Helena, Montana

“ The Northern Pacific Railroad runs through this wonderful State, with so great a future before it. Helena, the capital city of Montana, was originally a mining camp, and early prophecies were that it would not outlive the mining enthusiasm. These prophecies, however, have proved entirely mistaken. It is no longer a mere mining town, with rough, busy, uncultured men rushing hither and thither in the eager pursuit of their daily avocation. It is now not only the judicial capital of Montana, but it is also the great center of educational advance. ”

“ The surrounding country is both mineral and agricultural, and the city is principally made up of homes of cattlemen and miners. It is well-built, having good hotels and public buildings, chief among these being the government building, the state capitol and the county courthouse. Helena has excellent parish and public school systems, a high school costing $150,000, the Montana Wesleyan University, Saint Vincent's Academy and state and city libraries. ”

“ Following this discovery, thousands of gold-hunters sought this new "Eldorado," and in a few months a populous community had taken possession of the ground. Within a year after this the territory of Montana was formed, and from its central location and large population, Helena was chosen as the capital. ”

“ In addition, he had numerous conversations with these men, and he was, therefore, the beneficiary of their experience. They left Helena on August 17, 1870. Four days later they were at Fort Ellis. Here they listened to the post order detailing Lieutenant Gustavus C. Doane, one sergeant, and four privates “to escort the Surveyor-General of Montana to the falls and lakes of the Yellowstone and return....” The soldiers in the party were Sergeant William Baker and Privates John Williamson, George W. McConnell, William Leipler, and Charles Moore. ”

“ But about the middle of the lake Buntingford was seized with belated compunction that he had not done his host's duty to his queer, inarticulate cousin, Lady Georgina. "I suppose I ought to have gone to look after her?"
"Not at all," said Helena coolly. "I believe she does it often. She can't want more than Lady Cynthia—and Geoffrey—and Mawson. People shouldn't be pampered!" ”

“ The path was not just now in the Marchesa's thoughts. Nothing very definite was. Rather, as her eyes ranged from moor to sea, from the splendid uniformity of the unclouded sky to the ravishing variety of many-tinted earth, from the green of the Grange meadows (the one spot of rich emerald on the near coast-line, owing its hues to Sandy Nab's kindly shelter) to the gray mass of Scarsmoor Castle—there was in her heart that great mixture of content and longing that youth and— (what put bluntly amounts to) —a fine day are apt to raise. ”

“ Afterwards, the rain seemed to have cleared off a little, and through the yellow twilight a thin stream of people, driving or on foot, began to pour past the inn, towards the hills. Helena ran upstairs to put on an oilskin hat and cape over her white dress.
"You're coming to help light the bonfire?" said Geoffrey, addressing Philip.
Buntingford shook his head. He turned to Lucy.
"You and I will let the young ones go—won't we? I don't see you climbing Moel Dun in the rain, and I'm getting too old! We'll walk up the road a bit, and look at the people as they go by. ”

“ Great flights of clouds came up from the west and fought the sun, and as the afternoon declined, light gusts of rain, succeeded by bursts of sunshine, began to sweep across the oak-woods. The landlord of the inn and his sons, who had been mainly responsible for building the great bonfire on Moel Dun, and the farmers in their gigs who stopped at the inn door, began to shake their heads over the prospects of the night. Helena, Lucy Friend, and Geoffrey spent the afternoon chiefly in fishing and wandering by the river. ”

“ Mrs. Friend hurriedly caught hold of her.
"And you won't do anything hasty—about Lord Donald?"
"Oh, I can't promise anything. One must stand by one's friends. One simply must. But I'll take care Cousin Philip doesn't blame you."
"If I'm no use, you know—I can't stay."
"No use to Cousin Philip, you mean, in policing me?" said Helena, with a good-humoured laugh. "Well, we'll talk about it again to-morrow. Good-night—Lucy!"
The sly gaiety of the voice was most disarming.
"Good-night, Miss Pitstone."
"No, that won't do. It's absurd! I never ask people to call me Helena, unless I like them. ”

