They had ordered the lumber for the bunk-house, and got it in by small loads, and Paul was at work with half a dozen men from the neighborhood. He had engaged them himself, telephoning from Paradise; and if any of them felt humiliated at working under a nineteen year old boss, Dad’s twenty-two dollar check salved their feelings at twelve-thirty every Saturday. Even old Mr. Watkins, Paul’s father, was impressed by this sudden rise of his black sheep, and no longer said anything about hellfire and brimstone. It was on his ranch, you understand, that all this activity was taking place; the carpenters’ hammers were thumping all day, and up near the head of the arroyo the artesian well was flowing, and a gang of men and horses were leveling a road up to the drilling site. It seemed to the Watkins family as if the whole county had suddenly moved to their ranch. It meant high prices, right on the spot, for everything good to eat they could raise. You could not help being impressed by so much activity, even though you knew it was the activity of Satan!
Best of all was the effect upon Ruth, who fairly shone with happiness over Paul’s success. Ruth kept house for Dad and Bunny, besides what she did for Paul and herself; but it seemed to agree with her, she filled out, and her cheeks grew rosy. She had money to buy shoes and stockings and clean dresses, and Bunny noticed all of a sudden that she was quite a pretty girl. She shared Bunny’s idea that his father was a great man, and she expressed her admiration by baking pies and puddings for him, regardless of the fact that he was trying to keep his weight down! The four of them had supper together every evening, after the day’s work was done, in the Rascum bungalow with the bougainvillea vine; and then they sat out under the vine in the moonlight and talked about what they had done, and what they were going to do, and the world was certainly an interesting place to be alive in!
IV
It was time for Bunny to go back to school; but first he had to pay his semiannual visit to his mother.
Bunny had seen a notice in the paper, to the effect that Mrs. Andrew Wotherspoon Lang was suing for divorce on grounds of desertion. Now Mamma told him about it—her second husband had basely left her, two years after their marriage, and she had no idea where he was. She was a lonely and very sad woman, with tears in her eyes; Bunny could have no idea how hard it was, how everyone tried to prey upon defenseless women. Presently, through the tears, Bunny became aware that his “pretty little Mamma” was tactfully hinting something; she would have to have a new name when she got the divorce, and she wanted to take back Dad’s name, and Bunny wasn’t quite sure whether that meant that she was to take Dad back along with his name. She asked how Dad was, and mustn’t he be lonely, and did he have any women friends? That bothered Bunny, who didn’t like to have people probing into his father’s relations with women—he wasn’t sure himself, and didn’t like to think about it. He said that Mamma would have to write to Dad, because Dad wouldn’t let him, Bunny, talk about these matters. So then some more tears ran down the pretty cheeks, and Mamma said that everybody shut her out, even her own daughter, Bertie, had refused to come and stay with her this time, and what did that mean? Bunny explained, as well as he could; his sister was selfish, he thought, and wrapped up in her worldly career; she was a young lady now, flying very high, with a fast set, and didn’t have time for any of her family.
But Bertie had found time recently for a talk with her brother; telling him that he was old enough now to know about their mother. Bertie had got the facts long ago from Aunt Emma, and now she passed them on, and many mysteries were solved for the boy, not merely about his mother, but about his father. Dad had married after he was forty, being then the keeper of a crossroads store; he had married the village belle, who thought she was making a great conquest. But very soon she had got ideas beyond the village; she had tried to pry Dad loose, and finally had run away and left him, with a prosperous bond-salesman from Angel City, who had married her, but then got tired and left her.
Mamma’s leaving had done what all her arguments had failed to do—it had pried Dad loose. He had thought it over and realized—what everybody wanted was money, and he had lost out because he hadn’t made enough; well, he’d show them. And from that time Dad had shut his lips and set to work. Some of his associates in the village had proposed to drill for oil, and he had gone in with them, and they had made a success, and pretty soon Dad had branched out for himself.
Bunny thought that story over, and watched his father, and pieced things together. Yes, he understood now—that grim concentration, and watchfulness, and merciless driving; Dad was punishing Mrs. Andrew Wotherspoon Lang, showing her that he was just as good a man as any bond-salesman from the city! And Dad’s distrust of women, his idea that they were all trying to get your money away from you! And his centering of all his hopes upon Bunny, who was going to be happy, and to have all of his father’s virtues and none
