Britt

“ Britt glanced at the title of the story in his hands—The Flowers Along Life's Pathway—and perked up a bit as if he saw an opportunity to pluck some of those flowers. But when Mr. Harnden went on to say that politics was not as expensive—with the right manager—as some folks supposed, Mr. Britt exhibited gloomy doubt. “A home is about all I have in mind right now,” he declared. “A man has got to have a happy home before his mind is free for big plans.” ”

“ Then the Honorable Pulaski Britt came and sat down in his seat, penning him next to the window.
“Yes, sir,” said Britt, with keen memory as to where he had left off in his previous conversation and with dogged determination to have his say out, “a man that reads a book written by a perfesser that don’t know the difference between a ramdown and a dose of catnip tea, and then thinks he understands forestry of the kind that there’s a dollar in, needs to have his head examined for hollows. ”

“ The young man did not reply, and the Honorable Pulaski stared at him, his eyes narrowing shrewdly. Mr. Britt had no very delicate notions of repressing an idea when it occurred to him “Say, look here, young man,” he cried, “I reckon I understand! The Barrett girl, hey? And John got after you! Well, he can make it hot for any one he takes a niff at.”
“Can’t I have that job, Mr. Britt, without a general discussion of my affairs?” asked Wade, with temper. ”

“ Kate acquiesced in her brother's diversion of the stream of talk, but an hour later, as Britt was about to go, she seized the opportunity to say: "You must not fail to take me to see this girl. I have never been so excited about any one in my life. ”

“ The reverse of Britt’s [Pg 15] hard character as bully and tyrant was an insatiate curiosity as to the little affairs of the people he knew and a desire to retail those matters in gossip when he could wound feelings or stir mischief. If one with a gift of prophecy had told him that his next words would mark the beginning of the crisis of his life, Pulaski Britt would have professed his profane incredulity in his own vigorous fashion. All that he said was, “Well, John, your girl has picked out quite a rugged-lookin’ feller, even if he ain’t much inclined to listen to good advice on forestry.” ”

“ He was venting his own resentment at Pulaski Britt’s airs of general proprietorship over men.
“Just the same as that,” replied Britt, complacently. “I’ve had him more than twenty years, and I’d like to see him try to go to work for any one else, or any one else try to hire him away.” He struck his hand on the young man’s knee. “Up this way, if you don’t make men know you own ’em, you’re missin’ one of the main [Pg 34] points of forestry!” He sneered this word every time he used it in his talk with Wade. ”

“ Britt. You have bradded me on, and told me that a man of the woods always gets what he wants if he goes after it right. Twice to-day you have stood between me and what I want. You’ve let a college dude take the sluice ahead of me. I know you pay me my money, but don’t you do that again. I’m going to have that girl, I say! The man that steps in ahead of me, he’s goin’ to die, Mr. Britt, and the man that steps between me and that man, when I’m after him, he dies, too. And if that sounds like a bluff, then you haven’t got Colin MacLeod sized up right, that’s all! ”

“ Britt, you’re going to be sorry for it if you drag that poor abused girl to prison,” said Lane, with such fire of conviction that the timber baron, cautious in his methods, and always fearing the notoriety that would embroil the great secrets of the timber interests with public opinion, blinked at the oracular old warden and then at the still defiant face of the girl. Like most untrained natures in whom passion has unleashed natural high spirit, she seemed incapable of calm reconsideration. ”

“ Britt came close to him and clutched the belt of his wool jacket. “There are some nasty liars in these woods just now. There are some of them that will go to state-prison for attempted blackmail. You are too bright a man not to realize which is your own side. I know you well enough to believe that all the lunatics and slanderers this side of Castonia couldn’t turn you against your friends. And you’ve got no two better friends than John Barrett and I.”
“I’m not gainsaying it, Mr. Britt. ”

