Wolfville Nights
by Alfred Henry Lewis · English · Gutenberg #13709 · 476,240 chars · public domain (US)
The Project Gutenberg eBook of Wolfville Nights
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: Wolfville Nights
Author: Alfred Henry Lewis
Release date: October 11, 2004 [eBook #13709]
Most recently updated: October 28, 2024
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/13709
Credits: Etext produced by Al Haines
HTML file produced by David Widger
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WOLFVILLE NIGHTS ***
WOLFVILLE NIGHTS
by
Alfred Henry Lewis
Author of "Wolfville", "Wolfville Days", "Peggy O'Nea", &c.
1902,
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER
DEDICATION
SOME COWBOY FACTS
I. THE DISMISSAL OF SILVER PHIL
II. COLONEL STERETT'S PANTHER HUNT
III. HOW FARO NELL DEALT BANK
IV. HOW THE RAVEN DIED
V. THE QUEERNESS OF DAVE TUTT
VI. WITH THE APACHE'S COMPLIMENTS
VII. THE MILLS OF SAVAGE GODS
VIII. TOM AND JERRY; WHEELERS
IX. THE INFLUENCE OF FARO NELL
X. THE GHOST OF THE BAR-B-8
XI. TUCSON JENNIE'S CORRECTION
XII. BILL CONNORS OF THE OSAGES
XIII. WHEN TUTT FIRST SAW TUCSON
XIV. THE TROUBLES OF DAN BOGGS
XV. BOWLEGS AND MAJOR BEN
XVI. TOAD ALLEN'S ELOPEMENT
XVII. THE CLIENTS OF AARON GREEN
XVIII. COLONEL STERETT'S MARVELS
XIX. THE LUCK OF HARDROBE
XX. LONG AGO ON THE RIO GRANDE
XXI. COLONEL COYOTE CLUBBS
To
William Greene Sterett
this volume is
inscribed.
NEW YORK CITY,
August 1, 1902
MY DEAR STERETT:--
In offering this book to you I might have advantage of the occasion
to express my friendship and declare how high I hold you as a
journalist and a man. Or I might speak of those years at Washington
when in the gallery we worked shoulder to shoulder; I might recall to
you the wit of Hannum, or remind you of the darkling Barrett, the
mighty Decker, the excellent Cohen, the vivid Brown, the imaginative
Miller, the volatile Angus, the epigrammatic Merrick, the quietly
satirical Splain, Rouzer the earnest, Boynton the energetic, Carson
the eminent, and Dunnell, famous for a bitter, frank integrity. I
might remember that day when the gifted Fanciulli, with no more
delicate inspiration than crackers, onions, and cheese, and no more
splendid conservatory than Shoemaker's, wrote, played and consecrated
to you his famous "Lone Star March" wherewith he so disquieted the
public present of the next concert in the White House grounds. Or I
might hark back to the campaign of '92, when together we struggled
against national politics as evinced in the city of New York; I might
repaint that election night when, with one hundred thousand whirling
dervishes of democracy in Madison Square, dancing dances, and singing
songs of victory, we undertook through the hubbub to send from the
"Twenty-third street telegraph office" half-hourly bulletins to our
papers in the West; how you, accompanied of the dignified Richard
Bright, went often to the Fifth Avenue Hotel; and how at last you
dictated your bulletins--a sort of triumphant blank verse, they
were--as Homeric of spirit as lofty of phrase--to me, who caught them
as they came from your lips, losing none of their fire, and so
flashed them all burning into Texas, far away. But of what avail
would be such recount? Distance separates us and time has come
between. Those are the old years, these are the new, with newer
years beyond. Life like a sea is filling from rivers of experience.
