WILLOW SANDERS
Edited by BRIGGS CONSULTING LLC
Cover Design
POPPY PARKES
CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Willow’s Mea Culpa
Check out the rest of the Mountain Men! Coming in September Also by Willow Sanders
Copyright © 2021 by Willow
Sanders
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Characters in this book are figments of the authors imagination and in no way represent actual people. Any similarities to people living or dead is purely coincidental.
This book is intended for an adult audience ( i.e. there is S -E-X in it).
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ToLizzie
Ihavetodifferentiateyoufrommysistersomewaysoitwaseither youriPhonecontactlistingorthatHSnicknameyoulove ��For alwayssupportingme. SoonitwillbeyourhappilyeverafterI’mwritingabout.Ithasbeen writtennow,whichmeansit’srightaroundthecorner! Iloveyouinfinity.
CHAPTER ONE
To be honest, I don’t really know where in the timeline of my life taking over my
Pop’s bar morphed into it becoming my bar. Pop’s bar, The Old Lady, was like the sibling I never had. When I wanted to go hunting like my friends with their dad’s—it was sorry kid gotta work The Old Lady. At eighteen, my best friend Emmett got his old man’s truck. Said he needed his own set of wheels so he could get himself back and forth from his job working the railroad. For me though, The Old Lady always needed something that used up all my dad’s finances, and The Old Lady always came first. No matter the request, whether it was transportation or something simple like gym shoes, it was always the same. My pop died when I was twenty-four. Heart attack. Stress.
“Finn, listen to reason.”
Emmett lost his left arm from the shoulder down in an accident in the rail yard a week before his thirtieth birthday. No longer able to operate the heavy machinery necessary to load coal and steel onto rail beds, Emmett had taken some business and accounting classes at the junior college and was now my business partner.
“Stubs don’t fucking tell me to listen to reason. No. I’m not selling. Especially not to that piece of shit developer. Him and his fancy fucking loafers.”
I rubbed my eyes, unable to get the mental image of Marshall from Goldstein and Brandenburg out of New York, coming to tell me all the benefits of selling my land for lake front property. Barren Hill was a mountain town. During the fall months, we tended to get a shit ton of rain which of course meant mud—everywhere. That offense to humanity comes in with slipper looking shoes, a suit the color of dirty curtains, and a shirt with one too many buttons unclasped from his collar.
“Marshall,” I grunt, “that piece of work probably thinks the sun rises every day just to come out and greet him. It’s not a lake, it’s a pond. And even that is being generous.”
“If he wants to pay us three hundred grand to call it a lake, I say we quack like ducks and say thank you on our way to the bank.”
That is the other point that pissed me right off. Three hundred grand. Sure, it sounded fancy, but my pop’s whole life came down to a bar they’d wipe right out of existence. Mr. and Mrs. Smith with their two point five children would move into their traditional five bedroom with a walk out basement and “lake” views. No one would ever be the wiser that a guy by the name of Colt McKay dedicated his entire life to the town watering hole.
“Finn when’s the last time we even had a customer?”
I pointed at Rick and Hank playing pool in the corner.
“A non townie I mean.” Emmett clarified with a roll of his eyes.
Right around the time Emmett became Stubs, Mammoth Slope expanded into Barren Hill. With the extension of the I-5 at the north end of town, the south western portion no longer had the same amount of traffic on the state route as it used to. Even the bikers whose hides were practically tattooed on the stools when I was a kid had slowly found new routes to ride and other establishments to hang their hats.
Emmett came around the bar to sit to the left of me, his arm on my shoulder.
“Finn, you and I both know we’re running on fumes here. Within six months we’re going to become insolvent.”
We’d had this conversation before. I still didn’t understand how that was fucking possible. We owned the bar free and clear. Sure,
the taxes had started rising as Barren Hill and Mammoth Slope had expanded, but they were still tolerable. We had practically a skeleton crew at this point with Stub and I handling most of the shifts.
“We’ll figure something out.”
My jaw ached from clenching my teeth so hard. I knew what our financial situation was. There had to be something though. I refused to accept I was on the brink of losing the one thing my pop had killed himself to keep afloat.
“Finn, we need to talk about this.”
“I said not now!” I pushed his hand from my shoulder, shoved off the bar and stormed out, marching towards the trail head behind the bar. It was rare that Emmett could push me to anger. Deep down it wasn’t him. Talking about all this shit pickled the hell out of me though.
CHAPTER TWO
Iwish I could go back in time and meet my younger self. There are so many things I wish I could tell her. Things like not everyone gets a happily ever after. Sometimes, you get a sorry we’re great friends, but we probably shouldn’t have gotten married. Fourteen years wasted. Fourteen years trying to build something with someone and then one day, it all goes up in smoke. Couple that with a mass layoff at the hotel restaurant where I was Chef de Cuisine, and my thirty-ninth year on this planet was really one for the books. Most people dread turning forty. I couldn’t wait to turn the chapter on this decade. My thirties had brought me nothing but heartache.
My sister and I were supposed to take a trip together to celebrate the last remaining weeks in our thirties. Twelve days at a fancy lodge up in the mountains where we could relax at the spa, drink, and overeat. When Brent dropped the D-Bomb on me, however, Tami decided the time away would be a good “reset” for me. This was how I found myself at the Echo Creek Resort and Spa.
“Gemini James,” I told the receptionist, forgetting that I was in fact no longer James. Yet another item to add to my growing list of to-dos relating to the severing of my life as a we.
“Ah, Ms. James! We are so pleased you chose to stay at Echo Creek. You are booked in the Overlook Pass private cabin at the back
of the property. You’re going to love it back there.”
The watch on her wrist was oversized and sparkled with an attitude that screamed luxe. “You have about twenty-five minutes before lunch begins. I’m not certain you’ll make it out to your cabin and back in time. If you’d like I can have the concierge, take your bags to your cabin and you can hang out here until the dining room opens.”
The last thing I wanted to do was make idle chit chat with a someone I didn’t know.
“That’s okay. I’ll just order room service.” I took my map and went in search of the concierge shuttle.
I barely made it five steps before I heard The Wiggles “Twin Song” which was my sister’s custom ring tone. She’d switched it as a prank one drunken night a few years ago, and since then the obnoxious upbeat little ditty had grown on me.
“I literally just checked in, Tami.”
“I figured,” she replied in her Disney princess sing-songy voice, “I just wanted to tell you that I hope you have such a relaxing few weeks. And that I love you. And I’ll miss you. Use this time to decompress. The year’s been crazy but you have a room waiting for you here with me when you come home!”
I wanted to remind her of the time our mom downsized into a townhouse when we went off to college. A two-bedroom townhouse. The pair of us would share the guest bedroom every holiday break. By the time break was over, we’d be ready to disown one another, and desperately zipped off to our respective colleges—me in Rhode Island and she in California. I kept my mouth shut though. Despite the vast differences between us, she was one of the few people I could always count on.
“I’m already putting together a folder of some promising cooking jobs for you!”
If it would please the court, I’d like to submit this exact sentence as to the number one reason I could not live with Tami for an extended period of time.
“Tami, I’m a classically trained chef, I’m not a cook.”
“It’s the same difference.” I could practically see her sitting on her Pottery Barn sofa in her sunroom, examining her latest manicure, bored that she had to explain me how hard she worked finding those job openings.
“Actually, it’s a big difference,” I continued, not wanting to let this one die, even though common sense should have told me to hang up before this devolved into a ridiculous pissing contest.
