"So this is Albuquerque," observed Patsy Doyle, as
they alighted from
the train. "Is it a big town playing peek-a-boo
among those hills,
Uncle John, or is this really all there is to the
place?"
"It's a pretty big town, my dear. Most of the houses
are back on the
prairie, but fortunately our hold is just here at
the depot."
It was a quaint, attractive building, made of adobe
cement, in the
ancient mission style; but it proved roomy and
extremely comfortable.
"Seems to me," whispered Myrtle to Beth, "we're high
up on the
mountains, even yet."
"So we are," was the reply. "We're just between
Glorietta Pass and the
Great Continental Divide. But the steepest of the
Rockies are behind
us, and now the slopes are more gradual all the way
to California. How
do you like it, dear?"
"Oh, the mountains are grand!" exclaimed Myrtle. "I
had never imagined
anything so big and stately and beautiful." The
other girls had seen
mountains before, but this was their friend's first
experience, and
they took much pleasure in Myrtle's enthusiastic
delight over all she
saw.
Adjoining the hotel was a bazaar, in front of which
sat squatted upon
the ground two rows of Mojave Indians, mostly
squaws, with their
curious wares spread out for sale upon blankets.
There must have
been a score of them, and they exhibited odd pottery
ornaments of
indistinguishable shapes, strings of glass beads and
beadwork bags,
and a few really fine jardinieres and baskets. After
the girls had
been to their rooms and established themselves in
the hotel they
hurried out to interview the Indians, Myrtle Dean
supporting herself
by her crutches while Patsy and Beth walked beside
her. The lame girl
seemed to attract the squaws at once, and one gave
her a bead necklace
while another pressed upon her a small brown
earthenware fowl with
white spots all over it. This latter might have been
meant to
represent a goose, an ostrich or a guinea hen; but
Myrtle was
delighted with it and thanked the generous squaw,
who responded merely
with a grunt, not understanding English. A man in a
wide sombrero who
stood lazily by observed the incident and said:
"Don't thank the hag. She's selfish. The Mojaven
think it brings luck
to have a gift accepted by a cripple."
Myrtle flushed painfully.
"I suppose my crutches make me look more helpless
than I really am,"
she whispered to her friends as they moved away.
"But they're such a
help in getting around that I'm very grateful to
have them, and as I
get stronger I can lay them aside and not be taken
for a cripple any
more."
The air was delightfully invigorating here in the
mountains, yet it
was not at all cold. The snow, as Uncle John had
predicted, had all
been left behind them. After dinner they took a walk
through the
pretty town and were caught in the dark before they
could get back.
The twilights are very brief in Albuquerque.
"This is a very old town," remarked Uncle John. "It
was founded by a
Spanish adventurer named Cabrillo in the seventeenth
century, long
before the United States came into existence. But of
course it never
amounted to anything until the railroad was built."
Next day they were sitting in a group before the
hotel when a man was
seen approaching them with shuffling steps. Uncle
John looked at him
closely and Mumbles leaped from Patsy's lap and
rushed at the stranger
with excited barks.
"Why, it's Wampus," said Mr. Merrick. "The car must
have arrived."
Wampus caught up the baby dog and held it under his
arm while he took
his cap off and bowed respectfully to his employer.
"He an' me, we here," he announced.
"Who is 'he,' Wampus?"
"Aut'mob'l'."
"When did you arrive?"
"Half hour ago. He on side track."
"Very good. You have made capital time, for a
freight train. Let us go
at once and get the car unloaded."
Wampus hesitated, looking sheepish.
"I been arrest," he said.
"Arrested! For what?"
"I make speed. They not like it. They arrest
me--_Me_--Wampus!" He
straightened his slim little form with an assumption
of dignity.
"I knew it," sighed the Major. "I decided he was a
speed fiend the
first time I saw him."
"But--dear me!" said Uncle John; "how could you be
arrested for
speeding when the automobile was on a fiat car?"
Wampus glanced over his shoulder. Two railroad men
had followed him
and were now lounging against the porch railing. One
had his right eye
bandaged while the other carried one arm in a sling.
Both scowled as
they eyed the Canadian fixedly.