Forgetfulness rises as a tide and creeps upward to drown within us
those stories of the days that were. And because this is true, it
comes to me that you as a memory must stand tallest in the midst of
my regard. For of you I find within me no forgetfulness. I have met
others; they came, they tarried, they departed. They came again; and
on this second encounter the recollection of their existences smote
upon me as a surprise. I had forgotten them as though they had not
been. But such is not your tale. Drawn on the plates of memory, as
with a tool of diamond, I carry you both in broadest outline and in
each least of shade; and there hangs no picture in the gallery of
hours gone, to which I turn with more of pleasure and of good. Nor
am I alone in my recollection. Do I pass through the Fifth Avenue
Hotel on my way to the Hoffman, that vandyked dispenser leans
pleasantly across his counter, to ask with deepest interest: "Do you
hear from the Old Man now?" Or am I belated in Shanley's, a beaming
ring of waiters--if it be not an hour overrun of custom--will
half-circle my table, and the boldest, "Pat," will question timidly,
yet with a kindly Galway warmth: "How's the Old Man?" Old Man! That
is your title: at once dignified and affectionate; and by it you come
often to be referred to along Broadway these ten years after its
conference. And when the latest word is uttered what is there more
to fame! I shall hold myself fortunate, indeed, if, departing, I'm
remembered by half so many half so long. But wherefore extend
ourselves regretfully? We may meet again; the game is not played
out. Pending such bright chance, I dedicate this book to you. It is
the most of honour that lies in my lean power. And in so doing, I am
almost moved to say, as said Goldsmith of Johnson in his offering of
_She Stoops to Conquer_: "By inscribing this slight performance to
you, I do not mean to so much compliment you as myself. It may do me
some honour to inform the public that I have lived many years in
intimacy with you. It may serve the interests of mankind also to
inform them that the greatest wit may be found in a character without
impairing the most unaffected piety." I repeat, I am all but moved
to write these lines of you. It would tell my case at least; and
while description might limp in so far as you lack somewhat of that
snuffle of "true piety" so often engaging the Johnsonian nose, you
make up the defect with possession of a wider philosophy, a better
humour and a brighter, quicker wit than visited or dwelt beneath the
candle-scorched wig of our old bully lexicographer.
ALFRED HENRY LEWIS.
Some Cowboy Facts.
There are certain truths of a botanical character that are not
generally known. Each year the trees in their occupation creep
further west. There are regions in Missouri--not bottom lands--which
sixty years ago were bald and bare of trees. Today they are heavy
with timber. Westward, beyond the trees, lie the prairies, and
beyond the prairies, the plains; the first are green with long
grasses, the latter bare, brown and with a crisp, scorched, sparse
vesture of vegetation scarce worth the name. As the trees march
slowly westward in conquest of the prairies, so also do the prairies,
in their verdant turn, become aggressors and push westward upon the
plains. These last stretches, extending to the base of that bluff
and sudden bulwark, the Rocky Mountains, can go no further. The
Rockies hold the plains at bay and break, as it were, the teeth of
the desert. As a result of this warfare of vegetations, the plains
are to first disappear in favour of the prairies; and the prairies to
give way before the trees. These mutations all wait on rain; and as
the rain belt goes ever and ever westward, a strip of plains each
year surrenders its aridity, and the prairies and then the trees
press on and take new ground.
These facts should contain some virtue of interest; the more since
with the changes chronicled, come also changes in the character of
both the inhabitants and the employments of these regions. With a
civilised people extending themselves over new lands, cattle form
ever the advance guard. Then come the farms. This is the procession
of a civilised, peaceful invasion; thus is the column marshalled.
First, the pastoral; next, the agricultural; third and last, the
manufacturing;--and per consequence, the big cities, where the
treasure chests of a race are kept. Blood and bone and muscle and
heart are to the front; and the money that steadies and stays and
protects and repays them and their efforts, to the rear.
Forty years ago about all that took place west of the Mississipi of a
money-making character was born of cattle. The cattle were worked in
huge herds and, like the buffalo supplanted by them, roamed in
unnumbered thousands. In a pre-railroad period, cattle were killed
for their hides and tallow, and smart Yankee coasters went constantly
to such ports as Galveston for these cargoes. The beef was left to
the coyotes.
Cattle find a natural theatre of existence on the plains. There,
likewise, flourishes the pastoral man. But cattle herding, confined
to the plains, gives way before the westward creep of agriculture.
Each year beholds more western acres broken by the plough; each year
witnesses a diminution of the cattle ranges and cattle herding. This
need ring no bell of alarm concerning a future barren of a beef
supply. More cattle are the product of the farm-regions than of the
ranges. That ground, once range and now farm, raises more cattle now
than then. Texas is a great cattle State. Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
Iowa, and Missouri are first States of agriculture. The area of
Texas is about even with the collected area of the other five. Yet
one finds double the number of cattle in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
Iowa, and Missouri than in Texas, to say nothing of tenfold the sheep
and hogs. No; one may be calm; one is not to fall a prey to any
hunger of beef.
While the farms in their westward pushing do not diminish the cattle,
they reduce the cattleman and pinch off much that is romantic and
picturesque. Between the farm and the wire fence, the cowboy, as
once he flourished, has been modified, subdued, and made partially to
disappear. In the good old days of the Jones and Plummer trail there
were no wire fences, and the sullen farmer had not yet arrived. Your
cowboy at that time was a person of thrill and consequence. He wore
a broad-brimmed Stetson hat, and all about it a rattlesnake skin by
way of band, retaining head and rattles. This was to be potent
against headaches--a malady, by the way, which swept down no cowboy
save in hours emergent of a spree. In such case the snake cure
didn't cure. The hat was retained in defiance of winds, by a
leathern cord caught about the back of the head, not under the chin.