The concierge pulled up alongside where I stood, yanking on the handbrake and dashing to my side to collect my luggage. Noting I was on my phone he pointed to a seat in the second row, opposite to where he sat behind the steering wheel.
“Calling me a cook would be like calling a heart surgeon a family doctor. There is a host of additional training and specialization that come with holding the cheftitle.”
“Here we go.” Tami huffed, “Gemini James, Chef De Cuisine underneath the James Beard Award Winning Chef Tobin Laurent. Yes, I’ve heard it a million times Gem. But bottom line is, you’re out of work, have nowhere to live, and to put it bluntly, are dependent on me to keep you afloat until you find something.”
I didn’t let her finish. It was times like this I wish there was a more satisfying way to hang up on someone than just hitting “end call.”
AFTER UNPACKING and hitting ignore multiples times on my sister’s phone calls, I still had excess energy I desperately needed to burn off. I’m not sure what hurt the most—her categorically undermining my entire career with a single sentence or that she looked at me like some charity case. A regular Oliver Twist begging her for any crumb she’d deign to hand out. Even worse, this cabin in the woods originally had been a fifty/fifty split when we booked it. Technically, at this point, I was vacationing on her dime.
With sunscreen applied, I took my trusty map and headed off in the direction of the hiking trails. Barren Hill? Seriously, the town is
named Barren Hill? For just one week I wanted to not be reminded of all the ways I was an epic failure, and yet here came another one. Next I’d find out the resort was owned by Janet the Spinster. I was so caught up in the tailspin of my thoughts I somehow missed the slight dip in the trail. As if I hadn’t already taken a significant divergence from my life’s path, the world needed to really hit that fact home with a literal roll, ass over tit down into the ravine.
CHAPTER THREE
There was something magical about Barren Hill. I think it was in the air or part of the nature of these paths, something that helped even the angriest mule lose his fight. That mule presently being me, of course.
The bar was my whole my life. I worked there before I could even drive a car, helping Pop stock shelves during the week and bussing tables on the weekend. While it wasn’t the sit-com warmfuzzy version of a kid’s growing years, it was mine.
I refused to wallow in despair. There was a solution, I just needed to find it. I’d entertain practically anything at this point. That was the level of desperation I was quickly ascending.
“Fuck. Hello? Ouch! Mother fucking dick waffle!”
Usually it was songbirds and toads that greeted me, not a foul mouthed woman. I tried placing where the sound came from, not finding anyone on the nearby paths.
“Hello?” she called out again. “Please tell me those are human footsteps crunching on the gravel. Though it would totally be my luck if I met my demise being some bear’s post hibernation meal.”
“Do you always talk to yourself?” I called into the air, still unsure of where this unknown female was.
“Oh thank god. Hi! I can’t believe it. I honestly thought I was going to die down here.”
Down. As in the ravine. Hell’s fire, she was in the ravine. That ravine isn’t anything to sneeze at either. It was steep. She looked like she’d wrestled every tree on the way down. Her hair was knotted and covered with leaves, and even from the mouth of the ravine I could see a cut on her cheek.
“Do I need to call an ambulance?”
I watched as she patted her face, stretched her arms, and rolled her shoulders.
“No, I’m okay. I think I twisted my ankle though. I tried to stand a second ago and it was not having it. So, if you are concerned with being able to help me, you know, get back up the ravine, you may need to.”
Her voice changed just then. I couldn’t put my finger on it. I shot a text off to Emmett and let him know about the woman in the ravine and to keep him on standby in case I needed him.
While the ravine was steep, for someone who had been climbing the rocks of Barren Hill most of their life, it took less than a minute to make it to where she sat.
“Yoga pants and flip flops?” I helped pull her to a stand. “Did you get dropped on your head? What makes you think that is acceptable attire for these trails?”
“Excuse me?” She shoved me away, nearly losing her balance till I caught her. “Was I dropped on my head?”
She spoke real slow and snotty, like those girls you see on reality TV shows before they start pointing at one another jerking their heads around and squawking about facial waxing and cheating on diets as a way to publicly humiliate one another.
“There are snakes out here.” I pointed at her toes. “Especially right now that we’re through the thaw and the sun is warming the rocks up. You startle them and you’re gonna get more than a twisted ankle, they’ll be revoking your birth certificate.”
She was already pretty pale, but at the mention of all the ground critters that graced our hills, her face blanched to near white. I swear I have uppity suburban women radar and it never fails. This princess was definitely the queen of a cul de sac in some upper middle class town.
“On top of that, did you miss the mountain signs all over town? Ski in the winter, hike in the summer? What part of the word mountainimplies you can skip around here in those?”
I pointed again, and gosh getting a glance at her toes up close, they sure were pretty. She had a little daisy chain tattoo that looped around her second toe. Her toenails were painted in a soft lavender. Her ankle though shook the lead out of my boots. It was pretty close to the same color as her toes, and getting thick.
“We gotta get some ice on that.”
“After you just insulted my intelligence do you honestly think I would have any inclination to accept help from you?”
She leaned against one of the boulders, looking me up and down as her lips twisted into a sour frown. My skin prickled in awareness as she did. Her face morphed from pissed off to frantic in a nanosecond as she slapped against her front and back pockets.
“My phone? I lost my phone!”
“The ravine’s pretty steep, it could be anywhere if it fell out as you rolled down. Look, I don’t want to dismiss the importance of finding your phone but I’m looking at your ankle and if we don’t get ice on that thing, you may as well kiss your whole vacation goodbye. If we compress to reduce swelling maybe you’ll be able to walk on it tomorrow.”
I extended my hand again, and watched her stand there, like a damn flamingo, trying to decide whether or not to take my help. As if she could get out of the ravine without me.
“I’ve seen mules less stubborn than you,” I told her, having lost the last shred of patience I had, I scooped her up and headed towards the top.
“What the hell are you doing?”
She put up a fight. It already was a bit of struggle trying to navigate the both of us on rocks and small strips of clear gravel. Her kicking in my arms like a wet cat didn’t help. I was fixing to give her a firm swat right on her ass. And don’t think my hands hadn’t noticed what a lush set of thighs rested against my arms. My palm had strict directives from my brain to stay right the fuck where it was tucked safely beneath her knees. The yoga pants she wore had to
have been painted on her body, because every curve that brushed against my body, I could feel as if she was wearing nothing at all.
“Are you insane? What kind of a person just picks someone up without their permission and risks their life carrying them up a set of treacherous rocks?”
She pitched her fit all the way to the top of the hill. As I cleared its mouth and set out on the path her hollering and caterwauling continued.
“Put me down! You have no right! This is totally unacceptable.”
Now that I wasn’t trying to balance for the both of us, it was easier to keep a handle on her. Thankfully The Old Lady was less than fifty meters from where she had tumbled down, so she’d get over her fit right quick.
CHAPTER FOUR
My life was a roman tragedy lately, and now I could barely move my toes. That boorish bearded oaf had the audacity to pick me up and carry me. Carry. Me. Like a swaddled infant, up the ravine. That is if a swaddled infant had a muffin top and double D’s. What a mortifying experience. Aside from him being a total stranger with his hands, well, everywhere; I could hear him struggling for breath as we made it back up the hill. Those last few shreds of dignity I was holding on to, what did I really need them for anyway?
“Stubs!” He called while pushing us through a screen door of the back end of some bar called The Old Lady. “I need you to grab me a bucket of ice and some of those rags from storage.”
“You have exactly five seconds to put me down. I am a skilled chef and totally comfortable using all kinds of knives—including the ones that gut and fillet.”