“ The pursuers kept on at the heels of Vaniman. But they took the precaution to allow the men with the lanterns to go ahead.
Britt went frantically at his work, paying no attention to anybody. In fact, he did not seem to realize that others were present. There was a heap of furnace wood in one corner of the basement; he began to heave that wood in all directions. One of the lanterns was smashed by a billet. The men in the place were obliged to dodge the flying sticks. Britt worked as if he were alone in the place. He talked to himself. “Demons are after it. Demons and dead men! ”

“ Britt,” said the young man, bowing to Barrett and starting away.
“I’ve hired more men than any ten operators on the Umcolcus, put ’em all together,” declared Britt, following him, “and I’d ought to know something about whether a man is worth anything on a job or not. And rather than have any one of those squirt-gun foresters cuttin’ and caliperin’ over my lands, I’d—”
Wade shut the door behind him, strode through the outer office, and hurried down-stairs, his face very red and his teeth shut very tight. ”

“ Britt blinked as though trying to understand this sudden shifting of topic, and wagged slow nod of assent.
“Have you ever seen that girl of the Skeet settlement—the one that doesn’t belong to them?” Barrett half choked over the question.
“Have I seen her?” roared the Honorable Pulaski, no longer paying attention to incongruity of questions. “Why, that’s the draggle-tailed lightnin’-bug that set this fire that we’ve been fightin’ for forty-eight hours, and that only this rain stopped from bein’ a fifty-thousand-acre crown-fire! Have I seen her! ”

“ Barrett.”
“Say, look here, Ide,” cried Britt, in his irritation suddenly deciding to play the strong hand with this young interloper, “your friend Wade here, being a school-teacher, seems to have school on the brain. He also seems to be full of ready-made plans for men older and better than he is. From things that come to me, he has picked up a lot of foolishness about these Skeets and Bushees and this girl since he’s been cruisin’ round these woods. ”

“ Britt,” he said. “But you are putting this thing on a business basis, and you don’t have the right to do it. I ain’t engaged to Nina Ide, and I ’ain’t asked her to be engaged to me, for the time ’ain’t come right yet. But there ain’t nobody else in God’s world goin’ to have her but me. She ain’t too good for me, even if her father is old Rod Ide. I’ll have money some day myself. I’ve got some now. I can buy the clothes when I need ’em, if that’s all that a girl likes. But it ain’t all they like—not the kind of a girl like Nina Ide is. She knows a man when she sees him. ”

“ Britt obeyed. Then he and Starr took the unconscious cashier by shoulders and heels and carried him to the private office.
Britt's office conveniences did not include a couch; the men propped Vaniman in the desk chair and Vona crouched beside him and took his head on her shoulder.
There were no visible marks of injury. He gave off the scent of chloroform. His wrists were crossed in front of him and were secured with a noose of tape. Starr picked up shears from Britt's desk and cut the tape. “Where's your doctor? Get him in here.” ”

“ He pointed the finger straight down. “May be there!” He jumped his stallion ahead with a crack of his reins and disappeared in the smoke. Lane cast after him a look baleful, but relieved, and whirled and made away in the direction of Jerusalem.
“Me standing here wasting my time on a couple of whiffle-heads with that fire waltzing into my black growth!” Britt muttered, turning his wrath on himself, since there was no one else in sight. “It must be only some fool scare about Barrett. A man like him can take care of himself.” ”

“ Barrett stared uneasily from one crew to the other.
“It would have been too tough a story to go out of [Pg 219] these woods,” he faltered. “Two crews ste’boyed together by us to capture a State pauper.”
“A story of a woods rough-and-tumble, that’s all!” snorted Britt. “And these dogs wouldn’t have known what they were fightin’ about—and would have cared less. And while they were at it I could have taken the girl out of sight! You spoiled it! Now, don’t talk to me! You go ahead and see if you can do any better.” He tossed his big hand into the air and whirled away, snuffling his disgust. ”

“ In the silence, Britton was beginning to find his self-possession, when the sorceress spoke, her voice now undisguised.
"It's centuries and ages since we were so close, Rex," she said–and the magnetic hands were glued to his in a melting, appealing touch. "Isn't it ages and ages?" she continued passionately.
Britten's answer was a cry like that of a trapped bear. He wrenched his hands loose, swept away the intervening curtains, as he once swept the silken portières from an old-time boudoir, and stood face to face with the siren it had held. ”

