days after.
In response to her knock on the rough lumber door, a thin little voice
called to her to enter, which she did.
On the bare floor stood an open trunk from which a fur-trimmed pale
pink opera cloak hung carelessly. Beside the trunk in an attitude of
homesickness huddled the young woman, hair dishevelled, eyes red.
Her dress of green silk, embroidered stockings and beaded slippers
looked out of place and at variance with her primitive surroundings.
When Mrs. Corbett entered the room she sprang up hastily and
apologized for