"They are all like that when they are respectable. Their fierce Americanism resents any hint of patronage. Later on they invite it. You will find these waitresses—the class, as a rule, is thoroughly decent—much the same in manner."
Two girls, white clad, their extended arms loaded with dishes, were stalking about the room, anæmic, disdainful. A portly woman, whom Isabel knew to be the mother of a brood, was far more anxious to please. She came up to the table in the corner and asked Gwynne affably if his coffee was "all right" and if he was a stranger in "these parts." He was under Isabel's amused eye, but he acquitted himself with credit; and when he rose from the table she thanked him indifferently for his tip, but her eyes glowed softly. It was rarely thought worth while to tip a mere waitress.
V
As they rode slowly down the hill towards Main Street Gwynne examined his cousin from head to foot, but, he prided himself, out of the corner of his eye. She wore a dust-colored habit with divided skirt, and a soft felt hat and gloves of the same shade. Her horse was a very light chestnut, and he was obliged to confess that the effect was harmonious, although this Western style of riding by no means pleased his fastidious taste.
Isabel shot him an amused glance. "You don't approve of women riding astride," she said. "We invented it; although it is now the fashion in many other parts of America. Necessity is the mother of most fashions. Wait till you see our mountain roads. They are a disgrace to civilization—so broken and narrow that even in summer it is dangerous for a woman to ride a side-saddle, and in winter impossible. I have forgotten how, and that is the reason I never rode in England.... Here is the centre of your existence for several years to come. Main Street is to this section of the country what Wall Street is to the United States."
They had entered a street that turned abruptly in from the country a block below them, and rose gently for several hundred yards, when it straggled unevenly along a higher level, to melt into the older residence district and then out into the open country again. There was nothing quite like this Main Street in California. At its southern end was a long double hitching-rail—as old as the State—already flanked by several dusty wagons and big strong horses. The long unbroken block had as many and as various stores as are generally spread over the entire area of a town. Jammed against one another like cabins opening out of a steamer's gangway, and yet of no mean size, were banks and saloons; stores for chicken feed, groceries, fruit, candy, jewelry, clothing, hats, fancy goods, stationery; and five drug stores with tiled floors. Many of the windows made a brave display that would not have disgraced San Francisco. The entire west pavement was roofed, making a promenade like a ship's deck against rain or the severities of summer; and from this roof depended an extraordinary number of signs, often eccentric of color and design. Above the buildings of the opposite side of the street rose the spars of several fishing-boats; the creek finished at Rosewater. Gwynne glanced about him with an interest that nothing else Californian save the Mission and San Francisco had inspired. Here was a bit of a civilization of a building era, that was almost old, everything being relative. At all events it was old-fashioned. It was thoroughly countrified and yet suggestive of the concentrated activities of a city. Isabel, after leaving the hotel had made a detour, giving him a brief glimpse of the town. On the higher streets—Rosewater lay on a cluster of gentle hills—between Main Street and the "residence" district, he had noticed several modern buildings of brick or stone: offices, churches, school-houses, a solid little opera-house of colonial design, a fine City Hall, and one of those forlorn "Carnegie Libraries" in a state of arrested development for want of funds, but with an imposing façade and the name of the "donor" conspicuously advertised. All this had interested him little, although he had thought the town on its slopes looked very pretty and quiet; but this——the word "pioneer" suddenly came to him, and he looked up and down with a keenness of interest that was almost like a reviving memory. This beyond question was a remnant of the old thing, and here, no doubt, the great-grandfather whose first name he had forgotten, had been a familiar sight; his fortune and enterprise had helped to lay the very foundations of this landmark of a wild and stirring time.——Then they rode past a square park high on a terrace, walled up with stone most modernly, the green shaded with pines and palms, acacia and oaks; and the dream passed. At the same moment he became aware that his partner was talking.
"Rosewater is the financial and trading centre of an immense farming district. There are four banks, as solid as the best in the world. Three are as old as American California. The farmers come in daily for feed and supplies, the chicken-ranchers with their produce for the San Francisco buyers, and eggs for the great hatcheries. Many, like myself, find the last less trouble and expense than bothering with incubators. Something like four thousand dollars change hands daily in Rosewater, and it has less than five thousand inhabitants."
Having parted with her information she relapsed into silence, and, the town lying behind them, he transferred his attention to her. She looked severe, remote again, and he wondered if she would grow quite hard and business-like in time. In the hotel office as he paid his bill he had overheard one man say to another that she was "as good as the best, and no man could get ahead of her." In this sexless get-up and with her features set she looked hardly a woman. She certainly had capacities for good-fellowship, and yesterday she had been almost tender. He had just decided that he would as soon marry a portrait of George Washington, when, in response to a light call behind them, Isabel wheeled about with the pink in her cheeks and eyes wide with pleasure. She galloped back to an approaching buggy, in which there was an extremely pretty golden-haired young woman, and as she and Isabel simultaneously alighted and flew into each other's arms, Gwynne also descended, prepared to raise his hat when his existence was recognized. For some moments the girls talked a rapid duet, then Isabel turned suddenly and beckoned.
"This is my oldest friend, Anabel—Mrs. Tom Colton," she said, apologetically. "She only returned last night—just caught sight of us, and followed."