This cord was beautiful with a garniture of three or four perforated
poker chips, red, yellow, and blue.
There are sundry angles of costume where the dandyism of a cowboy of
spirit and conceit may acquit itself; these are hatband, spurs,
saddle, and leggins. I've seen hatbands made of braided gold and
silver filigree; they were from Santa Fe, and always in the form of a
rattlesnake, with rubies or emeralds or diamonds for eyes. Such
gauds would cost from four hundred to two thousand dollars. Also,
I've encountered a saddle which depleted its proud owner a round
twenty-five hundred dollars. It was of finest Spanish leather,
stamped and spattered with gold bosses. There was gold-capping on
the saddle horn, and again on the circle of the cantle. It was a
dream of a saddle, made at Paso del Norte; and the owner had it
cinched upon a bronco dear at twenty dollars. One couldn't have sold
the pony for a stack of white chips in any faro game of that
neighbourhood (Las Vegas) and they were all crooked games at that.
Your cowboy dandy frequently wears wrought steel spurs, inlaid with
silver and gold; price, anything you please. If he flourish a true
Brummel of the plains his leggins will be fronted from instep to belt
with the thick pelt, hair outside, of a Newfoundland dog. These
"chapps," are meant to protect the cowboy from rain and cold, as well
as plum bushes, wire fences and other obstacles inimical, and against
which he may lunge while riding headlong in the dark. The hair of
the Newfoundland, thick and long and laid the right way, defies the
rains; and your cowboy loathes water.
Save in those four cardinals of vanity enumerated, your cowboy wears
nothing from weakness; the rest of his outfit is legitimate. The
long sharp heels of his boots are there to dig into the ground and
hold fast to his mother earth while roping on foot. His gay pony
when "roped" of a frosty morning would skate him all across and about
the plains if it were not for these heels. The buckskin gloves tied
in one of the saddle strings are used when roping, and to keep the
half-inch manila lariat--or mayhap it's horsehair or rawhide
pleated--from burning his hands. The red silken sash one was wont
aforetime to see knotted about his waist, was used to hogtie and hold
down the big cattle when roped and thrown. The sash--strong, soft
and close--could be tied more tightly, quickly, surely than anything
besides. In these days, with wire pastures and branding pens and the
fine certainty of modern round-ups and a consequent paucity of
mavericks, big cattle are seldom roped; wherefor the sash has been
much cast aside.
The saddle-bags or "war-bags,"--also covered of dogskin to match the
leggins, and worn behind, not forward of the rider--are the cowboy's
official wardrobe wherein he carries his second suit of underclothes,
and his other shirt. His handkerchief, red cotton, is loosely
knotted about the cowboy's neck, knot to the rear. He wipes the
sweat from his brow therewith on those hot Texas days when in a
branding pen he "flanks" calves or feeds the fires or handles the
irons or stands off the horned indignation of the cows, resentful
because of burned and bawling offspring.
It would take two hundred thousand words to tell in half fashion the
story of the cowboy. His religion of fatalism, his courage, his
rides at full swing in midnight darkness to head and turn and hold a
herd stampeded, when a slip on the storm-soaked grass by his unshod
pony, or a misplaced prairie-dog hole, means a tumble, and a tumble
means that a hundred and fifty thousand dollars worth of cattle, with
hoofs like chopping knives, will run over him and make him look and
feel and become as dead as a cancelled postage stamp; his troubles,
his joys, his soberness in camp, his drunkenness in town, and his
feuds and occasional "gun plays" are not to be disposed of in a
preface. One cannot in such cramped space so much as hit the high
places in a cowboy career.
At work on the range and about his camp--for, bar accidents, wherever
you find a cowboy you will find a camp--the cowboy is a youth of
sober quiet dignity. There is a deal of deep politeness and nothing
of epithet, insult or horseplay where everybody wears a gun.
There are no folk inquisitive on the ranges. No one asks your name.
If driven by stress of conversation to something akin to it the
cowboy will say: "What may I call you, sir?" And he's as careful to
add the "sir," as he is to expect it in return.
You are at liberty to select what name you prefer. Where you hail
from? where going? why? are queries never put. To look at the brand
on your pony--you, a stranger--is a dangerous vulgarity to which no
gentleman of the Panhandle or any other region of pure southwestern
politeness would stoop. And if you wish to arouse an instant
combination of hate, suspicion and contempt in the bosom of a cowboy
you have but to stretch forth your artless Eastern hand and ask: "Let
me look at your gun."
Cowboys on the range or in the town are excessively clannish. They
never desert each other, but stay and fight and die and storm a jail
and shoot a sheriff if needs press, to rescue a comrade made captive
in their company. Also they care for each other when sick or
injured, and set one another's bones when broken in the falls and
tumbles of their craft. On the range the cowboy is quiet, just and
peaceable. There are neither women nor cards nor rum about the cow
camps. The ranches and the boys themselves banish the two latter;
and the first won't come. Women, cards and whiskey, the three war
causes of the West, are confined to the towns.
