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The Twins Of Table Mountain
by
“Pinkney, Pinkney, my boy! how are you? And this is your little ‘prop’? your quarter-section, your country-seat, that we’ve been trespassing on, eh? A nice little spot, cool, sequestered, remote,–a trifle unimproved; carriage-road as yet unfinished. Ha, ha! But to think of our making a discovery of this inaccessible mountain, climbing it, sir, for two mortal hours, christening it ‘Sol’s Peak,’ getting up a flag-pole, unfurling our standard to the breeze, sir, and then, by Gad, winding up by finding Pinkney, the festive Pinkney, living on it at home!”
Completely surprised, but still perfectly good-humored, Rand shook the stranger’s right hand warmly, and received on his broad shoulders a welcoming thwack from the left, without question. “She don’t mind her friends making free with ME evidently,” said Rand to himself, as he tried to suggest that fact to the young lady in a meaning glance.
The stranger noted his glance, and suddenly passed his hand thoughtfully over his shaven cheeks. “No,” he said–“yes, surely, I forget–yes, I see; of course you don’t! Rosy,” turning to his wife, “of course Pinkney doesn’t know Phemie, eh?”
“No, nor ME either, Sol,” said that lady warningly.
“Certainly!” continued Sol. “It’s his misfortune. You weren’t with me at Gold Hill.–Allow me,” he said, turning to Rand, “to present Mrs. Sol Saunders, wife of the undersigned, and Miss Euphemia Neville, otherwise known as the ‘Marysville Pet,’ the best variety actress known on the provincial boards. Played Ophelia at Marysville, Friday; domestic drama at Gold Hill, Saturday; Sunday night, four songs in character, different dress each time, and a clog-dance. The best clog-dance on the Pacific Slope,” he added in a stage aside. “The minstrels are crazy to get her in ‘Frisco. But money can’t buy her–prefers the legitimate drama to this sort of thing.” Here he took a few steps of a jig, to which the “Marysville Pet” beat time with her feet, and concluded with a laugh and a wink–the combined expression of an artist’s admiration for her ability, and a man of the world’s scepticism of feminine ambition.
Miss Euphemia responded to the formal introduction by extending her hand frankly with a re-assuring smile to Rand, and an utter obliviousness of her former hauteur. Rand shook it warmly, and then dropped carelessly on a rock beside them.
“And you never told me you lived up here in the attic, you rascal!” continued Sol with a laugh.
“No,” replied Rand simply. “How could I? I never saw you before, that I remember.”
Miss Euphemia stared at Sol. Mrs. Sol looked up in her lord’s face, and folded her arms in a resigned expression. Sol rose to his feet again, and shaded his eyes with his hand, but this time quite seriously, and gazed at Rand’s smiling face.
“Good Lord! Do you mean to say your name isn’t Pinkney?” he asked, with a half embarrassed laugh.
“It IS Pinkney,” said Rand; “but I never met you before.”
“Didn’t you come to see a young lady that joined my troupe at Gold Hill last month, and say you’d meet me at Keeler’s Ferry in a day or two?”
“No-o-o,” said Rand, with a good-humored laugh. “I haven’t left this mountain for two months.”
He might have added more; but his attention was directed to Miss Euphemia, who during this short dialogue, having stuffed alternately her handkerchief, the corner of her mantle, and her gloves, into her mouth, restrained herself no longer, but gave way to an uncontrollable fit of laughter. “O Sol!” she gasped explanatorily, as she threw herself alternately against him, Mrs. Sol, and a bowlder, “you’ll kill me yet! O Lord! first we take possession of this man’s property, then we claim HIM.” The contemplation of this humorous climax affected her so that she was fain at last to walk away, and confide the rest of her speech to space.
Sol joined in the laugh until his wife plucked his sleeve, and whispered something in his ear. In an instant his face became at once mysterious and demure. “I owe you an apology,” he said, turning to Rand, but in a voice ostentatiously pitched high enough for Miss Euphemia to overhear: “I see I have made a mistake. A resemblance–only a mere resemblance, as I look at you now–led me astray. Of course you don’t know any young lady in the profession?”