WILD YOUTH

CHAPTER I

THE MAZARINES TAKE POSSESSION

From the beginning, Askatoon had had more character and idiosyncrasy than
any other town in the West. Perhaps that was because many of its
citizens had marked personality, while some were distinctly original--a
few so original as to be almost bizarre. The general intelligence was
high, and this made the place alert for the new observer. It slept with
one eye open; it waked with both eyes wide--as wide as the windows of the
world. The virtue of being bright and clever was a doctrine which had
never been taught in Askatoon; it was as natural as eating and drinking.
Nothing ever really shook the place out of a wholesome control and
composure. Now and then, however, the flag of distress was hoisted, and
everybody in the place--from Patsy Kernaghan, the casual, at one end of
the scale, and the Young Doctor, so called because he was young-looking
when he first came to the place, who represented Askatoon in the meridian
of its intellect, at the other--had sudden paralysis. That was the
outstanding feature of Askatoon. Some places made a noise and flung
things about in times of distress; but Askatoon always stood still and
fumbled with its collar-buttons, as though to get more air. When it was
poignantly moved, it leaned against the wall of its common sense,
abashed, but vigilant and careful.

That is what it did when Mr. and Mrs. Joel Mazarine arrived at Askatoon
to take possession of Tralee, the ranch which Michael Turley, abandoning
because he had an unavoidable engagement in another world, left to his