Love stories; Miners -- Fiction; Mines and mineral resources -- Colorado -- Fiction; Strikes and lockouts -- Fiction
"Right up to the golden gates this time, sure. It's straight goods. St.
Peter ain't going to take no post-prandial siestas from now on. I'm
timbering my shots to keep from breaking the sky. Tell you what, I'm
jarring them mansions in heaven wuss'n a New York subway contractor them
Fifth Avenue palaces." Zephyr paused and glanced languidly at the
superintendent.
Firmstone chuckled.
"Go on," he said.
"I've gone as far as I can without flying. It's a lead from the golden
streets of the New Jerusalem. Followed it up to the foot of Bingham
Pass; caught it above the slide, then it took up the cliff, and
disappeared in the cerulean. Say, Goggles, how are you off for chuck?
I've been up against glory, and I'm down hungrier than a she-bear that's
skipped summer and hibernated two winters."
"Good! Guess Bennie will fix us up something. Can you wait a few
minutes?"
"I think I can. I've been practising on that for years. No telling when
such things will come in handy. You don't object to music, Goggles?"
"Not to music, no," Firmstone answered, with an amused glance at Zephyr.
Zephyr, unruffled, drew from his shirt a well-worn harmonica.
"Music hath charms," he remarked, brushing the instrument on the sleeve
of his shirt. "Referring to my savage breast, not yours."
He placed the harmonica to his lips, holding it in hollowed hands. His
oscillating breath jarred from the metal reeds the doleful strains of
_Home, Sweet Home_, muffled by the hollow of his hands into mournful
cadences.
At last Firmstone closed his desk.
"If your breast is sufficiently soothed, let's see what Bennie can do
for your stomach."
As they passed from the office Zephyr carefully replaced the harmonica
in his shirt.
"I'd rather be the author of that touching little song than the owner of
the Inferno. That's my new claim," he remarked, distantly.
Firmstone laughed.
"I thought your claim was nearer heaven."
"The two are not far apart. 'Death, like a narrow sea, divides.' But my
reminiscences were getting historical, which you failed to remark. I
ain't no Wolfe and Pierre ain't no Montcalm, nor the Heights of Abraham
ain't the Blue Goose. Pierre's a hog. At least, he's a close second. A
hog eats snakes and likewise frogs. Pierre's only got as far as frogs,
last I heard. Pierre's bad. Morrison's bad. Luna ain't. He thinks he is;
but he ain't. I'm not posting you nor nothing. I'm only meditating out
loud. That's all."
They entered the mill boarding-house. Bennie, the cook, greeted Zephyr
effusively.
"Goggles invited me to pay my respects to you," Zephyr remarked. "I'm
empty, and I'm thinking you can satisfy my longing as nothing else can
do."
Zephyr addressed himself to Bennie's viands. At last he rose from the
table.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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