The Bell-Ringer of Angel's Page #5

"The Bell-Ringer of Angel's" is a short story by Bret Harte that revolves around the life of a mysterious bell-ringer in the mining town of Angel's Camp. Set against the backdrop of the California Gold Rush, the story explores themes of love, identity, and community. The protagonist, whose bell-ringing serves as a harbinger of events, becomes intertwined with the lives of the townspeople, revealing their dreams and struggles. Harte's vivid storytelling captures the spirit of the West while delving into the complexities of human relationships in a rapidly changing environment.

• Short story

								

Enough that they were a general arraignment of humanity, the Bar,
himself, and his brother, and indeed much that the same Maker had
created and permitted. That through this hopeless denunciation still
lingered some human feeling and tenderness might have been shown by the
fact that at its close his hands trembled and his face was bedewed by
tears. And his brother was so deeply affected that he resolved hereafter
to avoid all evening prayers.

CHAPTER III.

It was a week later that Madison Wayne and Mr. McGee were seen, to the
astonishment of the Bar, leisurely walking together in the direction of
the promontory. Here they disappeared, entering a damp fringe of willows
and laurels that seemed to mark its limits, and gradually ascending some
thickly-wooded trail, until they reached its crest, which, to Madison's
surprise, was cleared and open, and showed an acre or two of rude
cultivation. Here, too, stood the McGees' conjugal home--a small,
four-roomed house, but so peculiar and foreign in aspect that it at
once challenged even Madison's abstracted attention. It was a tiny Swiss
chalet, built in sections, and originally packed in cases, one of the
early importations from Europe to California after the gold discovery,
when the country was supposed to be a woodless wilderness. Mr. McGee
explained, with his usual laborious care, how he had bought it at
Marysville, not only for its picturesqueness, but because in its
unsuggestive packing-cases it offered no indication to the curious
miners, and could be put up by himself and a single uncommunicative
Chinaman, without any one else being aware of its existence. There was,
indeed, something quaint in this fragment of Old World handicraft, with
its smooth-jointed paneling, in two colors, its little lozenge fretwork,
its lapped roof, overhanging eaves, and miniature gallery. Inartistic
as Madison was--like most men of rigidly rectangular mind and
principle--and accustomed to the bleak and economic sufficiency of the
Californian miner's cabin, he was touched strangely by its novel grace
and freshness. It reminded him of HER; he had a new respect for this
rough, sinful man who had thus idealized his wife in her dwelling.
Already a few Madeira vines and a Cherokee rose clambered up the
gallery. And here Mrs. McGee was sitting.

In the face that she turned upon the two men Madison could see that she
was not expecting them, and even in the slight curiosity with which
she glanced at her husband, that evidently he had said nothing of his
previous visit or invitation. And this conviction became certainty at
Mr. McGee's first words.

"I've brought you an ole friend, Safie. He used to spark ye once at
Angel's afore my time--he told me so; he picked ye outer the water
here--he told me that, too. Ye mind that I said afore that he was the
only man I wanted ter know; I reckon now it seems the square thing that
he should be the one man YOU wanted ter know, too. You understand what I
mean--you follow me, don't you?"

Whether or not Mrs. McGee DID follow him, she exhibited neither concern,
solicitude, nor the least embarrassment. An experienced lover might have
augured ill from this total absence of self-consciousness. But Madison
was not an experienced lover. He accepted her amused smile as a
recognition of his feelings, trembled at the touch of her cool hands,
as if it had been a warm pressure, and scarcely dared to meet her
maliciously laughing eyes. When he had followed Mr. McGee to the little
gallery, the previous occupation of Mrs. McGee when they arrived was
explained. From that slight elevation there was a perfect view over the
whole landscape and river below; the Bar stretched out as a map at her
feet; in that clear, transparent air she could see every movement and
gesture of Wayne's brother, all unconscious of that surveillance, at
work on the Bar. For an instant Madison's sallow cheek reddened, he knew
not why; a remorseful feeling that he ought to be there with Arthur came
over him. Mrs. McGee's voice seemed to answer his thought. "You can see
everything that's going on down there without being seen yourself. It's
good fun for me sometimes. The other day I saw that young Carpenter
hanging round Mrs. Rogers's cabin in the bush when old Rogers was away.
And I saw her creep out and join him, never thinking any one could see
her!"

She laughed, seeking Madison's averted eyes, yet scarcely noticing his
suddenly contracted brows. Mr. McGee alone responded.

"That's why," he said, explanatorily, to Madison, "I don't allow to have
my Safie go round with those women. Not as I ever see anything o'
that sort goin' on, or keer to look, but on gin'ral principles. You
understand what I mean."

"That's your brother over there, isn't it?" said Mrs. McGee, turning to
Madison and calmly ignoring her husband's explanation, as she indicated
the distant Arthur. "Why didn't you bring him along with you?"

Madison hesitated, and looked at McGee. "He wasn't asked," said that
gentleman cheerfully. "One's company, two's none! You don't know him,
my dear; and this yer ain't a gin'ral invitation to the Bar. You follow
me?"

To this Mrs. McGee made no comment, but proceeded to show Madison over
the little cottage. Yet in a narrow passage she managed to touch his
hand, lingered to let her husband precede them from one room to another,
and once or twice looked meaningly into his eyes over McGee's shoulder.
Disconcerted and embarrassed, he tried to utter a few commonplaces, but
so constrainedly that even McGee presently noticed it. And the result
was still more embarrassing.

"Look yer," he said, suddenly turning to them both. "I reckon as how you
two wanter talk over old times, and I'll just meander over to the claim,
and do a spell o' work. Don't mind ME. And if HE"--indicating Madison
with his finger--"gets on ter religion, don't you mind him. It won't
hurt you, Safie,--no more nor my revolver,--but it's pow'ful persuadin',
and you understand me? You follow me? Well, so long!"

He turned away quickly, and was presently lost among the trees. For an
instant the embarrassed Madison thought of following him; but he was
confronted by Mrs. McGee's wicked eyes and smiling face between him
and the door. Composing herself, however, with a simulation of perfect
gravity she pointed to a chair.

"Sit down, Brother Wayne. If you're going to convert me, it may take
some time, you know, and you might as well make yourself comfortable.
As for me, I'll take the anxious bench." She laughed with a certain
girlishness, which he well remembered, and leaped to a sitting posture
on the table with her hands on her knees, swinging her smart shoes
backwards and forwards below it.

Madison looked at her in hopeless silence, with a pale, disturbed face
and shining eyes.

"Or, if you want to talk as we used to talk, Mad, when we sat on the
front steps at Angel's and pa and ma went inside to give us a show, ye
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