“ Helena Pitstone meanwhile walked away by herself to a distant part of the room and turned over photographs, with what seemed to Mrs. Friend a stormy hand. And as she did so, everyone in the room was aware of her, of the brilliance and power of the girl's beauty, and of the energy that like an aura seemed to envelop her personality. Lady Cynthia made several attempts to capture her, but in vain. Helena would only answer in monosyllables, and if approached, retreated further into the dim room, ostensibly in search of a book on a distant shelf, really in flight. ”

“ THE scene of this little book is on a high mountain. There are, indeed, many higher; there are many of a nobler outline. It is no place of pilgrimage for the summary globe-trotter; but to one who lives upon its sides, Mount Saint Helena soon becomes a centre of interest. It is the Mont Blanc of one section of the Californian Coast Range, none of its near neighbours rising to one-half its altitude. It looks down on much green, intricate country. It feeds in the spring-time many splashing brooks. ”

“ My trustees pay Lord Buntingford whatever I cost him, and I shall have a good deal to spend. I shall have a horse—and perhaps a little motor. The chauffeur here is a fractious idiot. He has done that Rolls-Royce car of Cousin Philip's balmy, and cut up quite rough when I spoke to him about it."
"Done it what?" said Mrs. Friend faintly.
"Balmy. Don't you know that expression?" Helena, on the floor with her hands under her knees, watched her companion's looks with a grin. "It's our language now, you know—English—the language of us young people. The old ones have got to learn it, as we speak it! ”

“ He stood before her, in an ecstasy of pleasure.
"Helena!—you are a vision—a dream: Don't fade away! I wish we could stay here for ever."
"Am I a vision?" She put out a mischievous hand, and pinched him. "But come here, Geoffrey—come up beside me—look! Anybody sitting here could see a good deal of the lake!"
He squeezed in beside her, and true enough, through a natural parting in the branches, which no one could have noticed from outside, the little creek, with their boat in it, was plainly visible, and beyond it the lights on the lawn. ”

“ Buntingford emerged from the little Rectory to find Alcott again waiting for him in the garden. The sun had set some time and the moon was peering over the hills to the east. The mounting silver rim suddenly recalled to Buntingford the fairy-like scene of the night before?—the searchlight on the lake, the lights, the music, and the exquisite figure of Helena dancing through it all. ”

“ The evening had shaken itself free of the storm, and was pouring an incredible beauty on wood and river. The intoxication of it ran through Helena's veins. For she possessed in perfection that earth-sense, that passionate sense of kinship, kinship both of the senses and the spirit, with the eternal beauty of the natural world, which the gods implant in a blest minority of mortals. No one who has it can ever be wholly forlorn, while sense and feeling remain. ”

“ French, Lodge, Jones the butler, and Tomline the odd man, got in behind her. Mrs. Friend appeared with a food hamper that she and Mrs. Mawson had been rapidly packing. Her delicate little face was very pale, and Buntingford stooped to reassure her.
"We'll take every care of her. Don't be alarmed. It's always a woman comes to the rescue, isn't it? We're all ashamed. I shall take some lessons next week!"
Helena, with her hand on the steering wheel, nodded and smiled to her, and in another minute the splendid car was gliding out of the garage yard, and flying through the park. ”

“ It is said to be the richest city of its size in the United States, an assertion which we have good reasons for believing to be correct. The vast mineral region surrounding Helena is unsurpassed anywhere for the number and richness of its gold and silver-bearing lodes, having within an area of twenty-five miles over three thousand such natural deposits, the ownership of which is duly recorded, and many of which are being profitably worked. ”

“ But at least he had the chance to probe the situation a little deeper; even if prudence should ultimately forbid him anything more.
Helena had chosen a wooden seat round one of the finest limes. Some books brought out for show rather than use, lay beside her. A piece of knitting—a scarf of a bright greenish yellow—lay on the lap of her white dress. She had taken off her hat, and Geoffrey was passionately conscious of the beauty of the brown head resting, as she talked, against the furrowed trunk of the lime. ”

