MIDDLE LIFE
Ten years have passed. Lafe is a trifle heavier, his figure more set. The gray flecks in his hair are pronounced, and his manner has taken on an assured poise that marks him in the company of his fellows. I have seen Johnson in many companies, composed of men in all ranks of life. It must be admitted that sometimes he looked out of place, because he was so palpably not of their world; but never has he failed to win respect, frequently has he dominated the assembly, although usually silent.
If there be good stuff buried in a man, increased responsibility will bring it out. Larger responsibilities have contributed to develop Johnson's latent strength. He is now not only boss of the Anvil range, but has taken over the management of all its affairs from Horne, who has grown feeble in accumulating wealth and depends wholly on Lafe. In addition, he has started as a cowman in his own right and pays rental on pasture for eleven hundred cows. Fully a thousand calves wear his brand of the Spur—
A visitor to Hope Cañon is met by two tow-headed children, who greet him with their fingers in their mouths, staring round-eyed. These are Virginia and Eunice Johnson, daughters of the ex-sheriff, and they are aged respectively six and three years. Both of the parents are very dark, as you know, and Lafe's most reliable joke is to query Hetty very solemnly on the marked blondness of their offspring.
Hetty herself is plump and matronly. She is now in a position to afford domestics, and she has the calm bearing and complacence of a healthy, fruitful woman whose lot lies in pleasant places. In her face is the fulfillment of early promise. Selfishness and evil thinking may be slow to leave their marks, but devotion to a noble sense of duty will invariably light a woman's face. Although her household duties are greatly lessened, she takes such extraordinary pains in the bringing up of her children that her every hour is fully occupied. True, she occasionally snatches a half day to herself; but guess what the busybody does then? She drives over to the Ferriers', and lends her sister-in-law aid in straightening out her domestic difficulties. Bob Ferrier is working for Lafe, and works conscientiously, but he will never be anything but a salaried employé, for he lacks the faculty of thinking for himself. Perhaps he was too long under routine. Consequently their increasing family necessities provide the industrious Hetty with ample opportunity to exercise her desire of helping. So she is happy.
And when the Ferriers are provided for and everything is running evenly, of course she must interest herself in the plight of less fortunate neighbors. Many nesters have come to the country to take up farms, and to these Hetty appears as a saving angel, however hostile their arrival has been to her husband's interests. There are a few women in this world who must always be doing good or they are wretched, and Lafe had stumbled upon one of them for wife.
I have left until last any reference to a very important individual in the Johnson household—Lafe, Jr., the heir of the Spur. My reason for so doing has been a reluctance to take him up until something more to his credit than his father's comments, could be offered. The truth is that Lafe, Jr., has been a wild boy and a sore trial. He has shown tendencies which have greatly exercised his father. Hetty is more inclined to be lenient, which may be responsible for some of the trouble.
At the time this chapter opens, Lafe, Jr., was a tall, lank youth of about fifteen years, all knobby joints and hands and feet. When he spoke it gave one a scare, because his tones slid without warning from a high falsetto to a most sonorous bass. He was, indeed, at that awkward age when a well-grown boy is verging on manhood. Often Hetty worried over his abstraction and fits of sullenness; also, pimples marred his appearance, and a growth of down on chin and upper lip gave Lafe, Jr., food for thought.
"I swan that boy's getting worse every day," said Lafe to his wife one morning.
"What's he done now?" she asked.
"Oh, I done caught him out behind the barn again smoking cigarettes. Bill, he told me yesterday that he seen Lafe taking a drink out of a bottle with the horse wrangler. I'll can that feller if he don't leave Lafe alone."
"Oh, goodness, let the boy be, Lafe. You told me yourself you smoked when you were nine. All the boys out here learn to do that mighty young, and some of them know how to drink right well, too."
"That's all right," said Johnson stubbornly, "but I don't expect our son to be a no-account feller. We've got the money to educate him fine. But I'm scared to send him away until I'm sure he's worth it."
"Well, anyhow, don't be too hard on him. Don't go jumping on the boy all the time, Lafe. If you do you'll make a sneak out of him."
"He's mighty nigh that now," said Lafe, and walked out of the room before Hetty could start an argument on the point.
He had not spoken to his wife of the worry that rankled deepest. This was nothing less than a doubt of his son's courage. To a man who had lived as Johnson had lived, who had calmly braved danger every month in his life, absence of pluck is the most despicable of human traits. Little incidents he had noted in the behavior of Lafe, Jr., filled the boss with a dread that his son might not only be lacking in aggressive courage, but might be the victim of positive cowardice. However, he reflected that happenings previous to his birth may have been responsible, which gave him a patience with the boy he might not otherwise have had. Yet Lafe, Jr.'s, shrinking fear of the ordinary risks of range life was wholly at variance with the reckless spirit he had shown as a child.
"He's even scared of his horse," said Lafe to me on a night. "Don't tell anybody, Dan. I'd be 'shamed. But I've seen that boy's knees near knock together before he crawled up on ol' Waspnest."
"He's at a bad age," I said, trying to console him. "In the first place, he has grown too fast, and in the second place, you haven't handled him properly. Lafe is a mighty sensitive boy and you ought to be more companionable with him. As long as you hold him off and never give him anything but a stern order, he's going to do things which you think are sneaky."
The boss looked astounded. It was a new experience for him to be told that he did not know how to manage a fellow creature, and the fact that that fellow creature was his son sharpened the sting. He stared at me a long time very thoughtfully.
"Maybe you're right," he said. "I'll give it a trial, anyhow."
Acting on this suggestion, he began to take Lafe, Jr., with him on his rounds of the range. At first the boy was suspicious of his father's motive in this move, and showed it by the reluctance and laziness with which he executed his orders; but, discovering in his sire's attitude nothing to confirm this view, he became more cheerful and took to the work with alacrity. Johnson was much pleased. He told me that the boy was shaping right to become a man yet.