The Girl at the Halfway House Part 9

CHAPTER XIII

PIE AND ETHICS

One morning Battersleigh was at work at his little table, engaged, as he later explained, upon the composition of a letter to the London Times, descriptive of the Agrarian Situation in the United States of America, when he was interrupted by a knock at his door.

"Come in, come in, Ned, me boy," he exclaimed, as he threw open the door and recognised his visitor. "What's the news this mornin'?"

"News?" said Franklin gaily, holding his hands behind his back. "I've news that you can't guess--good news."

"You don't mean to tell me they've moved the land office into Ellisville, do you, Ned?"

"Oh, no, better than that."

"You've not discovered gold on your quarter section, perchance?"

"Guess again--it's better than that."

"I'll give it up. But leave me a look at your hands."

"Yes," said Franklin, "I'll give you a look, and one more guess." He held up a small bag before Battersleigh's face.

"It's not potatoes, Ned?" said Battersleigh in an awed tone of voice.

Franklin laughed.

"No; better than that," he said.

"Ned," said Battersleigh, "do ye mind if I have a bit smell of that bag?"

"Certainly," said Franklin, "you may have a smell, if you'll promise to keep your hands off."

Battersleigh approached his face to the bag and snuffed at it once, twice, thrice, as though his senses needed confirmation. He straightened up and looked Franklin in the face.

"Ned," said he, his voice sinking almost to a whisper, "it's--it's apples!"

"Right," said Franklin. "And isn't that news?"

"The best that could be, and the hardest to believe," said Battersleigh.

"Where'd you get thim, and how?"

"By diplomacy," said Franklin. "Morrison, one of the transit men of the engineers, was home in Missouri for a visit, and yesterday he came back and brought a sack of apples with him. He was so careless that he let the secret out, and in less than half an hour he had lost two thirds of his sack of apples--the boys wheedled them out of him, or stole them. At last he put the bag, with what was left of the apples, in the safe at the hotel, and left orders that no one should have even a look at them. I went out and sent a man in to tell the clerk that he was wanted at the depot, and while he was away I looted the safe--it wasn't locked--and ran for it. It was legitimate, wasn't it? I gave Sam one big red apple, for I knew he would rather have it, to give to his Nora, the waiter girl, than the best horse and saddle on the range. The rest--behold them!

Tell me, do you know how to make a pie?"

"Ned," said Battersleigh, looking at him with an injured air, "do you suppose I've campaigned all me life and not learned the simplest form of cookin'? Pie? Why, man, I'll lay you a half section of land to a saddle blanket I'll make ye the best pie that ever ye set eye upon in all your life. Pie, indeed, is it?"

"Well," said Franklin, "you take some risks, but we'll chance it. Go ahead. We'll just save out two or three apples for immediate consumption, and not put all our eggs in one basket."

"Wisely spoken, me boy," said Battersleigh. "Ye're a thrue conservative.

But now, just ye watch Batty while he goes to work."

Battersleigh busied himself about the little box which made his cupboard, and soon had out what he called his "ingraydeyints."

"Of course, ye've to take a little flour," he said, "that's for the osseous structure, so to speak. Ye've to add a little grease of some sort, lard or b.u.t.ter, an' we've nayther; the bacon fat'll do, methinks.

Of course, there's the bakin' powder. Fer I've always noticed that when ye take flour ye take also bakin' powder. Salt? No, I'm sure there's no salt goes in at all; that's against reason, an' ye'll notice that the principles of philosophy go into all the ways of life. And, lastly, makin', as I may say, the roundin' out of the muscular and adipose tissue of the crayture, as the sowl of the pie we must have the apples. It's a sin to waste 'em peelin'; but I think they used to peel 'em, too. And ye've to put in sugar, at laste a couple o' spoons full. Now observe. I roll out this dough--it's odd-actin' stuff, but it's mere idiosyncrashy on its part--I roll this out with a bottle, flat and fine; and I put into this pan, here, ye'll see. Then in goes the intayrior contints, cut in pieces, ye'll see. Now, thin, over the top of the whole I sprid this thin blanket of dough, thus. And see me thrim off the edges about the tin with me knife. And now I dint in the s.h.i.+rc.u.mference with me thumb, the same as July Trelawney did in the Ould Tinth. And there ye are, done, me pie, an' may G.o.d have mercy on your sowl!--Ned, build up the fire."

They sat at the side of the little stove somewhat anxiously waiting for the result of Battersleigh's labours. Every once in a while Battersleigh opened the oven door and peered in. "She isn't brownin' just to suit me, Ned," he said, "but that's the fault o' the chimney." Franklin opined that this anxiety boded no certainty of genius, but kept silent. "I'm wonderin' if it's right about that bakin' powder?" said Battersleigh.

"Is it too late now, do ye think?"

"This isn't my pie, Battersleigh," said Franklin, "but if anything has gone wrong with those apples it'll take more than a little diplomacy to get you out of the trouble."

As they sat for a moment silent there came the sound of approaching hoof-beats, and presently the cracking and popping of the feet of a galloping horse fell into a duller crunch on the hard ground before the door, and a loud voice called out,

"Whoa-hope, Bronch! h.e.l.lo, in the house!"

"Come in, Curly," cried Battersleigh. "Come in. We've business of importhance this mornin'."

Curly opened the door a moment later, peering in cautiously, the suns.h.i.+ne casting a rude outline upon the floor, and his figure to those within showing silhouetted against the background of light, beleggined, befringed, and begloved after the fas.h.i.+on of his craft.

"How! fellers," he said, as he stooped to enter at the low door. "How is the world usin' you all this bright and happy mornin'?"

"Pretty well, me friend," said Battersleigh, his eyes on the stove, importantly. "Sit ye down."

Curly sat down on the edge of the bed, under whose blanket the newspapers still rattled to the touch, "Seems like you all mighty busy this mornin'," said he.

"Yes," said Franklin, "we've got business on hand now. You can't guess what we're cooking."

"No; what?"

"Pie."

"Go 'long!"

"Yes, sir, pie," said Franklin firmly.

Curly leaned back on the bed upon his elbow, respectful but very incredulous.

"Our cook made a pie, onct," said he, to show himself also a man of worldly experience. "That was down on the Cimarron, 'bout four years ago. We et it. I have et worse pie 'n that, an' I have et better. But I never did git a chance to eat all the pie I wanted, not in my whole life. Was you sayin' I'm in on this here pie?"

"Certainly you are. You wait. It'll be done now pretty soon," said Franklin.

"If ye can poke a straw into thim, they're done," said Battersleigh oracularly. "Curly, hand me the broom."

Curly pa.s.sed over the broom, and the two, with anxiety not unmixed with cynicism, watched Battersleigh as he made several ineffectual attempts to penetrate the armour of the pie.

"Stop lookin' at me like a brace o' evil-minded hyenies," protested Battersleigh. "Ye'd make the devil himself nervous, a-reghardin' one so like a object o' suspicion. Mind ye, I'm goin' to take it out. There's nothin' at all whativver in that ijee of stickin' it with a straw.

Moreover, these straws is shameful."