Those occasions when cattle are shipped and the beef-herds, per
consequence, driven to the shipping point become the only times when
the cowboy sees the town. In such hours he blooms and lives fully up
to his opportunity. He has travelled perhaps two hundred miles and
has been twenty days on the trail, for cattle may only be driven
about ten miles a day; he has been up day and night and slept half
the time in the saddle; he has made himself hoarse singing "Sam Bass"
and "The Dying Ranger" to keep the cattle quiet and stave off
stampedes; he has ridden ten ponies to shadows in his twenty days of
driving, wherefore, and naturally, your cowboy feels like relaxing.
There would be as many as ten men with each beef-herd; and the herd
would include about five thousand head. There would be six "riders,"
divided into three watches to stand night guard over the herd and
drive it through the day; there would be two "hoss hustlers," to hold
the eighty or ninety ponies, turn and turn about, and carry them
along with the herd; there would be the cook, with four mules and the
chuck wagon; and lastly there would be the herd-boss, a cow expert
he, and at the head of the business.
Once the herd is off his hands and his mind at the end of the drive,
the cowboy unbuckles and reposes himself from his labours. He
becomes deeply and famously drunk. Hungering for the excitement of
play he collides amiably with faro and monte and what other deadfalls
are rife of the place. Never does he win; for the games aren't
arranged that way. But he enjoys himself; and his losses do not prey
on him.
Sated with faro bank and monte--they can't be called games of chance,
the only games of chance occurring when cowboys engage with each
other at billiards or pool--sated, I say, with faro and Mexican
monte, and exuberant of rum, which last has regular quick renewal,
our cowboy will stagger to his pony, swing into the saddle, and with
gladsome whoops and an occasional outburst from his six shooter
directed toward the heavens, charge up and down the street. This
last amusement appeals mightily to cowboys too drunk to walk. For,
be it known, a gentleman may ride long after he may not walk.
If a theatre be in action and mayhap a troop of "Red Stocking
Blondes," elevating the drama therein, the cowboy is sure to attend.
Also he will arrive with his lariat wound about his body under his
coat; and his place will be the front row. At some engaging crisis,
such as the "March of the Amazons," having first privily unwound and
organised his lariat to that end, he will arise and "rope" an Amazon.
This will produce bad language from the manager of the show, and
compel the lady to sit upon the stage to the detriment of her
wardrobe if no worse, and all to keep from being pulled across the
footlights. Yet the exercise gives the cowboy deepest pleasure.
Having thus distinguished the lady of his admiration, later he will
meet her and escort her to the local dancehall. There, mingling with
their frank companions, the two will drink, and loosen the boards of
the floor with the strenuous dances of our frontier till daylight
does appear.
For the matter of a week, or perchance two--it depends on how fast
his money melts--in these fashions will our gentleman of cows engage
his hours and expand himself. He will make a deal of noise, drink a
deal of whiskey, acquire a deal of what he terms "action"; but he
harms nobody, and, in a town toughened to his racket and which needs
and gets his money, disturbs nobody.
"Let him whoop it up; he's paying for it, ain't he?" will be the
prompt local retort to any inquiry as to why he is thus permitted to
disport.
So long as the cowboy observes the etiquette of the town, he will not
be molested or "called down" by marshal or sheriff or citizen. There
are four things your cowboy must not do. He must not insult a woman;
he must not shoot his pistol in a store or bar-room; he must not ride
his pony into those places of resort; and as a last proposal he must
not ride his pony on the sidewalks. Shooting or riding into
bar-rooms is reckoned as dangerous; riding on the sidewalk comes more
under the head of insult, and is popularly regarded as a taunting
defiance of the town marshal. On such occasions the marshal never
fails to respond, and the cowboy is called upon to surrender. If he
complies, which to the credit of his horse-sense he commonly does, he
is led into brief captivity to be made loose when cooled. Does he
resist arrest, there is an explosive rattle of six shooters, a mad
scattering of the careful citizenry out of lines of fire, and a
cowboy or marshal is added to the host beyond. At the close of the
festival, if the marshal still lives he is congratulated; if the
cowboy survives he is lynched; if both fall, they are buried with the
honours of frontier war; while whatever the event, the communal
ripple is but slight and only of the moment, following which the
currents of Western existence sweep easily and calmly onward as
before.
A. H. L.
WOLFVILLE NIGHTS
CHAPTER I.
The Dismissal of Silver Phil.
