Munroe Kirk
Rick Dale, A Story of the Northwest Coast

CHAPTER XXV
ENGAGED TO INTERPRET FOR THE FRENCH

"Where did you get that baseball?" asked Bonny Brooks, referring to one that Alaric was unconsciously tossing from hand to hand as they walked up-town together.

At this the latter stopped short and looked at the ball in question, as though now seeing it for the first time.

"Do you know," he said, "I have been so excited and taken up with other things that I actually forgot I had this ball in my hands. It belongs to the fellow who gave me that breakfast and your dollar, besides telling me where to look for something to do. Not only that, but I really believe if it hadn't been for this ball he would never have paid any attention to me. You see, we got to passing it; and when I became so dizzy that I had to sit down, he asked me what was the matter. So he found out somehow that I was hungry, though I don't remember telling him, and then insisted on giving me a breakfast."

"Who is he? I mean, what is his name?"

"I don't know. I never thought to ask him. And he doesn't live here either, but has just come down from Alaska, and was going off in the one-o'clock train. I do know, though, that he is the very finest chap I ever met, and I only hope I'll have a chance some time to pay back his kindness to me by helping some other poor boy."

"It is funny," remarked Bonny, meditatively, "that your friend and my friend should both have just come from Alaska."

"Isn't it?" replied Alaric; "but then they are travelling together, you know."

"I didn't know it, though I ought to have suspected it, for they are the kind who naturally would travel together – the kind, I mean, that give a fellow an idea of how much real goodness there is in the world, after all – a sort of travelling sermon, only one that is acted instead of being preached."

"That's just the way I feel about them," agreed Alaric; "but I wish I hadn't been so careless about this ball. It may be one that he values for association's sake, just as I did the one we left in that Siwash camp."

"Let me have it a moment," said Bonny, who was looking curiously at the ball.

Alaric handed it to him, and he examined it closely.

"I do believe it is the very one!" he exclaimed. "Yes, I am sure it is. Don't you remember, Rick, the burned place on your ball that came when Bah-die dropped it into the fire the first time you threw it at him, and how you laughed and called it a sure-enough red-hot ball? Well, here's the place now, and this is certainly the very ball that introduced us to each other in Victoria."

"How can it be?" asked Alaric, incredulously.

"I don't know, but it surely is."

"Well," said Alaric, finally convinced that his comrade was right, "that is the very most unexplainable thing I ever came across, for I don't see how it could possibly have come into his possession."

While discussing this strange happening, the lads approached the hotel in which one of them had been made to suffer so keenly a few hours before. He dreaded the very thought of entering it again, but having made up his mind that he must, was about to do so, when his attention was attracted to a curious scene in front of the main entrance.

A small, wiry-looking man, evidently a foreigner, was gesticulating, stamping, and shouting to a group of grinning porters and bell-boys who were gathered about him. As our lads drew near they saw that he held a small open book in his hand, from which he was quoting some sentence, while at the same time he was rapidly working himself into a fury. It was a French-English phrase-book, in which, under the head of instructions to servants, the sentence "Je désire un fiacre" was rendered "Call me a hansom," and it was this that the excited Frenchman was demanding, greatly to the amusement and mystification of his hearers.

"Call me a hansom! Call me a hansom! Call me a hansom!" he repeated over and over, at the top of his voice. "C'est un fiacre – fiacre – fiacre!" he shouted. "Oh, là, là! Mille tonnerres! Call me a hansom!"

"He must be crazy," said Bonny; "for he certainly isn't handsome, and even if he were, he couldn't expect people to call him so. I wonder why they don't send for the police."

Instead of answering him, Alaric stepped up to the laughing group and said, politely, "Pardon, monsieur. C'est Monsieur Filbert, n'est-ce pas?"

"Oui, oui. Je suis Filbert! Call me a hansom."

"He wants a carriage," explained Alaric to the porters, who stared open-mouthed at hearing this young tramp talk to the foreigner in his own "lingo."

"Vous voulez une voiture, n'est-ce pas?" he added, turning to the stranger.

"Oh, my friend!" cried M. Filbert, in his own language, flinging away the perplexing phrase-book as he spoke, and embracing Alaric in his joy at finding himself once more comprehended. "It is as the voice of an angel from heaven to hear again my own language in this place of barbarians!"

"Have a care, monsieur," warned Alaric, "how you speak of barbarians. There are many here who can understand perfectly your language."

"I care not for them! I do not see them! They have not come to me! You are the first! Can it be that I may engage you to remain and interpret for me this language of distraction?" Here the speaker drew back, and scanned Alaric's forlorn appearance hopefully.

