ion that Andrew Spooner got his nickname from a community who
had rechristened the tallest man in our village "Shorty" and the
ugliest "Beaut." The humorists knew that Pap might have been the
father of the foothills, the George Washington of Paradise, but he
wasn't.

Later we learned that Pap had buried a wife and child. And the child,
it seems, had called him "Pap." We made the inevitable deduction that
such paternal instincts as may have bloomed long ago in the miser's
heart were laid in a small grave in the San Lorenzo Cemetery. Our
little school-marm, Alethea-Belle Buchanan, said (without any reason):
"I reckon Mr. Spooner must have thought the world of his little one."
Whereupon Ajax replied gruffly that as much could be said, doubtless,
of a--vulture.

The word "vulture" happened to be pat, apart from the shape of Andrew
Spooner's nose, because we were in the middle of the terrible spring
which succeeded the dry year. Even now one does not care to talk about
that time of drought. During the previous twelve months the relentless
sun had destroyed nearly every living thing, vegetable and animal, in
our county. Then, in the late fall and early winter, we had sufficient
rain to start the feed on our ranges and hope in our hearts. But
throughout February and March not a drop of water fell! Hills and
plains lay beneath bright blue skies, into which we gazed day after
day, week after week, looking for the cloud that never came. The thin
blades of wheat and barley were already frizzling; the tender leaves
of the orchards and vineyards turned a sickly yellow; the few cattle
and horses which had survived began to fall down and die by the empty
creeks and springs. And two dry years in succession meant black ruin
for all of us.

For all of us in the foothills except Pap Spooner. By some mysterious
instinct he had divined and made preparations for a long drought.
Being rich, with land in other counties, he was able to move his stock
to green pastures. We knew that he was storing up the money sucked by
the sun out of us. He was foreclosing mortgages, buying half-starved
horses and steers for a song, selling hay and straw at fabulous
prices. And we were reeling upon the ragged edge of bankruptcy! He,
the beast of prey, the vulture, was gorging on our carrion.

Men--gaunt, hollow-eyed men--looked at him as if he were an obscene
bird, looked at him with ever-increasing hate, with their fingers
itching for the trigger of a gun