"His name, complete, is 'Silver City Philip.' In them social
observances of the Southwest wherein haste is a feacher an' brev'ty the
bull's eye aimed at, said cognomen gets shortened to 'Silver Phil.'"
The Old Cattleman looked thoughtfully into his glass, as if by that
method he collected the scattered elements of a story. There was a
pause; then he lifted the glass to his lips as one who being now evenly
equipped of information, proposed that it arrive hand in hand with the
inspiration which should build a tale from it.
"Shore, this Silver Phil is dead now; an' I never yet crosses up with
the gent who's that sooperfluous as to express regrets. It's Dan Boggs
who dismisses Silver Phil; Dan does it in efforts he puts forth to
faithfully represent the right.
"Doc Peets allers allows this Silver Phil is a 'degen'rate;' leastwise
that's the word Peets uses. An' while I freely concedes I ain't none
too cl'ar as to jest what a degen'rate is, I stands ready to back
Peets' deescription to win. Peets is, bar Colonel William Greene
Sterett, the best eddicated sharp in Arizona; also the wariest as to
expressin' views. Tharfore when Peets puts it up, onflinchin', that
this yere Silver Phil's a degen'rate, you-all can spread your blankets
an' go to sleep on it that a degen'rate he is.
"Silver Phil is a little, dark, ignorant, tousled-ha'red party, none
too neat in costume. He's as black an' small an' evil-seemin' as a
Mexican; still, you sees at a glance he ain't no Greaser neither. An'
with all this yere surface wickedness, Silver Phil has a quick,
hyster'cal way like a woman or a bird; an' that's ever a grin on his
face. You can smell 'bad' off Silver Phil, like smoke in a house, an'
folks who's on the level--an' most folks is--conceives a notion ag'in
him the moment him an' they meets up.
"The first time I observes Silver Phil, he's walkin' down the licker
room of the Red Light. As he goes by the bar, Black Jack--who's
rearrangin' the nosepaint on the shelf so it shows to advantage--gets
careless an' drops a bottle.
"'Crash!' it goes onto the floor.
"With the sound, an' the onexpected suddenness of it stampedin' his
nerves, that a-way, Silver Phil leaps into the air like a cat; an' when
he 'lights, he's frontin' Black Jack an' a gun in each hand.
"'Which I won't be took!' says Silver Phil, all flustered.
"His eyes is gleamin' an' his face is palin' an' his ugly grin gets
even uglier than before. But like a flash, he sees thar's nothin' to
go in the air about--nothin' that means him; an' he puts up his
hardware an' composes himse'f.
"'You-all conducts yourse'f like a sport who has something on his
mind,' says Texas Thompson, who's thar present at the time, an' can't
refrain from commentin' on the start that bottle-smashin' gives Silver
Phil.
"This Silver Phil makes no response, but sort o' grins plenty ghastly,
while his breath comes quick.
"Still, while you-all notes easy that this person's scared, it's plain
he's a killer jest the same. It's frequent that a-way. I'm never much
afraid of one of your cold game gents like Cherokee Hall; you can
gamble the limit they'll never put a six-shooter in play till it's
shorely come their turn. But timid, feverish, locoed people, whose
jedgment is bad an' who's prone to feel themse'fs in peril; they're the
kind who kills. For myse'f I shuns all sech. I won't say them
erratic, quick-to-kill sports don't have courage; only it strikes
me--an' I've rode up on a heap of 'em--it's more like a fear-bit
f'rocity than sand.
"Take Enright or Peets or Cherokee or Tutt or Jack Moore or Boggs or
Texas Thompson; you're plumb safe with sech gents--all or any. An' yet
thar ain't the first glimmer of bein' gun-shy about one of 'em; they're
as clean strain as the eternal granite, an' no more likely to hide out
from danger than a hill. An' while they differs from each other, yet
they're all different from sech folks as Silver Phil. Boggs, goin' to
war, is full of good-humoured grandeur, gala and confident, ready to
start or stop like a good hoss. Cherokee Hall is quiet an' wordless;
he gets pale, but sharp an' deadly; an' his notion is to fight for a
finish. Peets is haughty an' sooperior on the few o'casions when he
onbends in battle, an' comports himse'f like a gent who fights
downhill; the same, ondoubted, bein' doo to them book advantages of
Peets which elevates him an' lifts him above the common herd a whole
lot. Enright who's oldest is of course slowest to embark in blood, an'
pulls his weepons--when he does pull 'em--with sorrowful resignation.
"'Which I'm shorely saddest when I shoots,' says Enright to me, as he
reloads his gun one time.
"These yere humane sentiments, however, don't deter him from shootin'
soon an' aimin' low, which latter habits makes Wolfville's honoured
chief a highly desp'rate game to get ag'inst.
