第4章 CHAPTER I(2)

Water was the only free boon denied this Garden of Eden;what was necessary for irrigation had to be brought from a mining ditch at great expense,and was of insufficient quantity.In this emergency Mulrady thought of sinking an artesian well on the sunny slope beside his house;not,however,without serious consultation and much objection from his Spanish patron.With great austerity Don Ramon pointed out that this trifling with the entrails of the earth was not only an indignity to Nature almost equal to shaft-sinking and tunneling,but was a disturbance of vested interests."I and my fathers,San Diego rest them!"said Don Ramon,crossing himself,"were content with wells and cisterns,filled by Heaven at its appointed seasons;the cattle,dumb brutes though they were,knew where to find water when they wanted it.But thou sayest truly,"he added,with a sigh,"that was before streams and rain were choked with hellish engines,and poisoned with their spume.Go on,friend Mulrady,dig and bore if thou wilt,but in a seemly fashion,and not with impious earthquakes of devilish gunpowder."With this concession Alvin Mulrady began to sink his first artesian shaft.Being debarred the auxiliaries of steam and gunpowder,the work went on slowly.The market garden did not suffer meantime,as Mulrady had employed two Chinamen to take charge of the ruder tillage,while he superintended the engineering work of the well.

This trifling incident marked an epoch in the social condition of the family.Mrs.Mulrady at once assumed a conscious importance among her neighbors.She spoke of her husband's "men";she alluded to the well as "the works";she checked the easy frontier familiarity of her customers with pretty Mary Mulrady,her seventeen-year-old daughter.Simple Alvin Mulrady looked with astonishment at this sudden development of the germ planted in all feminine nature to expand in the slightest sunshine of prosperity.

"Look yer,Malviny;ain't ye rather puttin'on airs with the boys that want to be civil to Mamie?Like as not one of 'em may be makin'up to her already.""You don't mean to say,Alvin Mulrady,"responded Mrs.Mulrady,with sudden severity,"that you ever thought of givin'your daughter to a common miner,or that I'm goin'to allow her to marry out of our own set?""Our own set!"echoed Mulrady feebly,blinking at her in astonishment,and then glancing hurriedly across at his freckle-faced son and the two Chinamen at work in the cabbages."Oh,you know what I mean,"said Mrs.Mulrady sharply;"the set that we move in.The Alvarados and their friends!Doesn't the old Don come here every day,and ain't his son the right age for Mamie?And ain't they the real first families here--all the same as if they were noblemen?No,leave Mamie to me,and keep to your shaft;there never was a man yet had the least sabe about these things,or knew what was due to his family."Like most of his larger minded,but feebler equipped sex,Mulrady was too glad to accept the truth of the latter proposition,which left the meannesses of life to feminine manipulation,and went off to his shaft on the hillside.But during that afternoon he was perplexed and troubled.He was too loyal a husband not to be pleased with this proof of an unexpected and superior foresight in his wife,although he was,like all husbands,a little startled by it.He tried to dismiss it from his mind.But looking down from the hillside upon his little venture,where gradual increase and prosperity had not been beyond his faculties to control and understand,he found himself haunted by the more ambitious projects of his helpmate.From his own knowledge of men,he doubted if Don Ramon,any more than himself,had ever thought of the possibility of a matrimonial connection between the families.He doubted if he would consent to it.And unfortunately it was this very doubt that,touching his own pride as a self-made man,made him first seriously consider his wife's proposition.He was as good as Don Ramon,any day!With this subtle feminine poison instilled in his veins,carried completely away by the logic of his wife's illogical premises,he almost hated his old benefactor.He looked down upon the little Garden of Eden,where his Eve had just tempted him with the fatal fruit,and felt a curious consciousness that he was losing its simple and innocent enjoyment forever.

Happily,about this time Don Ramon died.It is not probable that he ever knew the amiable intentions of Mrs.Mulrady in regard to his son,who now succeeded to the paternal estate,sadly partitioned by relatives and lawsuits.The feminine Mulradys attended the funeral,in expensive mourning from Sacramento;even the gentle Alvin was forced into ready-made broadcloth,which accented his good-natured but unmistakably common presence.Mrs.

Mulrady spoke openly of her "loss";declared that the old families were dying out;and impressed the wives of a few new arrivals at Red Dog with the belief that her own family was contemporary with the Alvarados,and that her husband's health was far from perfect.

She extended a motherly sympathy to the orphaned Don Caesar.

Reserved,like his father,in natural disposition,he was still more gravely ceremonious from his loss;and,perhaps from the shyness of an evident partiality for Mamie Mulrady,he rarely availed himself of her mother's sympathizing hospitality.But he carried out the intentions of his father by consenting to sell to Mulrady,for a small sum,the property he had leased.The idea of purchasing had originated with Mrs.Mulrady.