"Freight train make pretty slow time," began the
chauffeur. "I know
you in hurry, so freight train he make me nervous. I
say polite to
conductor I like to go faster. He laugh. I say
polite to brakeman we
must go faster. He make abusing speech. I climb into
engine an' say
polite to engineer to turn on steam. He insult me.
So I put my foot
on him an' run engine myself. I am Wampus. I
understan' engine--all
kinds. Brakeman he swear; he swear so bad I put him
off train.
Conductor must have lump of coal in eye to keep
quiet. Fireman he jus'
smile an' whistle soft an' say nothing; so we
friends. When I say
'shovel in coal,' he shovel. When we pass stations
quick like, he
whistle with engine loud. So now we here an' I been
arrest."
Patsy tittered and stuffed her handkerchief into her
mouth. Uncle John
first chuckled and then looked grave. The Major
advanced to Wampus and
soberly shook his hand.
"You're a brave man, sir, for a chauffeur," he said.
"I congratulate
you,"
Wampus still looked uneasy.
"I been arrest," he repeated.
Uncle John beckoned the railroad men to come
forward.
"Is this story true?" he asked.
"Most of it, sir," answered the conductor. "It's
only by the mercy of
Providence we're here alive. This scoundrel held up
the whole crew
and ran away with the engine. We might have had a
dozen collisions or
smash-ups, for he went around curves at sixty miles
an hour. We'd cut
our train in two, so as to pull half of it at a time
up the grade at
Lamy, and so there were only six cars on this end of
it. The other
half is seventy miles back, and part of what we have
here ought to
have been left at the way stations. I can't make
out, sir, whether
it's burglary, or highway robbery or arson an'
murder he's guilty of,
or all of 'em; but I've telegraphed for instructions
and I'll hold him
a prisoner until the superintendent tells me what to
do with him."
Mr. Merrick was very sober now.
"The matter is serious," he said. "This man is in my
employ, but I did
not hire him to steal a railway train or fight its
crew. Not badly
hurt, I hope, sir?"
"My eye's pretty bad," growled the conductor. "Tom,
here, thought his
arm was broken, at first; but I guess it's only
sprained."
"How about the brakeman he threw off the train?"
"Why, we were not going fast, just then, and it
didn't hurt him. We
saw him get up and shake his fist at the robber. If
he ever meets Mr.
Wampus again he'll murder him."
"Come with me to the telegraph office and I'll see
what I can do to
straighten this out," said Mr. Merrick briskly. On
the way he remarked
to the conductor: "I'm sorry I let Wampus travel
alone. He's just
a little bit affected in his mind, you know, and at
times isn't
responsible for what he does."
The conductor scratched his head doubtfully.
"I suspected he was crazy," he replied, "and that's
why I didn't hurt
him. But if he's crazy he's the most deliberate
loonatic I ever run
acrost."
The superintendent had just wired instructions to
put the outlaw in
jail when Mr. Merrick reached the telegraph office,
but after an hour
spent in sending messages back and forth a
compromise was affected and
the little millionaire had agreed to pay a goodly
sum to the company
by way of damages and to satisfy the crew of the
freight train--which
he succeeded in doing by a further outlay of money.
"You're not worth all this bother," said Mr. Merrick
to the humbled
Wampus, when the final settlement had been made,
"but chauffeurs are
scarce in Albuquerque and I can't be delayed. Never,
sir, while you
are in my employ, must you allow yourself to be
guilty of such an act
again!"
Wampus sighed.
"Never," he promised, "will I ride by freight train
again. Send car by
express. I am Wampus. Freight train he make me
nervous."
The automobile was quickly unloaded and at once
Wampus set to work to
get it in running order. He drove it to the hotel at
about sundown
and Mr. Merrick told the girls to be ready to start
after an early
breakfast the next morning.
"Which way do we go?" asked the Major.
"We'll have a talk with Wampus this evening and
decide," said Uncle
John.
"Don't leave out the Grand Canyon!" begged Patsy.
"Nor the Petrified Forests." added Beth. "And
couldn't we visit the
Moki Indian reservation?"