That got his attention. He stopped short in his tracks, causing me to wobble a bit in his arms. Being dropped straight onto my ass on the cement floor didn’t appear to be out of the realm of possibility.
“You realize if it weren’t for me, you’d still be down there in your flip flops and precious toe nail polish, and these next to nothing pants that would have you dying of hypothermia in a few hours when the sun went down.”
A few things struck me as odd walking into the place. First, it was outfit with a full kitchen. Not a chef’s kitchen by any means, but a kitchen clearly intended for serving food, and yet it was a ghost town. Granted by my estimation it was around four in the afternoon, however any food service place should be prepping for dinner at four. Second, other than some twang country competing with the interference on a twist dial radio the bar was completely silent. No talking. No sounds of people playing pool, clinking glasses, or the general ambient sounds of a local watering hole.
“Stubs!” he shouted again, setting me down on top of the pool table. “Don’t move.” He told me, turning off in search of whomever Stubs was I assumed.
As I suspected, not a soul was in the bar. Maybe podunk towns in the middle of nowhere USA didn’t have a large enough population base for them to be popular on Saturday afternoons.
“Name’s Finn. You got a name, sugar or should I just call you princess?”
“It’s Gemini. And I’m probably more vinegar than sugar”
Princess. Every feminist in America would roll their eyes. Yet it tickled me in a weird way.
“You’re welcome, Gemini.”
He put extra emphasis on pronouncing my name. As if my name was the butter and it forming on his lips was the sugar, and the two produced the most decadent caramel sauce. He threw me a megawatt smile which caught me completely off guard. Seconds before, he was bellowing for some guy named Stubs and practically tossing me onto a pool table, and now he’s showing off a sexy smile beneath a firebush of a beard? Like, I’m talking toothpaste ad smile. Too bad he’d lose those pearly whites when I punched him square in his face for that fucking attitude of his.
“You make it really hard to be gracious for anything when you seem to lack just the most basic manners and social graces. For example randomly picking women up and carrying them basket style like they are distressed damsels from the old moving picture days. Also, when you rub an act of kindness in someone’s face, before
they even have a chance to express gratitude—you’re really killing your chances to start a relationship on the right foot.”
Finn, while broad in the shoulders, didn’t look athletic, so his ability to hike straight up treacherous terrain carrying the equivalent of an oversized bag of mulch—or bags of mulch if we’re being honest…the divorce hasn’t been kind to my heart or my ass— appeared to have fully recovered from the workout.
“Interesting.” He pulled at his beard as if considering what I just said. I couldn’t pay attention to that however, because the motion caused the muscles in his bicep to ripple drawing my attention to a jagged tattoo from his elbow all the way up under his T-shirt. It was beautiful in the most violent way. Like a bear that clawed at his arm and ripped away the skin exposing bone and sinew. I couldn’t stop staring at it.
“I know I have a first aid kit here somewhere.” He kept zipping around the bar like a gnat in search of fruit. “For now, here.” He handed me a damp wash cloth. “That scratch looked pretty nasty when I first saw you but seems to have clotted. But you’ve got some blood on your cheek.”
He pointed just below my eye. My fingers skimmed gently and the smarting pain led me right to the offending injury.
“Prolly have a doozy of a shiner in the morning. You’re lucky all ya got was a twisted ankle and a split cheek.”
I thought he was going to break into another lecture about my flip flops. He didn’t, thank god. In my defense, whenever I fly I always wear flip flops, because my feet swell on planes. I’d been arguing with Tami and completely forgot I wasn’t wearing hiking appropriate shoes.
“Can I get you a drink to dull the pain? We gotta ice that and wrap it.”
“G & T. Preferably Botanist, Hendricks otherwise. Whatever your well tonic is because somehow I doubt you carry specialty tonic.”
Finn rubbed his chin, pulling against the thickness of his beard once again. “This isn’t really a high caliber drinking establish shug—I mean—Gemini.”
I watched him circle the bar, and grab two shot glasses with one hand, and grip two bottle necks between his fingers of the other hand before coming back to where I was perched.
“Whiskey or Tequila?”
I pointed at the whiskey bottle. Tequila and I have never been friends. He poured two fingers, clinked my glass against his and downed his drink in a single gulp. I know this because my eyes couldn’t look away. I watched his rough hands bring the shot glass to his lips, which were round and downturned. Not in a frown necessarily but as if the weight of the word had settled on his bottom lip and it was too heavy to close all the way. I wondered, in an offhand sort of way as I threw back my whiskey, if it felt as heavy as it looked.
“So what’s the story on this place?”
The bar was in decent shape for looking like it hadn’t been the regular spot for the locals in a decade. There was a fifties style Wurlitzer in the corner, though there was so much dust blanketing it, it was hard to tell if it functioned. It could probably comfortably seat forty between the bar and the tables. In its glory days it was probably the place for Friday night fish frys and local honkey tonk bands playing to a packed room.
“It belonged to my pops. Used to be popular till they built a highway up north. Now all we get are locals.” He told me, ripping some rags into strips and soaking them in ice water. While the blue T-shirt he wore was totally unremarkable, the way his arms flexed beneath that cotton consumed my focus. Finn could have told me his Dad was abducted by aliens and they left him the bar as reparations for the pain and suffering they’d subjected him to.
“All right I’m going to have to start wrapping. It’s probably going to smart a bit. That joint is well on its way to blowing up into a tennis ball.”
He poured another shot of whiskey pushing it into my hands.
“Maybe I should just go to like urgent care and have them look at it?”
Though honestly, I wouldn’t be able to drive to save my life. Over the years with the crazy hours, I’d become a two-drink drunk. And
that was usually two glasses of Beaujolais with whatever charcuterie I pieced together at the end of a long shift.
“Never heard of urgent care. Hospital’s about an hour away. I don’t think it’s broken. Your toes wiggle, you were able to put weight on it, even though it hurt to do so. I think you’re fine. If it’s still bad tomorrow, you could probably have the hotel call the local doc and have him come look at it. Seems kind of a waste to take a taxi all the way to Mammoth Slope just for them to tell you it’s just sprained.”
His fingers caressed my ankle. I feel the need to preface this. He had a surgeon’s touch. Despite his fingers looking like they’d been buffed with a cheese grater, he couldn’t have been gentler. And yet when he touched my ankle, I felt it everywhere. E-v-e-r-y-w-h-e-r-e. It sparked like the smallest spit of oil jumping from a frying pan. But also spread like melted butter on lobster. It was the booze. It had to be. Two fingers of whiskey and I was feeling feels I hadn’t felt in, gosh. Long before Brent decided to take his last name back.
“I’m sorry.” He said in response to me practically flying off the pool table when he touched me. “Do you want another shot?”
I wasn’t going anywhere except back to my hotel room right? So why not. I nodded, pushing my shot glass towards him. He filled it up, dangled it between his fingers for me to take. His eyes locked with mine and he didn’t look away until the whiskey had disappeared down my throat. They were a strange color, his eyes. Not green or hazel, but a gray green, like the color of concrete. He possessed a set of eyelashes that was simply unfair to give to a man when women spent a small fortune buying fake ones to look like that.
“This water is ice cold.” He told me, pulling one of the rags from his ice bath. “It’s gonna smart like hell. But any time I had any kind of ailment, my pop made me suffer the same treatment. I don’t know what kind of voodoo magic is in here, but you’re gonna wake up in the morning a little stiff, but pain free, mark my words.”