“ Miss Britten laughed, and then looked grave again.
"Is he so very ill?"
"Very," answered Passavant abstractedly.
"But why is his health so important?" inquired Miss Britten, who was intelligent, and therefore inquisitive. "No one speaks of anything else—all Europe seems to have its attention fixed on Zell-am-Zee."
"Ah, that is a long story. But who has displayed this enormous interest in Lord Burdon's life—your German friend, I suppose?"
"Well, yes. He made inquiries."
"Hm—yes. A man with a mild gray eye and a beautiful crop of hair—speaks English well?" ”

“ You—you have known me long, Andrew Britton—tell me I never looked better in my life, and I will give you a hundred pounds—yes, a hundred pounds, good Britton.”
“Can’t be such a cursed hypocrite,” said Britten, who mightily enjoyed Learmont’s fright, “I never saw you look so bad in all my life!”
“I am sure you are joking.”
“Serious as a horseshoe.”
“Well, well, that don’t matter, I never take people by their looks. Sometimes the freshest and the finest go first. You know that well, Andrew Britton.” ”

“ How it comes to pass that this girl of nineteen occupies such an important position in the household is one of those things which are peculiar to Brittany. The strong individuality, industry, and force of character of the women make themselves felt wherever we go. Whilst the men slumber and smoke, the women are building little fortunes or propping up old ones. All through the land, in the houses, in the factories, and in the fields, the strong, firm hand and arm of a woman does the work. ”

“ As a closed carriage made me sick, I was put into the coupé with papa and maman. Eliane, Ernest, their nurses, and all the other servants, followed in a sort of omnibus, and behind them came all the horses, trotting gaily along the road to share in the blessings of this great day of the Assumption of the Virgin. The horses of Brittany, it will be conceded, are a specially favored race. ”

“ The servants stirred themselves to honor “my lord,” who was to fight for Brittany on Josselin Moors. The innkeeper, a shrewd old pimp, who wished his guests to be amused, sent up a couple of dancing-girls to the chamber after supper. Bertrand looked black when the girls came in to them, giggling and twitching their bright-colored skirts. It was customary at many inns to keep such ladies, and young Robin laughed at them, his head half turned with wine.
“Hallo, wicked ones! Come and sit by me. You can dance and sing for a gentleman, eh? ”

“ Standing in dream-girt Broceliande of a hundred legends, its shadows mirrored by dim meres that may never reflect the stars, one feels the lure of Brittany more keenly even than when walking by its fierce and jagged coasts menaced by savage grey seas, or when wandering on its vast moors where the monuments of its pagan past stand in gigantic disarray. ”

“ Passavant and Miss Britten.
"He is only amusing himself with her," said some.
"She is making a fool of him," laughed the rest. And the German gentleman, who was always endeavoring to get speech with Miss Britten and was invariably frustrated just in time by Passavant, scowled over his soup-spoon with such ardor that he spilt more potage-à-la-jardinière than usual.
"Tell them," said Passavant to Miss Britten one evening, "that Lord Burdon is better, and will probably take the air in a bath-chair to-morrow. His lordship would like you to walk by the side of the chair." ”

“ These Lays are wont to please ladies, who listen to them with delight, for they are after their own hearts.” This fame and its attendant adulation were very sweet to Marie, and she was justly proud of her work, which, inspired, as she herself distinctly states, by the lays she had heard Breton minstrels sing, has, because of its vivid colouring and human appeal, survived the passing of seven hundred years. The scenes of the tales are laid in Brittany, and we are probably correct in regarding them as culled from original traditional material. ”

“ Miss Britton looked across at her niece, who hastily dived into her trunk again; but the former confided to her sister-in-law afterwards, that Barbara had distributed the remainder of the money she had given her for riding lessons between the bath-boy and presents for the home-people, which news made Mrs. Britton prize her share of the treasures more than ever. ”