He saw to it that at least a measure of preparation was made for his
coming. That night a long wire went out to the Chamber of Commerce of
one of the larger Southern Oregon cities. In it, he told the date of his
arrival and asked certain directions. He wanted to know the name of some
mountain rancher where possibly he might find board and room for the
remainder of the summer and the fall. He wanted shooting, and he
particularly cared to be near a river where trout might be found. They
never came up Gitcheapolis River, or leaped for flies in the pond back
of the courthouse. The further back from the paths of men, he wrote, the
greater would be his pleasure. And he signed the wire with his full
name: Dan Failing with a Henry in the middle, and a "III" at the end.
He usually didn't sign his name in quite this manner. The people of
Gitcheapolis did not have particularly vivid memories of Dan's
grandfather. But it might be that a legend of the gray, straight
frontiersman who was his ancestor had still survived in these remote
Oregon wilds. The use of the full name would do no harm.
Instead of hurting, it was a positive inspiration. The Chamber of
Commerce of the busy little Oregon city was not usually exceptionally
interested in stray hunters that wanted a boarding place for the summer.
Its business was finding country homes for orchardists in the pleasant
river valleys. But it happened that the recipient of the wire was one of
the oldest residents, a frontiersman himself, and it was one of the
traditions of the Old West that friendships were not soon forgotten. Dan
Failing I had been a legend in the old trapping and shooting days when
this man was young. So it came about that when Dan's train stopped at
Cheyenne, he found a telegram waiting him:
"Any relation to Dan Failing of the Umpqua Divide?"
Dan had never heard of the Umpqua Divide, but he couldn't doubt but that
the sender of the wire referred to his grandfather. He wired in the
affirmative. The head of the Chamber of Commerce received the wire, read
it, thrust it into his desk, and in the face of a really important piece
of business proceeded to forget all about it. Thus it came about that,
except for one thing, Dan Failing would have probably stepped off the
train at his destination wholly unheralded and unmet. The one thing that
changed his destiny was that at a meeting of a certain widely known
fraternal order the next night, the Chamber of Commerce crossed trails
with the Frontier in the person of another old resident who had his
home in the farthest reaches of the Umpqua Divide. The latter asked the
former to come up for a few days' shooting--the deer being fatter and
more numerous than any previous season since the days of the grizzlies.
For it is true that one of the most magnificent breed of bears that ever
walked the face of the earth once left their footprints, as of
flour-sacks in the mud, from one end of the region to another.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account