"That is what I came to see you about, monsieur," answered Alaric. "I am looking for employment, and shall be happy – "

"It is enough!" interrupted the other, vehemently. "You have found it. I engage you now, at once. Come, the carriage is here. Let us enter."

"But," objected the lad, "I have a friend whom I cannot leave."

"Let him come! Let all your friends come! Bring your whole family if you will, but only stay with me yourself!" cried the Frenchman, impetuously. "I am distracted by my troubles with this terrible language, and but for you I shall go crazy. You are my salvation. So enter the carriage, and your friend. Après vous, monsieur. Do you also speak the language of the beautiful France? No? It is a great pity."

"Does his royal highness take us for dukes?" questioned the bewildered Bonny, who, not understanding one word of the foregoing conversation, had, of course, no idea why he now found himself rolling along the streets of Tacoma in one of its most luxurious public carriages.

"Not exactly," laughed Alaric; "but he takes us for interpreters – that is, he wants to engage us as such."

"Oh! Is that it? Well, I'm agreeable. I suppose you told him that I was pretty well up on Chinook? But what language does he talk himself?"

"French, of course," replied Alaric, "seeing that he is a Frenchman."

"Are you a Frenchman too?"

"Certainly not."

"Well, I didn't know but what you were, seeing that you talk the same language he does, and just as well, for all that I can make out. Really, Rick Dale, it is growing interesting to find out the things you know and can do."

"And the things I still have to learn," laughed Alaric.

Having thus satisfied his curiosity, and learned that he was an interpreter, the last position in the world for which he would have applied, Bonny folded his arms, assumed what he considered a proper attitude for the occasion, and entered upon a calm enjoyment of the first regular carriage-ride of his life. Nor did he allow the animated conversation taking place between M. Filbert and Alaric to disturb him in the least, though by it the whole future course of his life was to be changed.

Under Alaric's direction the carriage first bore them to the railway-station, where a number of strange-looking boxes and packages, all belonging to M. Filbert, were gathered in one place, and given in charge of a porter, who was instructed to receive and care for any others that might come marked with the same name. Then the carriage was again headed up-town, and driven to shop after shop until it seemed as though the entire resources of the city were to be drawn upon to supply the multitudinous needs of the mysterious Frenchman.

Among the things thus purchased and ordered sent down to the station were provisions, cooking utensils, axes, medicines, alcohol, tents, blankets, ammunition, and clothing.

"I don't know what's up," reflected Bonny, "and I don't care, so long as Rick says everything is all right; but I should think we were either going to make war on the Siwash or take a trip to the North Pole."

Of course Alaric accompanied M. Filbert into each store, where his knowledge of languages was invaluable in conducting the various negotiations; but the Chinook interpreter, as he called himself, finding that his services were not yet in demand, was content to remain luxuriously seated in the carriage. Here he discussed the whole remarkable performance with the driver, who was certain that the Frenchman was either going prospecting for gold, or for a new town-site on which to settle a colony of his countrymen.

During the whole afternoon M. Filbert talked incessantly with his new-found interpreter, and Alaric seemed almost as excited as he. At length the former, casting a dubious glance at the lads, asked, with an apologetic manner, if they were well provided with clothing.

"Only what you see, monsieur," answered Alaric. "Everything else we have lost."

"Ah! is it so? Then must you be provided with the habiliments necessary. If you will kindly give the instructions?"

So the carriage was ordered to a shoe-shop and an outfitting establishment, where both lads, to Bonny's further bewilderment, were provided with complete suits of rough but warm and serviceable clothing, including two pairs of walking-boots, one of which was very heavy and had hob-nailed soles.

These last purchases were not concluded until after sunset, and with them the business of the day was ended. With many parting injunctions to Alaric, and a polite bon nuit to both lads, M. Filbert was driven back to the hotel, leaving his newly engaged assistants to their own devices for the time being.

"Now," said Bonny, "if you haven't forgotten how to talk United States, perhaps you will explain what all this means – what we are engaged to do, what our wages are to be, and where we are bound? Are we to turn gold-hunters or Indian-fighters, or is it something in the exploring line?"

"I expect," laughed Alaric, "it is to be more in the climbing line."

"Climbing?"

"Yes. Do you see that mountain over there?" Here Alaric pointed to the lofty snow-capped peak of Mount Rainier, still rose-tinted with sunlight, and rising in awful grandeur high above all other summits of the Cascade range, nearly fifty miles from where they stood.

"Certainly. I can't help seeing it."

"Do you think you could climb it?"

"Of course I could, if it came in my line of business."

