Scattergood Baines Part 5

The boy was returning. Scattergood placed the tin object to his lips and puffed out his bulging cheeks. A sound resulted such as the ears of Coldriver had seldom suffered. It was shrill, it was penetrating, it rose and fell with a sort of ripping, tearing slash. The boy stopped in front of Scattergood and stared. Without a word Scattergood held out his hand for his mail, and, receiving it, placed a nickel in the grimy palm that remained extended. Then, apparently oblivious to the boy's existence, he applied himself again to the whistle.

"Say," said the boy, "what's that?"

"Patent whistle," said Scattergood, without interest.

"Is it your'n, or is it for sale?"

"Calculate I might sell."

"How much?"

"Nickel."

"Gimme it," said the boy, and Scattergood gravely received back his coin.

"Might tell the kids I got more," said Scattergood, and watched the boy trot down the street, entranced by the horrid sound he was fathering.

This transaction from beginning to end was eloquent of Scattergood Baines's character. He had been obliged to pay more than he regarded a service as worth, but had not protested vainly. Instead he had set about recouping himself as best he could. The whistle cost him two cents and a half. Therefore the boy had come closer to working for Scattergood's figure than for his own demanded price. In addition, Scattergood's wares were to receive free and valuable advertising, as was proven by the fact that before night he had sold ten more whistles at a profit of twenty-five cents! No deal was too small to receive Scattergood's best and most skillful attention.

Now he opened his letters, one of which was worthy of attention, for it was from a friend in the office of the Secretary of State for that commonwealth--a friend who owed his position there in great measure to Scattergood's influence. The letter gave the information that two gentlemen named Crane and Keith had pooled their timber holdings on the east and west branches of Coldriver, and had filed papers for the incorporation of the Coldriver Lumber Company.

This was important. First, the gentlemen named were no friends of Scattergood's by reason of having underestimated that fleshy individual to their financial detriment in the matter of a certain dam and boom company, of which Scattergood was now sole owner. Second, because it presaged active lumbering operations. Third, because, in Scattergood's safe were ironclad contracts with both of them whereby the said dam and boom company should receive sixty cents a thousand feet for driving their logs down the improved river.

And fourth--the fourth brought Scattergood's active toes to a rest.

Fourth, it meant that Crane and Keith would be building the largest sawmill--the only sawmill of consequence--that the valley had seen.

It was an attribute of Scattergood's peculiar genius that even after you had encountered him once, and come out the worse for it, you still rated him as a fatuous, guileless mound of flesh. You did not credit his successes to astuteness, but to blundering luck. Another point also should be noted: If Scattergood were hunting bear he gave it out that his game was partridge. He would hunt partridge industriously and conspicuously until men's minds were turned quite away from the subject of bear. Then suddenly he would s.h.i.+ft shotgun for rifle and come home with a bearskin in the wagon. Probably he would bring partridge, too, for he never neglected by-products.

"Them fellows," said he to himself, referring to Messrs. Crane and Keith, "hain't aimin' nor wis.h.i.+n' to pay me no sixty cents a thousand for drivin' their logs.... I figger they calculate to cut about ten million feet. That'll be six thousand dollars. Profit maybe two thousand. Don't see as I kin afford to lose it, seems as though."

On the river below Coldriver village were three hamlets each consisting of a general store, a church, and a few scattered dwellings. These villages were the supply centers for the mountain farms that lay behind them. Necessity had located them, for nowhere else along the valley was there flat land upon which even the tiniest village could find a resting place. These were Bailey, Tupper Falls, and Higgins's Bridge. In common with Coldriver village their communication with the world was by means of a stage line consisting of two so-called stages, one of which left Coldriver in the morning on the downward trip, the other of which left the mouth of the valley on the upward trip. There was also one freight wagon.

The morning following Scattergood's second anniversary in the region, he boarded the stage, occupying so much s.p.a.ce therein that a single fare failed utterly to show a profit to the stage line, and alighted at Bailey. He went directly to the store, where no one was to be found save sharp-featured Mrs. Bailey, wife of the proprietor.

"Mornin', ma'am," said Scattergood, politely. "Husband hain't in?"

"Up the brook, catchin' a mess of trout," she responded, shortly. "He's always catchin' a mess of trout, or huntin' a deer or a partridge or somethin'. If you're ever aimin' to see Jim Bailey here, you want to git around afore daylight or after dark."

"Hain't it lucky," said Scattergood, "that some men manages to marry wimmin that kin look after their business?"

"Not for the wimmin," said Mrs. Bailey, shortly.

"My name's Baines," said Scattergood.

"I calculate to know _that_."

"Like livin' here, ma'am?"

"Not so but what I could bear a change."

"Um!... Mis' Bailey, I calc'late you'd hate to see Jim make a little money so's to be able to git away from here if he wanted to."

"Him? Only way h.e.l.l ever make money is to ketch a solid-gold trout."

"Maybe I'm the solid-gold trout you're speakin' about," said Scattergood.

She regarded him sharply a moment. "Set," she said. "Looks like you got somethin' on your mind."

There were times when Scattergood could be direct and succinct. He perceived it was best to be so with this woman.

"I might want to buy this here store--under certain conditions."

"How much?"

"Inventory, and a share in the profits of a deal I got in mind."

"What's them conditions you mentioned?"

"That you and Jim don't mention the sale to anybody, and keep on runnin'

the place--for wages--until I'm ready for you to quit."

"What's the deal them profits is comin' from, and how much you figger they'll be?"

"The deal's feedin' about five hunderd men, and the profits'll be plenty. I furnish the capital and show you how it's to be done. All Jim'll have to do is foller directions."

Then, lowering his voice, Scattergood went farther into particulars.

Suddenly Mrs. Bailey arose, and screamed shrilly to an urchin playing in the road, "You, Jimmy, go up the brook and fetch your pa." Scattergood knew his deal was as good as closed. Before the up-bound stage arrived it was closed. The Baileys had cash in hand for their store and Scattergood carried away a duly executed bill of sale.

The following day, for fifteen hundred dollars cash, he acquired all the property of the stage line--and when the news became public it was believed that Scattergood had departed from his wits, for the line was notoriously unprofitable and an aching worry to its owners. But the commotion the transfer of the stage line created was as nothing to the news that Scattergood had bought a strip of land along the railroad at the mouth of the river, and was erecting a large wooden building upon it. When asked concerning this and its purpose, Scattergood replied that he wasn't made up in his mind what he would use it for, but likely it would be an "opry" house.

Following this, Scattergood went to the city, where he spent much valuable time interviewing gentlemen in wholesale grocery and provision houses....

Jim Bailey liked to fish--which is not an attribute to create scandal.

He was not ambitious, nor was he endowed with a full reservoir of initiative, but he was a shrewd customer and seldom got the worst of it.

One virtue he possessed, and that was an ability to follow directions--and to keep his mouth shut.

Not many days after Scattergood became the owner of the store at Bailey, Jim was a caller at the new offices of the lumber company, formed when Crane and Keith pooled their interests.

"I come to see you," he told Crane, "because it seemed like you got to feed your lumberjacks, and I want to git the contract for furnis.h.i.+n' and deliverin' the provisions."

"We've sure got to feed 'em," said Crane. "But five hundred men eat a lot of grub. Can you swing it if we give you a chance at it?"

Bailey produced a letter from the Coldriver bank which stated the bank was willing to stand behind any contract made by the Bailey Provision Company, up to a certain substantial amount.

"Who's the Bailey Provision Company?"

"Me 'n' my wife mostly holds the stock."