"Jack Moore, bein' as I explains former, the execyootive of the
Stranglers, an' responsible for law an' order, has a heap of shootin'
shoved onto him from time to time. Jack allers transacts these
fireworks with a ca'm, offishul front, the same bein' devoid, equal, of
anger or regrets. Tutt, partic'lar after he weds Tucson Jennie, an'
more partic'lar still when he reaps new honours as the originator of
that blessed infant Enright Peets Tutt, carries on what shootin' comes
his way in a manner a lot dignified an' lofty; while Texas
Thompson--who's mebby morbid about his wife down in Laredo demandin'
she be divorced that time--although he picks up his hand in a fracas,
ready an' irritable an' with no delays, after all is that well-balanced
he's bound to be each time plumb right.
"Which, you observes, son, from these yere settin's forth, that thar's
a mighty sight of difference between gents like them pards of mine an'
degen'rates of the tribe of Silver Phil. It's the difference between
right an' wrong; one works from a impulse of pure jestice, the other is
moved of a sperit of crime; an' thar you be.
"Silver Phil, we learns later--an' it shore jestifies Peets in his
theories about him bein' a degen'rate--has been in plenty of blood.
But allers like a cat; savage, gore-thirsty, yet shy, prideless, an'
ready to fly. It seems he begins to be homicidal in a humble way by
downin' a trooper over near Fort Cummings. That's four years before he
visits us. He's been blazin' away intermittent ever since, and allers
crooel, crafty an' safe. It's got to be a shore thing or Silver Phil
quits an' goes into the water like a mink.
"This yere ondersized miscreant ain't ha'nted about Wolfville more'n
four days before he shows how onnecessary he is to our success. Which
he works a ha'r copper on Cherokee Hall. What's a ha'r copper? I'll
onfold, short and terse, what Silver Phil does, an' then you saveys.
Cherokee's dealin' his game--farobank she is; an' if all them national
banks conducts themse'fs as squar' as that enterprise of Cherokee's,
the fields of finance would be as safely honest as a church.
Cherokee's turnin' his game one evenin'; Faro Nell on the lookout stool
where she belongs. Silver Phil drifts up to the lay-out, an' camps
over back of the king-end. He gets chips, an' goes to takin' chances
alternate on the king, queen, jack, ten; all side an' side they be.
Cherokee bein' squar' himse'f ain't over-prone to expect a devious play
in others. He don't notice this Silver Phil none speshul, an' shoves
the kyards.
"Silver Phil wins three or four bets; it's Nell that catches on to his
racket, an' signs up to Cherokee onder the table with her little foot.
One glance an' Cherokee is loaded with information. This Silver Phil,
it seems, in a sperit of avarice, equips himse'f with a copper--little
wooden checker, is what this copper is--one he's done filched from
Cherokee the day prior. He's fastened a long black hoss-ha'r to it,
an' he ties the other end of the hoss-ha'r to his belt in front. This
ha'r is long enough as he's planted at the table that a-way, so it
reaches nice to them four nearest kyards,--the king, queen, jack, ten.
An' said ha'r is plumb invisible except to eyes as sharp as Faro
Nell's. The deceitful Silver Phil will have a stack on one of 'em,
coppered with this yere ha'r copper. He watches the box. As the turns
is made, if the kyards come his way, well an' good. Silver Phil does
nothin' but garners in results. When the kyards start to show ag'in
him, however, that's different. In sech events Silver Phil draws in
his breath, sort o' takin' in on the hoss-ha'r, an' the copper comes
off the bet. When the turn is made, thar's Silver Phil's bet--by
virchoo of said fraud--open an' triumphant an' waitin' to be paid.
"Cherokee gets posted quick an with a look. As sharp as winkin'
Cherokee has a nine-inch bowie in his hand an' with one slash cuts the
hoss-ha'r clost up by Silver Phil's belt.
"'That's a yoonique invention!" observes Cherokee, an' he's sarcastic
while he menaces with the knife at Silver Phil; 'that contraption is
shorely plenty sagacious! But it don't go here. Shove in your chips.'
Silver Phil obeys: an' he shows furtive, ugly, an' alarmed, an' all of
'em at once. He don't say a word. 'Now pull your freight,' concloods
Cherokee. 'If you ever drifts within ten foot of a game of mine ag'in
I'll throw this knife plumb through you--through an' through.' An'
Cherokee, by way of lustration lets fly the knife across the bar-room.
It comes like a flash.
"'Chuck!'
"Thar's a picture paper pasted onto the wooden wall of the Red Light,
displayin' the liniaments of some party. That bowie pierces the
picture--a shot in the cross it is--an' all with sech fervour that the
p'int of the blade shows a inch an' a half on the other side of that
individyool board.
"'The next time I throws a knife in your presence,' remarks Cherokee to
Silver Phil, an' Cherokee's as cold an' p'isonous as a rattlesnake,
'it'll be la'nched at you.'