“ The way thence from Missoula is over a comparatively level stretch of country, until just west of Helena the road strikes the Main Divide of the Rocky Mountains, and to cross this broken region it is compelled to pursue a winding way.
Helena is reputed to be the richest city of its size in all the world, a claim well supported by appearances, for while having probably 15,000 inhabitants, it has all the conveniences of our largest cities, and in no other place of equal population are the public buildings and residences so magnificent and palatial. ”

“ The whole neighbourhood of Mount Saint Helena is (182) full of sulphur and of boiling springs. The Geysers are famous; they were the great health resort of the Indians before the coming of the whites. Lake County is dotted with spas; Hot Springs and White Sulphur Springs are the names of two stations on the Napa Valley Railroad; and Calistoga itself seems to repose on a mere film above a boiling, subterranean lake. At one end of the hotel enclosure are the springs from which it takes its name, hot enough to scald a child seriously while I was there. ”

“ Here was the "new woman" indeed, in her best aspect. He could not but compare the Helena of this adventure—this competent and admirable Helena—with the girl of the night before. Had the war produced the same dual personality in thousands of English men and English women?—in the English nation itself?
They drew up at the steps of the market-hall, where a group of persons were standing, including a nurse in uniform. Buntingford came forward, and bending over the side of the car, said to Helena:
"Do you want to be relieved? There are several people here who could drive the car." ”

“ There was no sign of Helena. He strode along, singing to himself, and spinning his towel rhythmically. A small path led him across a field and down a zigzag in front of the cliffs. Some nooks, sheltered from the wind, were warm with sunshine, scented of honeysuckle and of thyme. He took a sprig of woodbine that was coloured of cream and butter. ”

“ Why did you cut me, not once—but twice—three times—for that beast Donald?"
Helena laughed.
"Now you're beginning!" she said, as she lazily trailed her hand in the water. "It's really comic!"
"What do you mean?"
"Only that I've already quarrelled with Cousin Philip—and Geoffrey—about Lord Donald—so if you insist on quarrelling too, I shall have no friends left."
"Damn Donald! It's like his impudence to ask you to dance at all. It made me sick to see you with him. He's the limit. Well, but—I'm not going to quarrel about Donald, Helena—I'm not going to quarrel about anything. ”

“ They were to be married soon, and then, realising one of the dreams of his life, they were to visit America, for his mother's blood called to him to go there, to see the great new world—yes, but above all to stand, with Helena's quivering hand in his, on that rock at Plymouth, where a handful of fearless men and women had landed on a bleak and hungry coast, afraid of no fate, for God was with them, and in two short centuries had peopled a vast continent and created one of the mightiest empires of the earth. ”

“ Claim all the freedom you like—but as you're not twenty-five, but nineteen—let a good fellow like Buntingford give you advice—and be thankful!"
"Prig!" said Helena, pelting him with a spray of wild cherry, which he caught and put in his button-hole. "If that isn't preaching, I should like to know what is!"
"Not at all. Unbiased opinion—civilly expressed. If you really were an emancipated young woman, Helena, you'd take it so! But now—" his tone changed—"let's come to business. What have you and Philip been quarrelling about?" ”

“ After having been immured for some three years in close attendance on an invalided woman shut up in two rooms, she was like a person walking along a dark road and suddenly caught in the glare of motor lamps. Brought into contact with such a personality as Helena Pitstone promised to be, she felt helpless and half blind. A survival, too; for this world into which she had now stepped was one quite new to her. Yet when she had first shut herself up in Lancaster Gate she had never been conscious of any great difference between herself and other women or girls. ”

“ Helena watched him out of the corner of her eyes, saw the girl's eager greeting, and the disappearance of the two in the woody walk that bordered the lawn. Then she noticed a man sitting by himself not far away, with a newspaper on his knee.
"Suppose we take Mr. Horne, Peter?"
"Don't let's take anybody!" said the boy. "And anyway Horne's a nuisance just now. He talks you dead with strikes—and nationalization—and labour men—and all that rot. Can't we ever let it alone? I want to talk to you, Helena. I say, you are ripping in that dress! You're just divine, Helena!" ”