--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Cameron, Marguerite collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 28 number: 3 published: 1925-01 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: "Marguerite Cameron, “A Chance at Life,” *Improvement Era 28, no. 3 (January 1925)*: 235–239." source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2803unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera2803unse start_page: 235 end_page: 239 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1925-01) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2803unse publication_year: 1925 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1925, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # A Chance at Life A CHANCE AT LIFE By Marguerite Cameron I sat in our hotel room, drumming my fingers on the small table, which offered for perusal the New York ^telephone directory, and a copy of the Holy Bible. Ben Hawskins was due — watch in hand I counted the minutes. Possibly he had been held up in one of those street jams. Ben and I had been out yesterday to witness the noonday crush — hurrying, scurrying mobs taking in the shops along Broadway, better dressed and better mannered throngs sweeping the wide paved walks which lined stately and beautiful Fifth Avenue. It had been thrilling! I got up and pulled the curtain of our hotel window aside — nothing but a grey wall opposite, with windows like our hotel wall. That was like New York. But what was keeping Ben? He and I had come to New York straight from Harvard com- mencement. We were filled to the brim with dreams of the great service we were to render humanity — he in medicine, I in engineering. If Ben passed the medical examination, for which he had gone to Dr. Robinson's office this morning, he would be in line for a big job here in New York. It was much later. I had taken up the telephone directory for entertainment. I heard a hand on the doorknob. The door opened. I staggered to my feet at the sight of Ben's white face. "What — what the deuce?" I gasped. Ben sank down on the edge of a chair, staring. "They've given me a year, Joe," he answered dully. "What, what have you done?" I stammered. "A year to live," and his head went down on his) arms. Silence. We could say nothing. Ben had no prospect for the hospital job now. He went back to Boston to wait. It was ghastly. Weeks passed. One day, in my mail box, I found a letter with foreign stamps and unfamiliar postmark. I tore it open. "We're in Mexico," Ben wrote. "Cousin Fred thinks the climate here may prove invigorating, and Genia and I have accepted his invitation to stay on for a trial." Then Danny came, their firstborn and adored son. Ben seemed to abandon himself in his adoration, and knowing the brief measure of his days, I allowed him the limit. Months passed — a year — two. Another letter dropped into 23 6 IMPROVEMENT ERA my mailbox. Ben spoke his decision to become physician for a mining camp high in the Sierra Madres. "Genia and I will be the only whites in the district," he wrote, "a day's ride from the colonists, the nearest Americans. It will be pretty lonesome and not a little dangerous, but my time is shortening. I have been fortunate enough to stretch one year into two. Now, if the fates are good, I may be able to get together a little something for my family." Then, one morning the chief engineer of our office offered me my choice, "Mexico or Alaska?" Wholeheartedly I voted "Mexico." Now here, I was on my way to Ben's mine. I trotted Brownie along the edge of the arroyo. It was early spring and the mountain lilac seemed to be pushing the rest of the world away before its shimmering mist. Blinded though I was, I discerned something dodging up the zigzag, which I had just climbed. It was flaming scarlet in color. I watched it climb to higher and higher levels of the trail. I waited. Imagine my delight when I beheld Ben Hoskins emerge around the last curve of the zigzag and come out on the rim of the arroyo. I shouted aloud and, as my eyes still held fast to the scarlet kiddie-kar which he carried in front of him across his saddle horn, I called out, "Taking it home to the kid, I warrant." "Well, Joe!" We grasped hands and tugged at each other's shoulders as our ponies rubbed alongside. "Going up to the mine?" Ben asked. "On my way," I rejoined happily. "Don't say? Well, come on. My boy hasn't been so well " "Sick?" "Not exactly, but ailing. That's why I made the trip down to the store. It takes a day each way, but Genia and I thought a new toy might pep him up. They just had these kiddie-cars in new from the states. Isn't she a stunner? They strengthen a kid's legs, you know. My boy — " "My boy. My boy — " Then he was always saying it, as he was always writing it. It colored everything he said on our ride to the mine, recurring again and again with the same certainty that a motif rises out of the crashing strains of a Wagnerian opera, and covers the whole harmony. Ben and I had not seen each other for three years. These were our first minutes together. And he was breaking his neck to tell me about, "My boy!" "Genia says we can't raise him in the mountains," he informed me. "I'd hate to give up, but we may have to." As we climbed on up more rugged arroyos, along mountain ledges, where dynamite had blasted a trail, we seemed to step out of the A CHANCE AT LIFE 23 7 lavender pettiskirts. which had fringed the down country. Here the scrub cedar curled in knobs and stray shootings over the baldness of the mountain tops. And, as it came evening, a sunset flush reddened the cliffs. Ben did not look as strong as he had looked in college. But, in spite of the dread thought which overhung his life, he was happier. There was no doubt of it. He talked on: "I hope Danny will be well enough to try this kiddie-kar tonight," he said wistfully. "It's been a long trip. Seems as if I've been gone a week." The picturesque mine holdings loomed up through the twi- light:— a line of smoke straggling along the mountain tops; grey, weather-beaten buildings pitched slant against the hillside; lighted windows in the miners' huts; and flickering lanterns like fire-flies along the trails from