My synapses were on overload. The whiskey hissed through my blood stream creating a laxity through my body that had me riding a delicious wave of bliss. The dichotomy of Finn’s gentle touch but roughened fingers had me squirming as if he had me tied
blindfolded to a bed post. And then there was the cold. No. Cold is too soft a word for that sudden plunge into the violence of pin pricks driving themselves repeatedly into the tortured nerves of my foot and ankle. This time I really did launch from the pool table. I can only liken my response to a spooked pony. My limbs went everywhere, and I’m certain I caught air time.
“Finn has a reputation for strange ways to play with his women.” I heard a soft chuckle above me, and a warm, firm arm holding me in place. “Emmett.” He replied when I turned my head to see who was holding me.
“Stubs, the fuck you been? I’ve been hollering for you for near twenty minutes.”
“Taking pictures of the lake,” he replied. “Marshall needed ‘em for the file.”
At Emmett’s utterance of the word Marshall, Finn’s fingers clamped down hard on my already tender ankle, yanking a cry from me.
“Marshall doesn’t need pictures of my fucking lake. I thought I told you we had this handled and to tell him to kindly step into traffic.”
Emmett leaned against the pool table, his arm grazing mine as he faced Finn to continue the discussion. Apparently the discussion warranted that he be seated.
“Why don’t we continue this later, after you’ve tended to whomever this beautiful stranger is.”
Finn looked up at me, amusement glinting his eye and drawing a lopsided grin. “This is Gemini. Don’t sweet talk her, she’s made of vinegar not sugar. And we’ll have this discussion right fucking now because it’ll be a short one. He can take that fancy fucking pen of his, and the contract it sat on top of, and shove them up his ass.”
“Finn she’s on the verge of tears. Let up. Jesus. Like I said, we’ll continue this conversation when you aren’t about to break that ankle you’re working on setting.” He turned towards me his empathetic eyes assessing my face. “Can I get you something. Maybe a shot from the bar to dull the pain?”
“She’s already had three. I’m almost done here. Why don’t you go look in Pop’s storage shed and see if he has any crutches laying around back there.”
“We cleaned out all the storage areas a few years ago, there’s nothing back there.”
“Can you just go check?” Finn huffed, losing his focus and his grip on my ankle. “This was going much smoother before you waltzed in here and distracted everyone.”
Emmett pushed off the pool table, chuckling as he moved out of my line of sight towards what I assumed was the storage area Finn spoke about.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make it hurt even worse. I’ve only got three more bands to tie and then I can take you back to the hotel.”
Emmett reappeared with a glass of ice water in his hand, which he passed to me.
“Maybe I should drive her back to the hotel. You’re as jumpy as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs.”
Finn cradled my foot between his hands, putting pressure on my toes, and pushing against the swell up towards my ankle. Despite the ache just beneath the surface, it also felt like heaven. Is it possible to have an orgasm just from sensation overload? Because that foot massage sent me into sensory bliss, so much so I may have shown the two men what my O face looks like.
“Why don’t you make yourself useful and call Lexi at the front desk and tell her to have a wheel chair ready for when we arrive. Also make sure someone has set up dinner in Gemini’s room so she can stay off her foot for the rest of the night. What’s your last name vinegar not sugar?”
He threw me another one of those lopsided smiles, as he said it and my stomach flip flopped.
“James. Gemini James. Well technically I’m not Gemini James anymore. I’m Gemini Tate but my credit card doesn’t know that yet. Ha! No one knows that yet. Well, except you, my lawyer, the judge, and Brent, my ex-husband. Oh, and my sister. She’s the reason I fell.
Too busy trying to convince her that I’m actually a capable fully functioning adult.”
“A capable adult that wears flip flops on a hiking trail.”
He just couldn’t let that go, but gosh I dug that sarcastic smile. Whether it was the shock setting in as a result of my twisted ankle and Finn’s manipulation of the joint, or the three shots of whiskey I was feeling loose and mellow. A complete one eighty from how I’d felt this morning. It was nice. Freeing. I knew in the morning I would regret existing in this level of drunkenness, but I liked it.
“All right let’s get you up and in the truck.” Finn draped my arm around his shoulder, helping me stand on my good foot. “Keep the other one up. Do you want me to carry you?”
I must have cut him with quite a look because he belly laughed at me. Not a chuckle or a snicker, but an actual laugh.
“All right princess. We’ll do it the hard way.”
“Lexi is at the ready.” Emmett appeared on my other side, giving me his shoulder to balance. Between the two of them I was more floating towards the truck parked outside than actually walking.
“He’s really a big teddy bear.” Emmett whispered, “His ire is directed at me, not you. Just in case you were worried about getting in his truck. The hotel is literally up the road, not even a five-minute drive.”
With the fresh air coming from the woods, and not the cloying smell of a musty dive bar, I could detect the subtle hints of familiar smells.
“I smell ginger,” I told him, “and I think peppermint? And something else…rosemary maybe?”
“You part blood hound or something?”
“I’m a chef. Or, I was a chef. It’s a hazard of the job. Did you rub those all on my foot? Aren’t you a regular naturopath?”
I liked his laugh, and the way he played with his beard when he thought about something to say.
“Back in the day, Cheffie—our cook, he had people coming from three counties for his food. The spices are left over from him. But my dad used the same things. I’m telling you tomorrow you’ll wake up and you will feel brand new.”
“I bet I will. All of those spices have anti-inflammatory properties. So between that and that nearly orgasmic foot massage, I think I’m on the road to recovery.”
I realized too late what I said. I didn’t even have time to feel embarrassed about it because within seconds he was pulling into the driveway of the resort.
Time had morphed in hyper speed. One minute Finn and Emmett were loading me into the front seat of the biggest pick-up truck I’d ever laid eyes on, and the next Finn was helping me out of the truck, and balancing me against the door while we waited for the bellhop to bring the wheelchair.
“Thank you,” I said. My hands wrapped around his biceps, though I don’t remember putting them there. He looked filled out but not bulky, I wouldn’t have ever guessed that he was as firm in the arms and shoulders that he actually was. “I know I didn’t say it earlier. But I appreciate it. Well, you. Especially hauling my ass out of that ravine.”
“It’s a baby ravine. More like a gulch than anything.”
I could smell the whiskey on his breath too. It was a honing beacon for the part of whiskey that controls your libido. One minute we’re standing there awkwardly waiting for the bellhop, and the next I’m nibbling on his lips, testing how firm and heavy they felt caressing mine.
“You’ll be gone in a few days.” His fingers cradled my shoulder, holding me at the slightest distance. “This isn’t a good thing to start.”
“That I’ll be gone in a few days is precisely why it’s the best kind of thing to start.”
I tried to go in again, because the first swipe of my lips did little to dampen the molten desire that threatened to erupt.
“Princess, you start this, and I promise you won’t want to stop.”
My fingers itched to bury themselves in his beard. To feel for myself if it was soft or wiry, if he liked being caressed there or if it bothered him. The truth was I just wanted to feel his mouth again. I wanted more of the heaviness of his lips pressed against mine, being wrapped in his scent like a scarf on a snowy day.
“Someone’s overconfident.”
Me, apparently. While I can’t say that this “wasn’t like me” because quite honestly, I’d been a “me” alongside someone else for so long I don’t even know what my singular identity was.
“Oh, I’m sure of it. I’m not the kind of person that has missionary style, penciled in my agenda- sex, with a blow job kicker for birthdays and anniversaries. I’m a flip you over, pull your hair, plunge my finger into your hidden treasure and tell you to take it like a good girl. I’ll wreck you. You won’t want it any other way after me. And I’m not the matching retirement account and monogrammed towels kind of man.”
