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In The Tules
by
The boat did not “slow up” the next night, but passed as usual; yet three or four days elapsed before he could look forward to its coming with his old extravagant and half-exalted curiosity–which was his nearest approach to imagination. He was then able to examine it more closely, for the appearance of the stranger whom he now began to call “his friend” in his verbal communings with himself–but whom he did not seem destined to again discover; until one day, to his astonishment, a couple of fine horses were brought to his clearing by a stock-drover. They had been “ordered” to be left there. in vain Morse expostulated and questioned.
“Your name’s Martin Morse, ain’t it?” said the drover, with business brusqueness; “and I reckon there ain’t no other man o’ that name around here?”
“No,” said Morse.
“Well, then, they’re YOURS.”
“But who sent them?” insisted Morse. “What was his name, and where does he live?”
“I didn’t know ez I was called upon to give the pedigree o’ buyers,” said the drover dryly; “but the horses is ‘Morgan,’ you can bet your life.” He grinned as he rode away.
That Captain Jack sent them, and that it was a natural prelude to his again visiting him, Morse did not doubt, and for a few days he lived in that dream. But Captain Jack did not come. The animals were of great service to him in “rounding up” the stock he now easily took in for pasturage, and saved him the necessity of having a partner or a hired man. The idea that this superior gentleman in fine clothes might ever appear to him in the former capacity had even flitted through his brain, but he had rejected it with a sigh. But the thought that, with luck and industry, he himself might, in course of time, approximate to Captain Jack’s evident station, DID occur to him, and was an incentive to energy. Yet it was quite distinct from the ordinary working man’s ambition of wealth and state. It was only that it might make him more worthy of his friend. The great world was still as it had appeared to him in the passing boat–a thing to wonder at–to be above–and to criticize.
For all that, he prospered in his occupation. But one day he woke with listless limbs and feet that scarcely carried him through his daily labors. At night his listlessness changed to active pain and a feverishness that seemed to impel him toward the fateful river, as if his one aim in life was to drink up its waters and bathe in its yellow stream. But whenever he seemed to attempt it, strange dreams assailed him of dead bodies arising with swollen and distorted lips to touch his own as he strove to drink, or of his mysterious guest battling with him in its current, and driving him ashore. Again, when he essayed to bathe his parched and crackling limbs in its flood, he would be confronted with the dazzling lights of the motionless steamboat and the glare of stony eyes–until he fled in aimless terror. How long this lasted he knew not, until one morning he awoke in his new cabin with a strange man sitting by his bed and a Negress in the doorway.
“You’ve had a sharp attack of ‘tule fever,'” said the stranger, dropping Morse’s listless wrist and answering his questioning eyes, “but you’re all right now, and will pull through.”
“Who are you?” stammered Morse feebly.
“Dr. Duchesne, of Sacramento.”
“How did you come here?”
“I was ordered to come to you and bring a nurse, as you were alone. There she is.” He pointed to the smiling Negress.
“WHO ordered you?”
The doctor smiled with professional tolerance. “One of your friends, of course.”
“But what was his name?”
“Really, I don’t remember. But don’t distress yourself. He has settled for everything right royally. You have only to get strong now. My duty is ended, and I can safely leave you with the nurse. Only when you are strong again, I say–and HE says–keep back farther from the river.”