the mine opening. In a fringe of willows, we came to Ben's hut. We put our ponies up and presently stepped into the dimmed lamplight of the Hoskins' one room. Genia hurried toward us. "Where's Danny?" asked Ben, as he hastily set the kiddie-kar down on the table. From the shaded lamplight or Genia's presence — which, I could not say — Ben seemed to detect something amiss. He hurried to the crib side, fussed over the child lying there. Presently he turned toward us — a haggard man. "Danny can't last the night," he said. Genia, who had borne so much, alone in the camp with only foreigners, strangeness and suffering, stood by tearless. "Oh, Dan," I protested, "sometimes — " "I know," he said. "I can't be longer." There was something stoical about our evening. We at our meagre supper. We talked. We were silent at the little bedside. "Do you know," Ben confided, "I don't think anything in the world could make me happier than to be here tonight. Since Danny has to go, I want to stand by and help him. Genia," he said, as he lovingly circled his wife's shoulder, "you can do everything for him as well as I, yet I'd be jealous of you tonight, if I couldn't wait on the little fellow myself. It's a big comfort to me that I got here in time." "Perhaps Genia was right," he continued aside to me. "She didn't want us to come up here. But, you see, it was the only way I could manage to get a stake ahead for them. Here I make ten times what I made with the colonists." The evening was chill. We built a fire. Ben drew up the little crib. Danny was going fast. "I am glad you are with us tonight," Ben assured me. "You are our best friend. God is good." Time and again my eyes rested on the scarlet kiddie-kar, which 238 IMPROVEMENT ERA Genia had set in the corner. Under the lamplight it glowed soft and rosy — a great ruby framed in flitting shadows. Danny would never ride it now. Toward midnight the silent chill of the canyon changed to a violent wind storm. Windows rattled. Our fire puffed and gasped. Still we sat — waiting. The loving concern of that group seemed to pour out through Ben's fingers, as he touched the feverish child. He and Genia begged me to retire in the shakedown, which they had provided. But I could not dessert the vigil. It was after two when we heard voices. Presently there came a knock. When Ben opened the door, two men stood there dripping with rain. They were rough uplanders. Neither could speak English. They smiled and thrust a note into Ben's hand. "What is it?" urged Genia, after he had finished reading. "Surely they won't be sending for you tonight!" • "There's a woman dying from blood poisoning at Terazes. They say I can save her." "Terazes? It's ten miles." "Genia, dear," Ben entreated, but unable to go on he came over and looked at the little sufferer. He bent down and smoothed the sheet. "I'll go," he nodded to the two rough men, who were again swallowed up in the black and howling night. "You see," he turned to me, "Genia can do everything for Danny that I could now. It's only a matter of waiting. His pulse is very faint." Tears filled his voice. "If I get there, the sick woman has a chance at life. There comes a time when we all need a, lift. I seem to be the only doctor here about. You see, Joe, I should go. You stay with Genia." I promised. Ben scouted hurriedly for the things he would need. Then sud- denly he blurted our. "My God, I can't get through. They've been blasting the Terazes road. I'll have to go around by Sonora — twenty miles." "I was there this morning," I interrupted. "Take the old road as far as Tony's. Then — " I stopped. "It's dangerous — the rain will be pretty bad. You'd better go around, Ben." "Could you show him?" Genia entreated me. "Yes, but — " "You mustn't leave Genia," protested Ben. "It will be quite the best way," insisted Genia. "Joe can come back," she comforted her husband. "When you return, Ben, it will be light and you won't need a guide." So Ben and I let our ponies out on the trail as far as Tony's. From there we nosed carefully along the broken ledge trying to keep out of the deep pools and off the slides where a false step would mean a plunge into darkness and oblivion. On the outskirts of A CHANCE AT LIFE ' 239 Terazes we tugged at each other's hands and parted almost without a word. He was gone. Darkness blotted him out. And the rain slashed with such fury that I lost even the clatter of his pony stumbling along the rocky road. ***** I rode back to the little cabin just before daybreak. The fine rain showed the whole camp in a greyish mist. Yet, from one window gleamed a light — a beacon to guide me back to the Hoskin's cabin. I knocked down some hay and made Brownie comfortable in the shelter in the willows, then hurried to the cabin. But on the doorstep I hesitated. Even in my meagre way, what could I do to match the silent courage of this household? I stepped inside. There sat Genia in a glow of candlelight beside the little crib. She hurried to meet me. "Joe," she quavered, as she helped me remove my dripping coat. "I'm so glad you've come. Danny has just passed on!" The Resigners You'll find them by dozens in every town, I suppose we could call them the whiners. Those who, on the slightest excuse, will throw down Their callings; I mean the resigners. They'll throw down their tools at the drop of the hat, And think they've good reasons behind them. They're watching for slights, like a cat for a rat; Of course, it's not long till they find them. You're either in favor, or else you're against; You're helping, or in opposition. The devil is pleased when you sit on the fence, He's got you if that's your position. He's trying to pull down the kingdom of God; For that he is always designing. Unless you are blind, then, you surely can see That you're helping his cause by resigning. The hands of God's servants were placed on your head, And blessed you to fill that position; And angels above us wrote down what they said; How dare you resign such a mission? Then stick to your callings until you're released; Just peg right along and keep climbing, You'll find it the way to salvation and peace, Just give up that thought of resigning. Shelley, Idaho. JOSEPH H. DEAN.