“The towels just end up going to the Goodwill anyway,” I tell him, before pushing myself into his space. It was all the invitation he needed. He cradled my jaw firmly between his thumb and finger, and plundered my mouth like there was buried treasure that could only be unearthed with a very adroit tongue.
My whole being melted. Liquid heat erupted down my spine, sending the most delicious of sensations from the tips of my ears all the way to my curling toes.
“Ahem.”
The bellboy appeared. Top notch customer fucking service. Great timing too. The Yelp review practically wrote itself.
“Ms. James I’m here to take you to your room. I’ve just come from there, the staff is setting your dining room for dinner, so we best get moving so it doesn’t get cold.”
Alistair, according to his name tag, had the good sense to school his features and not indicate he’d just walked into what felt like a pornographic display of lips, teeth and tongue.
The atmosphere cooled, Finn stepped back wiping his lips and shooting me a sheepish wink.
“Feel better Ms. James. Hopefully I’ll see you around.”
Before I could even say thanks for rescuing me, or hey come back to my hotel room and prove it, he was behind the wheel of his truck and pulling out of the roundabout.
Unfortunately for me, every blood cell in my body vibrated in concert, and the song it sang was about a bar owner named Finn
with concrete gray eyes, and a dirty, pouty, mouth.
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“Or rope me into believing any taffy I’ll show you how much joke there’s in it!”
Something happened.
Victor’s small fists began to move with truly remarkable speed. It was Tom Clifton’s ribs that stopped several snappy punches.
“Ouch! Quit it!” yelled Tom, jumping aside with undignified haste.
“Stop—stop, I say!”
But whichever way he turned Victor was always dancing before him.
“You would make me miss that motor yacht trip, eh? Thought maybe I looked soft, eh? Well, here’s one for that!”
Two pairs of restraining hands suddenly gripped Victor Collins’ shoulders.
“No more of this, Vic,” commanded Bob, sternly. “We don’t want to start a rival show on this side of the street.”
“You’re making more noise than that fat barker over there!” added Charlie.
Tom Clifton, painfully conscious that he had made no effort to defend himself, and feeling the various assortment of punches which Victor had liberally bestowed upon him, suddenly decided that his reputation would suffer unless some decisive action was taken.
A good shaking, he thought, would be about the proper thing.
“I’ll tend to him myself, Bob. Leave the whole thing to me!” he cried.
While Victor squirmed and struggled in Bob Somers’ strong grasp, Charlie, bubbling over with mirth, had secured a firm hold on Tom Clifton’s arm.
“I guess the circus has been too much for somebody’s nerves,” he chuckled. “Better stop. There are about eighteen people looking over.”
“I don’t care!” stormed Tom.
“I do,” said Bob. “Let’s begin at the beginning, and come to the end fast. Victor seems peeved about something. Speak up, Vic: what’s the trouble?”
Realizing that the odds were too great to overcome, Victor simmered down.
“There’d be thirty-nine people looking at us if I had my way,” he said, sullenly. “This thing isn’t ended yet. Tall Indians are easy for me.”
“Then explanations ought to be easy,” laughed Bob.
Victor poured forth the story of his woes with a volubility that showed a strong grip on the English language, and, as he proceeded, the faces of the three completely changed expression. Bob and Charlie fairly roared with mirth, while Tom, backing up against the motor car, seemed almost too astonished to speak.
“We had our trip on the yacht,” cried Blake, between his peals of laughter.
“And Tom did motor it to Milwaukee,” supplemented Bob. “But ‘things are not always what they seem.’”
Briefly he explained the situation. His manner and tones were so convincing as to completely silence Victor Collins’ suspicions. The angry look slowly faded from his eyes. He stuck his hands into his overcoat pocket and whistled shrilly.
For once in his life Victor had learned a lesson.
The story of Tom’s brilliant deductions was, of course, too good to keep, so the “grind,” in spite of the tall boy’s frantic winks, gave all the details with a charming disregard for his feelings.
The sheepish expression which had rested on Victor’s face gave place to an enormous grin. He laughed quite as loudly as Bob and Charlie had done a few moments before.
“Well,” growled Tom, “can you blame me? Weren’t you all twisted up yourself? I went down to the wharf and saw——”
“So did Brandon and I; and all we saw was a mean-looking little fat man. He had the nerve to come up and begin talking. ‘No; not even
the glitter of a cent,’ I told the beggar Whew, wasn’t he hopping mad, though! You ought to have seen how he beat it.”
“A little fat man!” cried Tom, opening his eyes. “Why—why, he must have been the very one that told me about the boys going off on the yacht.”
“He did?” gasped Victor.
“Yes! Why, he wasn’t any beggar It wouldn’t take a Sherlock Holmes to see that he had sized up the situation and was going to tell you all about it. If you had only given him half a chance, Victor Collins, this ——”
“What! Are you going to try and put the blame on me?” interrupted Victor, fiercely. “It wouldn’t have changed things at all—not a bit of it. I knew the whole crowd had skipped.”
“Say, fellows!” Bob Somers’ loud exclamation put an end to the wrangle. “No wonder that chap over there has a shape like Dave’s! It is Dave; and I knew it!”
“Why, of course it is!” snapped Victor.
“Great Scott!” cried Tom. “What—that fellow with the red coat and dinky little cap our Dave? Somebody fan me with a feather.”
“A rope’s end would suit your case better. Yes; Brandon has had to earn his own living for once.”
“Help!” murmured Charlie. “This has been almost too much for my weak intellect.”
“Now, Vic, do let us have an explanation!” cried Bob.
“You might have told us before, instead of raising such a howl about me,” broke in Tom.
Victor immediately launched forth into a vivid description of their experiences with the circus. He had a great deal to say, but the boys did not stand still while listening to it. Each was too anxious to see David Brandon in his new and astonishing rôle. They rapidly crossed the street, then made as straight a line as booths, stands and people would permit toward the entrance to the show.
All the sights and sounds peculiar to circuses were on every side. Their thoughts, however, were centered upon the boy with the red coat and tasseled cap who seemed to be talking as easily and naturally as though merely reciting in school.
In the midst of an impassioned argument Dave caught sight of his friends. He waved his arm, but that was all he could do in the way of greeting.
The end of Victor’s story fell on inattentive ears.
Tom felt his heart swell with pride—pride that Dave—their Dave— had again shown his versatility. Forgetting diffidence, he yelled:
“You didn’t know our automobile passed you on the road last night, eh, Dave?”
And a moment after these words were spoken he observed a small, thin man, who had been staring toward them, start forward. He also noticed, as the man approached, that he was scowling angrily.
“Say, boys,” he exclaimed, in a voice which the Ramblers had heard on the night before, “so it was your car that passed us on the road, eh? Well, I’ve got a word to say!”
CHAPTER XXII DAVE RESIGNS
M P W , straining his neck in an effort to look squarely into Tom Clifton’s eyes, also waved his finger threateningly in the air.
“Things has came to a pretty pass when a lot of irresponsible kids can go chasin’ all around creation in a motor car. Do you know what you done last night?”
The familiar flush appeared once more on Tom Clifton’s face as many pairs of eyes were leveled in his direction.
“What do you mean?” he stammered.
“It’s a wonder it doesn’t mean a ten thousand dollar suit for damages!” thundered Mr. Whiffin, savagely. “An’ it’s only by good luck that you ain’t mixed up in the biggest kind of a rumpus. That car o’ yourn stampeded our elephants—that’s what it done!”