"Silver Phil don't say nothin' in retort. He's aware by the lib'ral
way Cherokee sep'rates himse'f from the bowie that said weepon can't
constitoote Cherokee's entire armament. An' as Silver Phil don't pack
the sperit to face no sech flashlight warrior, he acts on Cherokee's
hint to _vamos_, an fades into the street. Shore, Cherokee don't cash
the felon's chips none; he confiscates 'em. Cherokee ain't quite so
tenderly romantic as to make good to a detected robber. Moreover, he
lets this Silver Phil go onharmed when by every roole his skelp is
forfeit. It turns out good for the camp, however, as this yere
experience proves so depressin' to Silver Phil he removes his blankets
to Red Dog. Thar among them purblind tarrapins, its inhabitants, it's
likely he gets prosperous an' ondetected action on that little old ha'r
copper of his.
"It's not only my beliefs, but likewise the opinions of sech joodicial
sports as Enright, Peets, an' Colonel Sterett, that this maverick,
Silver Phil, is all sorts of a crim'nal. An' I wouldn't wonder if he's
a pure rustler that a-way; as ready to stand up a stage as snake a play
at farobank. This idee settles down on the Wolfville intell'gence on
the heels of a vicissitoode wherein Dan Boggs performs, an' which gets
pulled off over in the Bird Cage Op'ry House. Jack Moore ain't thar
none that time. Usual, Jack is a constant deevotee of the dramy.
Jack's not only a first-nighter, he comes mighty clost to bein' a
every-nighter. But this partic'lar evenin' when Boggs performs, Jack's
rummagin' about some'ers else.
"If Jack's thar, it's even money he'd a-had that second shot instead of
Boggs; in which event, the results might have been something graver
than this yere minoote wound which Boggs confers. I'm confident Jack
would have cut in with the second shot for sech is his offishul system.
Jack more'n once proclaims his position.
"'By every roole of law,' says Jack at epocks when he declar's himse'f,
'an' on all o'casions, I, as kettle-tender to the Stranglers, is
entitled to the first shot. When I uses the term 'o'casion,' I would
be onderstood as alloodin' to affairs of a simply social kind, an' not
to robberies, hold-ups, hoss-larcenies, an' other an' sim'lar
transactions in spec'latif crime when every gent defends his own.
Speakin' social, however, I reasserts that by every roole of guidance,
I'm entitled to the first shot. Which a doo regyard for these plain
rights of mine would go far to freein' Wolfville upper circles of the
bullets which occurs from time to time, an' which even the most
onconventional admits is shore a draw-back. All I can add as a
closer,' concloods Jack, 'is that I'll make haste to open on any sport
who transgresses these fiats an' goes to shootin' first. Moreover,
it's likely that said offender finds that when I'm started once, what I
misses in the orig'nal deal I'll make up in the draw, an' I tharfore
trusts that none will prove so sooicidal as to put me to the test.'
"This Bird Cage Op'ry House evenin', however, Jack is absent a heap.
Dan Boggs is present, an' is leanin' back appreciatin' the show an' the
Valley Tan plenty impartial. Dan likes both an' is doin' 'em even
jestice. Over opp'site to Dan is a drunken passel of sports from Red
Dog, said wretched hamlet bein' behind Wolfville in that as in all
things else an' not ownin' no op'ry house.
"As the evenin' proceeds--it's about sixth drink time--a casyooal gun
goes off over among the Red Dog outfit, an' the lead tharfrom bores a
hole in the wall clost to Dan's y'ear. Nacherally Dan don't like it.
The show sort o' comes to a balk, an' takin' advantages of the lull Dan
arises in a listless way an' addresses the Red Dogs.
"'I merely desires to inquire,' says Dan 'whether that shot is
inadvertent; or is it a mark of innocent joobilation an' approval of
the show; or is it meant personal to me?'
"'You can bet your moccasins!' shouts one of the Red Dog delegation,
'thar's no good fellowship with that gun-play. That shot's formal an'
serious an' goes as it lays.'
"'My mind bein' now cl'ar on the subject of motive,' says Dan; 'the
proper course is plain.'"
With this retort Dan slams away gen'ral--shoots into the flock like--at
the picnickers from Red Dog, an' a party who's plenty drunk an' has his
feet piled up on a table goes shy his off big toe.
"As I remarks yeretofore it's as well Jack Moore ain't thar. Jack
would have corralled something more momentous than a toe. Which Jack
would have been shootin' in his capac'ty as marshal, an' couldn't onder
sech circumstances have stooped to toes. But it's different with Dan.