"Would you undertake it for thirty dollars a month and all expenses?"

"Rick Dale, I'd undertake to climb to the moon on those terms. But you are surely joking. The Frenchman will never pay that just for the fun of seeing us climb."

"Yes he will, though, and I have agreed that we shall start with him for the top of that mountain to-morrow morning."

CHAPTER XXVI
PREPARING FOR AN ASCENT

Monsieur Jean Puvis Filbert was a Frenchman of wealth, a distinguished member of the Alpine Club, an enthusiastic mountain-climber, and had for an especial hobby the making of botanical collections from high altitudes. He was now on a leisurely tour around the world, and had recently arrived in Tacoma on one of the Northern Pacific steamships from Japan. This was his first visit to America, and he was filled with enthusiasm by the superb mountain scenery that greeted him on all sides as his ship steamed through the Strait of Juan de Fuca and up the glorious waterways of Puget Sound. He gazed longingly at the snow-crowned Olympics, and went into ecstasies over a distant view of Mount Baker, the most northerly peak of the Cascade range. When grand old Rainier, loftiest of all, appeared on the southeastern horizon, lifting its hoary head more than 14,000 feet above the level of the intervening plain, he became silent with adoration, and determined that his first achievement in America should be to gain that glorious summit.

As his knowledge of English was very limited, our mountain-climber began his preparations for this arduous undertaking by engaging an interpreter. The only one whom he could find was a Canadian, who spoke French nearly as badly as he did English, and whom his employer was quickly obliged to discharge for drunkenness and utter incompetence. Then it seemed as though the expedition on which M. Filbert had set his heart must be given up, and he was in despair. At this critical moment Alaric Todd appeared on the scene seeking employment, though never dreaming that it would come to him through his knowledge of French, and was received literally with open arms.

Of course he was engaged at once, and was able to secure a situation for Bonny Brooks as well, though the precise nature of the young sailor's duties were not defined. Thus Bonny was allowed to regard himself as also holding the rank of interpreter, whose services would be invaluable in the event of an encounter with Indians, who, for all he knew, might contest every foot of their way up the great mountain.

To this young man the climbing of a mountain seemed a very foolish and profitless undertaking, for, as he said, "The only thing we can do when we get up there is to turn around and come down again. But you mustn't think, Rick, that I'm trying to back out. No, siree. Just so long as I am paid to climb I'll climb, even if it comes to shinning up the North Pole and interpreting the Constitution to the polar bears."

M. Filbert wished the boys to spend the night with him at the hotel, but Alaric was still so sore over his morning's experience that he begged to be excused. So when they were left to themselves they carried their recently acquired belongings down to the railway-station, and persuaded the agent to allow them to sleep in that corner of the baggage-room devoted to their employer's collection of chattels. Here they put on their new suits, and then, feeling once more intensely respectable, and well content with their own appearance, each invited the other to dine with him. Had they not two whole dollars between them, and was not that enough to make them independent of the world?

They procured a bountiful dinner in the restaurant where Alaric had breakfasted, and with it ate up one of their dollars. The place was so associated in their minds with the fine young fellow to whom they owed all their present good fortune that they thought and talked much of him during the meal. Recalling what he had said concerning his father reminded Alaric of his own parent, and caused him to wonder if he were yet aware that his younger son was not travelling around the world with the Sonntaggs as he had planned.

"If the dear old dad has heard of my disappearance," reflected the boy, "he must be a good deal worried, for he has no idea of how well I can take care of myself. I believe I would write to him if I only knew his address. He said to send all letters to the bank; but I can't do that, because John, who must have heard from the Sonntaggs by this time, would be certain to recognize the handwriting and open it. I know what, though. I'll write to Cousin Esther, and ask her to tell dad all about me. She is sure to see him on his way home, for he always visits Uncle Dale's when he is in Boston."

So after supper, Alaric, who was beginning to have a lively appreciation of the value of money, as well as of fathers, cautiously invested four cents in a sheet of paper, an envelope, and a stamp, all of which he was able to procure from the proprietor of the restaurant. The boy smiled, as he carefully pocketed his one cent of change, to think on what a different scale he would have made a similar purchase less than a month before. Then he would have ordered a box of note-paper, another of envelopes, and a whole sheet of stamps. As for the change, why, there wouldn't have been any, for he would simply have said, "Charge it, please," and it would have been charged to his father's account.