“I’m very sorry to hear it,” spoke up Bob Somers, quietly, “but you can hardly blame us. We had just as much right to the road as you.”
“No sass, now!” cried Whiffin.
Tom was trembling with indignation.
“Seems to me you’re handing some out yourself,” he managed to say
“I’m good at it,” snapped Whiffin. “Anybody what deserves sass gits their full share from me.”
“By George, if I’d only known it was the Ramblers in that car,” cried Victor, recovering from his surprise, “maybe some mud balls wouldn’t have been flying!”
“I must say this has been a wonderful motor car trip,” remarked Charlie.
“Just supposin’ them elephants had run inter somethin’?” Mr Whiffin’s querulous tones rose above all other sounds. “Just supposin’ a farmer’s wagon had been in the way——”
“Or a picnic party,” broke in Tom, satirically.
No doubt Mr. Whiffin would have made a very interesting retort but for the fact that his eyes happened to rest on the form of a stocky, freckle-faced boy. This lad, attracted by the sound of his voice, had come forward and was taking in the scene with much apparent interest.
The audacity of such a proceeding seemed to appal Mr. Peter Whiffin.
“Loafin’ ag’in, eh?” he snarled. “Expect to be supported in idleness, I reckon! You ain’t done scarcely nothin’ since I hired that new barker.”
“Oh, I ain’t, eh?” Joe Rodgers’ eyes flashed angrily. “Oh, no; I ain’t done nothin’ but work me arms an’ legs most off!”
“Light out!” commanded the manager.
“When I gits ready I will,” answered Joe, defiantly. “Hey, fellers, I heard all that. So you’re the ones what Jumbo, I—I mean Dave told me about? An’, say, he’s the bulliest feller in the whole world. Anybody what could do what he done last night ought ter have a medal.”
“Permit me to introduce into your charmed circle the esteemed and particular crony of Mr. David Brandon—Joseph Rodgers, Esquire, water-carrier by special appointment to Oily Spudger’s Great Show,” snickered Victor.
The boys greeted Joe politely.
“If the fat feller belongs to a bunch like this it’s most enough to make me fire him,” growled the manager. “Have you watered them elephants, Joe?”
“Sure I have.”
“And wiped off them cages?”
“Yep.”
“Well, you know what yer next job is. Git!”
“Don’t have to.”
Mr. Whiffin was both amazed and angry.
“It’s all the doin’s o’ that there new barker,” he declared, emphatically. “He’s been fillin’ yer head full o’ cranky notions. Ye’re gittin’ too big fer your place.”
“’Tain’t so!” Joe flung back, spitefully.
“I’ll look inter this here affair, an’ if that fat feller keeps meddlin’ inter other people’s business I’ll hand him somethin’ what he won’t never forgit.”
“A fine bit of gratitude for stopping the runaway elephants!” cried Tom.
“Mr. Whiffin is going to give you all free passes,” spoke up Victor, loudly. “Step right over to the box office and get ’em!”
The manager glared at the crowd.
“If that’s what ye’re after, pass straight along,” he snarled. “I wouldn’t want you in the show at fifty cents per. Like as not you’d stampede the whole menagerie!”
The furious blast of the ten thousand dollar band starting up made further conversation almost impossible. As though the music conveyed some signal to the brain of Mr. Whiffin and his protégé, they immediately started off, and, by the simple process of mingling with the crowd, were soon lost to sight.
“The automobile hasn’t bumped anything,” laughed Bob, “but a whole lot of things have bumped us.”
The boys, seeing that there would be no chance to interview the barker for some time, concluded to take the car to the nearest garage.
“I always knew that Dave could do a lot of things,” said Tom, as he climbed into the machine, “but who ever thought he could stand up
before a crowd and talk like that?”
“And didn’t he look perfectly stunning in that red coat and pretty little cap?” remarked Charlie Blake, with a sly glance at each of the others. “Aren’t we the brainy chaps on this trip, though?”
“A hulking big thing like that ought to be out working on a farm,” roared Bob.
With a loud honk, honk, the motor car was off, and twenty minutes later the four were back at the circus.
They found the lot in the grip of a frenzy of sound. Dave was hammering on a gong, the ringing notes of which even overtopped the most strenuous efforts of the hard-working band; and this medley of sound was punctuated at intervals by the cries of venders, or the shrill whoops of children.
“It’s a dandy show, all right,” said Victor.
“If Whiffin had gotten me to do the barking instead of Dave——” began Tom. “Hey, what are you laughing about?” he demanded, suspiciously.
“Oh, nothing!” gurgled Victor. “Excuse me, but the thought of you chinning to a crowd somehow gave me a fit of the laughs.”
“Then get over it. I was going to say that there would have been a fine row if he’d tried any of his prattling on me.”
“My, oh my, isn’t that awful to think of?” snickered Victor.
Tom tossed his head scornfully, and was about to join in a rush for the ticket wagon when Bob stopped him.
“I want to get a chance to speak to Dave first,” he said. “Plenty of time yet, Tom.”
“The tent seems to be actually swallowing people,” objected Clifton. “There won’t be any places left.”
“Only wish they were turning hundreds away,” exclaimed Charlie. “Then we wouldn’t be able to go in.”
When the stampede to gain admission was over the band ceased playing with remarkable promptness, and Dave as promptly resumed speaking.
It was clearly evident that those who failed to avail themselves of the opportunity of seeing the great Spudger show on that particular afternoon would be making one of the most amazing mistakes of their lives. Dave almost said as much.
“Thank goodness we haven’t missed it,” said Bob, with a smile. “Oh,” he turned abruptly at the sound of a voice—“you here again, Joe!”
“’Tain’t nobody else,” chuckled Joe.
“Mr. Rodgers looks like a living danger signal,” said Charlie, his eyes scanning Joe’s flaming red vest.
The circus boy seemed to construe this as a great compliment. He grinned complacently.
“You fellers is certainly all to the good,” he said, graciously. “An’, say, isn’t Dave a Jim dandy?”
“Of course he is,” laughed Charlie. “How do you like circus life, Joe?”
“Not as much as I did afore I met Dave,” answered Joe. “He kinder started me a-thinkin’. I ain’t got no eddication, an’ he says if I don’t never begin I won’t have no chanc’t to get up in the band wagon. An’, say”—the freckle-faced boy laughed—“I wish’t I could play music.”
“Why?” inquired Tom.
“’Cause them fellers has an easy job.”
“How so?”
“Oh, I’m wise to ’em. Often, when the leader weren’t a-lookin’, I’ve seen ’em quit playin’—honest, I have. An’ when he gits his eyes on ’em ag’in an’ waves that there club o’ hisn, they starts up like mad.”
“Deceitful rascals,” murmured Charlie, trying to stifle a suspicious gurgle.
Within a short time the boys found their opportunity to speak to Dave. They shook hands as heartily and their tongues wagged as rapidly as though weeks had separated them. Making the best of the few minutes which were at their disposal, enough was said to render the situation clear all around.
They learned that Dave expected to be with Spudger’s until the next day, and that he had written a letter to Captain Bunderley.
“I told him Vic and I would leave for Milwaukee just as soon as my work was over,” explained the stout boy.
“Hooray!” cried Tom. “Then there is nothing for us to do but enjoy ourselves.”
“An’ I’ll show you the best seats in the house,” added Joe. “Come on!”
Of course Tom was too dignified to show any visible effects of the pleasing sensations which seized him as he entered the abode of pomp and sawdust. He had never before seen so much of either
As the performance was about to begin, Joe immediately conducted them to the reserved seat section, where real chairs took the place of piles of lumber.