"Those things may be well enough in their way,"
observed the Major,
"but is their way our way? That's the question. The
one thing we must
take into consideration is the matter of roads. We
must discover which
road is the best and then take it. We're not out of
the mountains yet,
and we shall have left the railroad, the last
vestige of civilization,
behind us."
But the conference evolved the fact, according to
Wampus, that the
best and safest roads were for a time along the line
of the Santa Fe,
directly west; and this would enable them to visit
most of the scenes
the girls were eager to see.
"No boulevard in mountain anywhere," remarked
Wampus; "but road he
good enough to ride on. Go slow an' go safe. I drive
'Autocrat' from
here to Los Angeles blindfold."
With this assurance they were obliged to be content,
and an eager
and joyful party assembled next morning to begin the
journey so long
looked forward to. The landlord of the hotel, a man
with a careworn
face, shook his head dismally and predicted their
return to
Albuquerque within twenty-four hours.
"Of course people _do_ make the trip from here to
the coast," he said;
"but it's mighty seldom, and they all swear they'll
never do it again.
It's uncomfortable, and it's dangerous."
"Why?" asked Uncle John.
"You're headed through a wild country, settled only
by Mexicans,
Indians, and gangs of cowboys still worse. The roads
are something
awful. That man Wampus is an optimist, and will
tackle anything and
then be sorry for it afterward. The towns are
scattered from here on,
and you won't strike a decent meal except at the
railway stations.
Taking all these things into consideration, I advise
you to make your
headquarters here for the winter."
"Thank you," returned Mr. Merrick pleasantly. "It's
too late for us to
back out now, even if we felt nervous and afraid,
which I assure you
we do not."
"We are not looking for excessive comfort on this
journey, you know,"
remarked Patsy. "But thank you for your warning,
sir. It has given us
great pleasure; for if there were no chance of
adventure before us we
should all be greatly disappointed."
Again the landlord shook his head.
"Right?" asked Wampus, at the wheel.
"Go ahead," said Mr. Merrick, and slowly the big car
started upon its
journey into the Golden West.
The air was keen and bracing, but not chilly. The
sunshine flooded the
landscape on every side. All the windows of the
limousine had been
lowered.
Myrtle Dean had been established in one corner of
the broad back seat,
where she nestled comfortably among the cushions.
Uncle John sat
beside her, with Beth and the Major on the seat on
front. There were
two folding chairs that could be used on occasion,
and the back seat
easily accommodated three, the "Autocrat" being a
seven passenger car;
but Patsy was perched in front beside Wampus, which
was really the
choicest seat of all, so there was ample room inside
to "swing a cat,"
as the Major stated--if anyone had cared to attempt
such a feat. Of
course the wee Mumbles was in Patsy's lap, and he
seemed to have
overcome his first aversion of Wampus and accepted
the little
chauffeur into the circle of his favored
acquaintances. Indeed, they
soon became fast friends.
On leaving the town Wampus turned into a smooth,
hard wagon road that
ran in zigzag fashion near the railroad grade. The
car bowled along
right merrily for some twenty miles, when the driver
turned to the
right and skimmed along a high plateau. It was green
and seemed
fertile, but scarcely a farmhouse could they see,
although the clear
air permitted a broad view.
"He up hill now all way to Continental Divide," said
Wampus to Patsy;
"then he go down hill long time."
"It doesn't seem to be much uphill," returned the
girl, "and the road
is very good."
"We make time here," observed the driver. "By'm-by
we find rock an'
bad road. Then we go slow."
The Major was watching the new chauffeur carefully,
and despite his
dismal forebodings the man seemed not at all
reckless but handled his
car with rare skill. So the critic turned to his
brother-in-law and
asked:
"Is it fully decided which way we shall go?"
"I've left it to Wampus and the girls," was the
reply. "On account
of our little invalid here we shall take the most
direct route to
California. It isn't a short route, at that. On
Beth's account we
shall visit the Moki and Navajo reservations, and on
Patsy's account
we're going by way of the Grand Canyon of Arizona.
Wampus says he
knows every inch of the road, so for my part I'm
content to be just a
passenger."
"Which remark," said the Major, "indicates that I'm
to be just a
passenger also. Very well, John; I'm willing. There
may be trouble
ahead of us, but to-day is so magnificent that it's
wise to forget
everything but the present."