When Bonny saw that Alaric was about to write a letter, he decided to write one to his aunt Nancy at the same time. "For," said he, "she probably imagines that I am in China by now, and would never think of sending word to me here in case she got any news of father." So Bonny also invested four cents in stationery; and the restaurant man good-naturedly allowing them to use a table, besides loaning them pens and a bottle of ink, they sat down to compose their respective epistles. When Alaric's letter was finished it read as follows:

"Dear Cousin Esther, – I have taken your advice and run away – that is, I have done what amounts to the same thing, for I just sat still and let the other folks run away. By this time I expect they are in China, while I am here in the very place you said you would be if you were a boy. I wish you were one so you could be here with me now, for I think you would make a first-class boy. I am learning to be one as fast as I can, a real truly boy, I mean, and not a make-believe. I have already learned how to smuggle, and catch a baseball, besides a little batting, and to swim, sail a boat, paddle a canoe, talk some Siwash, and have had a good deal of experience besides.

"Now I am an interpreter and engaged in the mountain-climbing business. We start to-morrow.

"I have a partner who is a splendid chap, about my age, and named Bonny Brooks. I know you would like him, for he is such a regular boy, and knows just how to do things.

"When you see my dear dad, please give him my warmest love, and tell him I think more of him now than I ever did. Please make him understand that it was the Sonntaggs who ran away, and not I. Tell him that when I am through experimenting with my heart, and have become a genuine boy like Bonny, I am coming back to him, to learn how to be a man – that is, I will if I can afford to pay my way to San Francisco. But you have no idea how much money it takes to travel, especially when you have to earn it yourself, and so far I haven't earned any. Still I have not starved – that is, not very often – so far, and am in hopes of having plenty to eat from this time on. Now I must say good-bye because we are going to sleep in the station to-night, and it closes early.

"Ever your loving cousin,

"Rick."

"P.S. – The principal reason I let the Sonntaggs go was because they called me 'Allie.' Please tell this to dad."

Bonny's letter was not so long as Alaric's, but it described the situation with equal vagueness. He wrote:

"Dear Aunt Nancy, – I am not in China, as you may suppose, having quit the sea after rising to be first mate. Have also been a smuggler, but am not any more. Am now engaged by the French as interpreter, and so far like the business very well. Have also gone into the climbing trade. We are to do our first mountain to-morrow. Have for a chum one of the cleverest chaps you ever saw. He can talk most any language except Chinook, and is a daisy ball-catcher. His name is Rick Dale, and I am trying hard to be just like him. If you have any news from father, please let me know. You can send a letter in care of Mr. P. Bear, Hotel Tacoma, which is our headquarters.

"Ever your loving nephew,

"B. Brooks, Interpreter."

Both these letters were sent to Massachusetts, Alaric's being addressed to Boston, and Bonny's to Sandport. After they were posted, and our lads were on their way back to the railway station, they began for the first time to realize how very tired and sleepy they were. They were so utterly weary that as they snuggled down in their corner of the baggage-room, on a bed made of M. Filbert's tents and blankets, Alaric remarked:

"This is what I call solid comfort."

"Yes," replied Bonny, "we certainly have struck a big streak of luck. Do you remember how we were feeling about this time last night?"

"No," answered Alaric, "I can't remember. It's too long ago. Good-night." And in another minute both boys were fast asleep.

They had taken "through tickets," as Bonny would have said, and slept so soundly that they hardly stirred until the agent flung open the baggage-room door at six o'clock the following morning, and caused them to spring from their blankets in a hurry by shouting, "All aboard!" A dash of cold water from the hydrant outside drove all traces of sleep from their eyes, and so filled them with its fresh vigor that they raced all the way up-town to the restaurant. Here, although their appetites were keen as ever, they managed to satisfy them with a ninety-cent breakfast, "and left the place with money still in their pockets," as Alaric expressed it.

"That's so," responded Bonny. "We've just one cent apiece. Let's toss up to see who will have them both."

"No," said Alaric, "for that would be gambling; and I promised my mother long ago at Monte Carlo never to gamble. She said more fortunes were lost and fewer won in that way than by any other."

"But one cent isn't a fortune," objected Bonny.

"Why not? A man's fortune is all that he has, and if you have but one cent, then that is your fortune."

"I guess you are right, Rick Dale," laughed Bonny. "I hate gambling as much as you do; but it never seemed to me before that tossing pennies was gambling. I expect it is, though, so I'll just keep my fortune in my pocket, and not risk it on any such foolishness."

As the lads hastened back to the station, where they were to meet their employer, the glorious mountain that was now the goal of their ambition reared its mighty crest, radiant with sunlight, directly before them. So wonderfully clear was the atmosphere that it did not seem ten miles away, and Bonny, shaking a fist at it, cried, cheerfully: "Never you mind, old fellow, we'll soon have you under foot."