“We haven’t stampeded the menagerie and it’s cost us only twentyfive cents per,” laughed Bob.
Dave, minus his red coat and cap, soon joined them; and from their point of vantage they witnessed the “Stupendous and Gorgeous Spectacle” which Spudger always gave to his patrons.
After the show, when the crowds had departed, Dave took the crowd to the small side tent and introduced them to “Little” Georgy, Zingar, the Randolpho family and Ormond de Sylveste. The circus people all expressed profound gratification at the meeting. The young giant was particularly charmed.
“I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if you’d have a job like mine some day,” he remarked to Tom.
“If it comes to that I’ll remember Spudger’s,” grinned the high school lad.
“We can’t have any fellows on our ball nine that measure over six feet three inches,” said Blake.
“Ball nine—ball nine!” queried Joe. “What ball nine?”
“This tall Indian here has started one on paper,” put in Victor. “He’s spoiled about a hundred perfectly good sheets. Why? Can you play?”
“Kin I play?” echoed Joe. “Well—some.”
“In the major league class, I suppose?”
Joe grinned.
“Here, here, gentlemen,” exclaimed Victor, “I hereby propose that the managing director of Clifton’s great baseball nine immediately gets an option on the services of one Joseph Rodgers, Esquire.”
“Oh, don’t I wish I could play ball and enjoy myself like other boys,” sighed the young giant.
“But think how awful it would be when you had to slide for second base,” laughed Victor.
“Wouldn’t I like to go to school an’ git on a team,” murmured Joe, staring moodily at the ground.
“Stranger things have happened, Joe,” said Bob.
“It will never happen to me if Whiffin kin prevent it,” sniffed the circus boy.
“Brace up, lad,” said Ormond de Sylveste, in a kindly tone. “At one time I was poor and ignorant, too. But there is always a chance for the most obscure to become the most prominent. I don’t wish to boast, gentlemen, but I venture to say that in my own profession there are few who dare assert their supremacy over me, and——”
“Say, is Bill Potts in there!” a disagreeable voice suddenly thundered. “By Jingo, I thought so! Ketched ag’in! If that fat barker stays here any longer there won’t be a man in the show workin’. I guess Joe’ll
expect to be President of the United States next. I don’t want no idlin’ around this tent, understan’, an’——”
“A little politeness, sir!” expostulated the bareback rider, with dignity
“I never heard the beat o’ that,” exclaimed Whiffin. His voice indicated great surprise. “Even Bill Potts is a-borrowin’ nerve from the fat one. You want ter git out o’ them fancy clothes o’ yourn, an’ buckle down to some real work.”
For an instant it actually looked as if Ormond de Sylveste was about to make some fiery retort, but, apparently changing his mind, he bowed to his new acquaintances and strode moodily away, the picture of outraged dignity.
“If you don’t take them there ‘stars’ down onc’t in a while yer couldn’t live in the same tent with ’em, they’d git that uppish,” came from Mr. Whiffin.
“Some allowances must be made for genius,” laughed Dave. “Come on, fellows. I’m almost famished.”
“Be sure to come and see me again,” cried the treble voice of “Little” Georgy
Outside the tent, Dave led the way to the nearest restaurant with remarkable speed.
“Tom,” he said, “when you become a great physician, if some of your patients have no appetite advise them to take a two or three day course of barking. Boys, I can eat twice as much as before.”
“I have always suspected where Brandon’s cash went,” chirped Victor.
After leaving the restaurant the boys wandered around town until it was time for Dave’s duties to begin. Tom would have had no objection to seeing another performance, but this idea receiving no encouragement from the others, he proposed going to a hotel.
“I’ve got some letters to write to the fellows at school,” he said.
The boys found a hotel near by, and, later on in the evening, leaving Tom hard at work scribbling, they strolled over to the circus grounds.
“Fellows,” laughed Dave, who had been looking for them, “I have resumed my occupation of gentleman and scholar. My connection with Ollie Spudger’s Great Combined Peerless Circus and Menagerie has unexpectedly ended. Jack Gray, having recovered his voice, will in future speak from the rostrum.”
“Well, it was a jolly good lark, anyway,” remarked Bob.
“How can you tear yourself away from Mister Joe Rodgers?” asked Victor.
“He’s a good little chap,” declared Dave, “and ought to amount to something if he should have an opportunity. There doesn’t seem much chance for him here, although Whiffin isn’t such a bad fellow when one gets to understand him.”
By the gracious permission of Mr. Ollie Spudger, the boys were permitted to enter the tent so that they might say good-bye to the young giant.
“Little” Georgy seemed almost on the point of blubbering as he shook hands. Joe Rodgers was soon found. Joe’s face wore a strange expression.
“So you are goin’ ter git, eh, fellows?” he remarked, slowly. “I’m mighty glad I met this here bunch. Maybe I’ll see you ag’in some day.”
“And by that time Brandon might give you a job as his private secretary,” laughed Victor.
When the crowd returned to the hotel they found that Tom’s literary labors were not yet concluded. The others, however, having decided that it was time to turn in, pen, ink and paper were promptly wrested from him.
“If I don’t get some rest soon,” declared Dave, “I’ll be in danger of going to sleep right here.”
Although this appeal was heeded, the task of awakening the historian next morning proved to be one of heroic proportions.
“Oh ho!” he yawned, at last wearily dragging himself to his feet, in answer to their repeated knocking. “All right, Bob! No; you needn’t batter down the door. I’m coming directly.”
In spite of his objections breakfast was hurried through with unseemly haste, and a quick start made for the garage.
There, they jumped into a machine looking as spick and span as though it had just come from the salesroom.
“And this time I do hope we manage to reach Milwaukee,” said Victor.
“If Tom doesn’t get out of our sight we may,” laughed Charlie.
As the car whirled along the street Spudger’s tents were brought into view again, but none of those whom they had met could be seen.
“Poor old Joe,” sighed Dave. “I’m afraid he’ll never get that chance he wants so badly.”
With but a few vehicles on the long, straight road the motor car leaped forward at a rate which caused the miles to slip by with astonishing rapidity. Before the noon hour it rolled across the East Water Street bridge, and soon stopped in front of the garage where it had been previously left.
“Now we want to see Uncle Ralph the quickest ever!” exclaimed Victor, flicking a few spots of mud from his clothes. “By George, it seems like an age since I was on board that yacht.”
“A few more weeks of the same stuff would make you a strong, husky chap,” said Tom, loftily.
“Like yourself, I suppose?” gurgled Victor.
As the boys trooped into the hotel, perhaps with a trifle more noise and hilarity than was necessary, they heard a sonorous voice exclaim:
“Well, well; here you are, at last!”
Captain Bunderley, his weather-beaten face wreathed in smiles, stamped forward. He seized Victor Collins’ hand.
“I’ve never seen you looking better, lad!” he said. “I want to hear all about those wonderful experiences you’ve been having. Traveling with a circus, eh? And, Bob, I’d like to know how you managed to find each other.”
He led the way to the reception room, motioned them to seats and selected a divan on which to place his own heavy form.
“Sail ahead,” he commanded. “No tacking, now; run right before the wind.”
Upon Dave fell the rôle of principal spokesman. The stout boy’s broad smile grew broader as he proceeded. Captain Bunderley’s deep-throated laughter boomed out at frequent intervals.
“Capital—capital! You’ll do, my boy!” he exclaimed. “’Pon my word, you ought to succeed in life.”
