The Claim Jumpers: A Romance

A free download from http://www.dertz.in ----dertz ebooks publisher !----

The Claim Jumpers: A Romance

The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Claim Jumpers, by Stewart Edward White This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: The Claim Jumpers
Author: Stewart Edward White
Release Date: February 4, 2004 [EBook #10942]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CLAIM JUMPERS ***

Produced by Suzanne Shell and PG Distributed Proofreaders

THE CLAIM JUMPERS
A ROMANCE
BY
STEWART EDWARD WHITE

1901

CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I.
--JIM LESLIE WRITES A LETTER II.--THE STORY-BOOK WEST III.--BENNINGTON HUNTS FOR GOLD AND FINDS A KISS IV.--THE SUN FAIRY V.--THE SPIRIT MOUNTAIN VI.--BENNINGTON AS A MAN OF BUSINESS VII.--THE MEETING AT THE ROCK VIII.--AN ADVENTURE IN THE NIGHT IX.--THE HEAVENS OPENED X.--THE WORLD MADE YOUNG XI.--AND HE DID EAT XII.--OLD MIZZOU RESIGNS XIII.--THE SPIRES OF STONE XIV.--THE PIONEER'S PICNIC XV.--THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN XVI.--A NOON DINNER XVII.--NOBLESSE OBLIGE XVIII.--THE CLAIM JUMPERS XIX.--BENNINGTON PROVES GAME XX.--MASKS OFF XXI.--THE LAND OF VISIONS XXII.--FLOWER O' THE WORLD
CHAPTER I
JIM LESLIE WRITES A LETTER
In a fifth-story sitting room of a New York boarding house four youths were holding a discussion. The sitting room was large and square, and in the wildest disorder, which was, however, sublimated into a certain system by an illuminated device to the effect that one should "Have a Place for Everything, and then there'll be one Place you won't have to look." Easels and artists' materials thrust back to the wall sufficiently advertised the art student, and perhaps explained the untidiness.
Two of the occupants of the room, curled up on elevated window ledges, were emitting clouds of tobacco smoke and nursing their knees; the other two, naked to the waist, sat on a couple of ordinary bedroom mattresses deposited carefully in the vacant centre of the apartment. They were eager, alert-looking young men, well-muscled, curly of hair, and possessing in common an unabashed carriage of the head which, more plainly than any mere facial resemblance, proved them brothers. They, too, were nursing their knees.
"He must be an unadorned ass," remarked one of the occupants of the window seats, in answer to some previous statement.
"He is not," categorically denied a youth of the mattresses. "My dear Hench, you make no distinctions. I've been talking about the boy's people and his bringing up and the way he acts, whereupon you fly off on a tangent and coolly conclude things about the boy himself. It is not only unkind, but stupid."
Hench laughed. "You amuse me, Jeems," said he; "elucidate."
Jeems let go his knees. The upper part of his body, thus deprived of support, fell backward on the mattress. He then clasped his hands behind his head, and stared at the ceiling.
"Listen, ye multitude," he began; "I'm an artist. So are you. I'm also a philosopher. You are not. Therefore, I'll deign to instruct you. Ben de Laney has a father and a mother. The father is pompous, conceited, and a bore. The mother is pompous, conceited, and a bore. The father uses language of whose absolutely vapid correctness Addison would have been proud. So does the mother, unless she forgets, in which case the old man calls her down hard. They, are rich and of a good social position. The latter worries them, because they have to keep up its dignity."
"They succeed," interrupted the other brother fervently, "they succeed. I dined there once. After that I went around to the waxworks to get cheered up a bit."
"Quite so, Bertie," replied the philosopher; "but you interrupted me just before I got to my point. The poor old creatures had been married many years before Bennie came to cheer them up. Naturally, Bennie has been the whole thing ever since. He is allowed a few privileges, but always under the best auspices. The rest of the time he stays at home, is told what or what not a gentleman should do, and is instructed in the genealogy of the de Laneys."
"The mother is always impressing him with the fact that he is a de Laney on both sides," interpolated Bert.
"Important, if true, as the newspapers say," remarked the other young man on the window ledge. "What constitutes a de Laney?"
"Hereditary lack of humour, Beck, my boy. Well, the result is that poor Bennie is a sort of----" the speaker hesitated for his word.
"'Willy boy,'" suggested Beck, mildly.
"Something of the sort, but not exactly. A 'willy boy' never has ideas. Bennie has."
"Such as?"
"Well, for one thing, he wants to get away. He doesn't seem quite content with his job of idle aristocrat. I believe he's been pestering the old man to send him West. Old man doesn't approve."
"'That