“Not even an aeroplane could keep him down!” cried Tom.
Bob Somers, too, had a great deal to say, and by lunch time Uncle Ralph had learned everything worth knowing and much else besides.
Finally he rose to his feet.
“I have a little business to attend to this afternoon, so we’ll get something to eat at once,” he said.
“I was just about to suggest it myself,” murmured Dave.
The dining-room, with its ornate columns and rich decorations of the Louis XV period, was a very attractive-looking place. It suited Dave’s artistic eye to a nicety. A sigh of contentment came from his lips as he took a seat at a table by the window.
Course after course was placed before them, and the coffee stage of the proceedings had just arrived when the sound of loud voices in the corridor attracted general attention.
“Don’t go in there, boy,” exclaimed a commanding voice. “Get right out of this hotel!”
“I ain’t goin’ to, I tells yer. I know this is the place ’cause he told me he was comin’ here hisself.”
“There’s some mistake, boy; none of our guests could possibly want to see you.”
“That’s where you’re foolin’ yerself. The clerk says he’s in the eatin’ parlor. I’ll wait outside while you goes in an’ looks around. He’s a big fat feller with a round face.”
“You’re the most impudent little rooster I’ve ever met. I’ll do nothing of the sort.”
“Then I’ll do it myself.”
There was the sound of a struggle.
“Grab him, Richards!” bawled the same loud voice. “Quick!”
Following this came a snort of indignation and disgust, and the eyes of every one in the room, focused on the doorway, saw a stocky, freckle-faced boy swinging recklessly into the room, with the faultlessly-dressed manager close at his heels.
“Come back!” ordered the latter, angrily.
“Not on yer life! I sees him. There he is by the winder. Hello, Dave!”
Yes—actually—Joe Rodgers, flaming red vest, big brass buttons and all, had invaded the fashionable dining-room of a fashionable hotel, and, unabashed by his surroundings or by the looks on the faces of the horrified guests and waiters, was steering as straight a course as he could for the table at which Captain Bunderley and the boys were seated.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE ARM OF THE LAW
“I ’ I’d see ’im!” cried Joe, exultingly “I know’d it! That chump a-chasin’ me says ter git, but I up an’ comes in jist the same.”
“I beg your pardon, gentlemen!” exclaimed the agitated manager. “I assure you that it is not our fault; you see, the young——”
“It’s all right, sir!” boomed Captain Bunderley.
“Oh,—oh!” gasped the manager. “I’m gratified to hear it.”
Red-faced and flustered he promptly turned away.
Joe, with as little ceremony as though he was in the menagerie tent, drew up a chair, plumped himself down upon it and laid his cap across one knee. Then, having stared at the captain with solemn earnestness for a moment, blurted out:
“Dave, I’ve shook Whiffin!”
“What! Left the show?” cried the historian. “You don’t mean it?”
“Yes; I sure have, Dave.”
“Well, this is a big surprise, all right,” quoth Tom.
“It isn’t to me,” giggled Victor. “I had an idea last night that Dave’s particular crony was up to something desperate.”
“I presume this is the boy you told me about?” broke in Captain Bunderley.
“Yes, sir. Permit me to formally introduce Mr. Joseph Rodgers, of Iowa,” laughed Victor.
“What made you leave the show?” asked the captain. “Him!”
Joe’s brown finger pointed straight toward Dave Brandon.
“I made you leave?” cried Dave. “How?”
“’Cause, when I meets a feller what’s got learnin’ like you, I couldn’t stan’ it no longer. I wants ter be somethin’.”
Captain Bunderley was interested.
“Joe, your desire to rise is commendable,” he exclaimed, heartily. “Have you ever spoken to Mr. Whiffin about it?”
“I begins to talk to ’im this mornin’, an’ he ups an’ gits riled ter beat the band. ‘I wish’t I’d never laid eyes on that fat feller,’ says he.
‘Brandon’s been puttin’ all them fool notions inter your head.’ ‘Look ’ere, Whiffin,’ says I, ‘don’t you never say nothin’ ag’in ’im; he’s the whitest chap I ever see.’”
“So I have a champion at last,” chuckled Dave.
“Then Whiffin hollers fer me ter git back ter work or he’d fetch me a good one on the ear. That makes me most bile over—him—Whiffin, talkin’ like that! So I skips right out.”
“How’d you get here—board a fast freight?” inquired Victor.
“I did not. I stepped inter a real car, with real winders an’ real seats, an’ I’ve got seventy-five cents left.”
“Goodness, what a risk—floating around in a real city with that much real money in your pocket!” said Victor. Joe’s thoughts were on something else.
“Gee, I can most see Whiffin hollerin’ his way around the show an’ askin’ everybody if they’ve seen that young scamp, Joe! My, I’ll bet he’s so mad he’s clean forgot that quarter he give to Dave the other night.”
“What do you expect to do in Milwaukee?” asked Captain Bunderley.
“Do!” echoed Joe, rather blankly. “I dunno!” Thoughtfully, he ran his fingers through his bushy hair. “I—I—kinder thought as how Dave could tell me.”
“Has Mr. Whiffin any claim on your services?”
“Nix; he certainly ain’t,” asserted Joe, with considerable emphasis.
“Is the circus coming here?”
“Yes, sir! Day after to-morrow.”
“Well, I’ll look after you till then.” Uncle Ralph beckoned to a waiter. “What will you have to eat, Joe?”
“Eat! Me eat in a—a—place like this?” stammered Joe, for the first time abashed.
“Certainly! Why not? Order just what you please.”
Joe stared from one to another as though he feared that his ears were deceiving him. Then his eyes fell on the waiter, whose professional dignity was sadly shocked by the presence before him of such an uncouth specimen.
“Gimme a great big hunk o’ bread an’ cheese an’ a piece o’ real apple pie, with no skimpin’ o’ the apples, neither,” he said, “an’ a glass o’ water twic’t. Thankin’ you kindly, mister; I won’t do nothin’ to that pile o’ grub when it comes.”
“And you may add to that order plenty of roast beef and potatoes,” added the captain. “I have an idea that our friend has a famous appetite.”
Joe Rodgers had never really lived until that afternoon. He seemed to be fairly lifted out of himself, and a side of life was revealed which he had never before dreamed could exist.
“Honest, Dave,” he declared emphatically, “I can’t never go back to Spudger’s.”
“We’ll see if anything can be done to help you,” said Dave, encouragingly. “But you ought not to have run away. Anyhow, fellows, I propose that we invite Joe to see the sights of Milwaukee from a seat in the motor car.”
Even Victor Collins made no objection. He was beginning to realize that character counts for more than appearance, and that the
passport to respectable society consists of something besides good clothes.
Presently, leaving Captain Bunderley in the reading room, the boys walked briskly out upon the street.
At the garage Joe became immensely interested in the automobile.
“It’s the finest I ever see,” he cried, admiringly. “Looks most too good to use.”
“Climb in, Joe,” commanded Bob.
He sprang to his place in the driver’s seat, pushed the button on the dash, and, immediately, the thunderous din of the motor echoed from every side and corner of the big interior.
“You’ve got ter know somethin’ to be an engineer of one o’ these things,” exclaimed Joe. “Still, I wouldn’t be a bit skeered to try my hand at drivin’.”
“There is nothing like a motor car to chase dull care away,” said Dave, who was reclining at ease on the rear cushions. “Let’s see: what does Bryant say——?”
“Nothing about motor cars, that’s quite sure,” laughed Bob, as the wheels began to revolve.