He is present private an' only idlin' 'round; an' he ain't driven to
take high ground. More partic'lar since Dan's playin' a return game in
the nacher of reproofs an' merely to resent the onlicensed liberties
which Red Dog takes with him, Dan, as I says, is free to accept toes if
he so decides.
"When Dan busts this yere inebriate, the victim lams loose a yell
ag'inst which a coyote would protest. That sot thinks he's shore
killed. What with the scare an' the pain an' the nosepaint, an'
regyardin' of himse'f as right then flutterin' about the rim of
eternity, he gets seized with remorse an' allows he's out to confess
his sins before he quits. As thar's no sky pilot to confide in, this
drunkard figgers that Peets 'll do, an' with that he onloads on Peets
how, bein' as he is a stage book-keep over in Red Dog, he's in cahoots
with a outfit of route agents an' gives 'em the word when it's worth
while to stand-up the stage. An' among other crim'nal pards of his
this terrified person names that outlaw Silver Phil. Shore, when he
rounds to an' learns it ain't nothin' but a toe, this party's chagrined
to death.
"This yere confidin' sport's arrested an' taken some'ers--Prescott
mebby--to be tried in a shore-enough co't for the robberies; the Red
Dog Stranglers not bein' game to butt in an' hang him a lot themse'fs.
They surrenders him to the marshal who rides over for him; an' they
would have turned out Silver Phil, too, only that small black outcast
don't wait, but goes squanderin' off to onknown climes the moment he
hears the news. He's vamoosed Red Dog before this penitent bookkeep
ceases yelpin' an' sobbin' over his absent toe.
"It ain't no time, however, before we hears further of Silver Phil;
that is, by way of roomer. It looks like a couple of big cow outfits
some'ers in the San Simon country--they're the 'Three-D' an' the
'K-in-a-box' brands--takes first to stealin' each, other's cattle, an',
final, goes to war. Each side retains bands of murderers an' proceeds
buoyantly to lay for one another. Which Silver Phil enlists with the
'Three-D' an' sneaks an' prowls an' bushwhacks an' shoots himse'f into
more or less bloody an' ignoble prom'nence. At last the main
war-chiefs of the Territory declar's themse'fs in on the riot an'
chases both sides into the hills; an' among other excellent deeds they
makes captive Silver Phil.
"It's a great error they don't string this Silver Phil instanter. But
no; after the procrastinatin' fashion of real law, they permits the
villain--who's no more use on the surface of Arizona that a-way than
one of them hydrophoby polecats whose bite is death--to get a law sharp
to plead an' call for a show-down before a jedge an' jury. It takes
days to try Silver Phil, an' marshals an' sheriff gents is two weeks
squanderin' about gettin' witnesses; an' all to as much trouble an'
loss of time an' dinero as would suffice to round-up the cattle of
Cochise county. Enright an' the Stranglers would have turned the
trick in twenty minutes an' never left the New York Store ontil with
Silver Phil an' a lariat they reepairs to the windmill to put the
finishin' touches on their lucoobrations.
"Still, dooms slow an' shiftless as they shore be, at the wind-up
Silver Phil's found guilty, an' is put in nom'nation by the presidin'
alcade to be hanged; the time bein' set in a crazy-hoss fashion for a
month away. As Silver Phil--which he's that bad an' hard he comes
mighty clost to bein; game--is leavin' the co't-room with the marshal
who's ridin' herd on him, he says:
"'I ain't payin' much attention at the time,'--Silver Phil's talkin' to
that marshal gent,--'bein' I'm thinkin' of something else, but do I
onderstand that old grey sport on the bench to say you-all is to hang
me next month?'
"'That's whatever!' assents this marshal gent, 'an' you can gamble a
bloo stack that hangin' you is a bet we ain't none likely to overlook.
Which we're out to put our whole grateful souls into the dooty.'
"'Now I thinks of it,' observes Silver Phil, 'I'm some averse to bein'
hanged. I reckons, speakin' free an' free as between fellow sports,
that in order for that execootion to be a blindin' success I'll have to
be thar personal?'
"'It's one of the mighty few o'casions,' responds the marshal, 'when
your absence would shorely dash an' damp the gen'ral joy. As you says,
you'll have to be thar a heap personal when said hangin' occurs.'
"'I'm mighty sorry,' says Silver Phil, 'that you-all lays out your game
in a fashion that so much depends on me. The more so, since the longer
I considers this racket, the less likely it is I'll be thar. It's
almost a cinch, with the plans I has, that I'll shore be some'ers else.'
"They corrals Silver Phil in the one big upper room of a two-story
'doby, an' counts off a couple of dep'ty marshals to gyard him. These
gyards, comin' squar' down to cases, ain't no improvement, moral, on
Silver Phil himse'f; an' since they're twice his age--Silver Phil not
bein' more'n twenty--it's safe as a play to say that both of 'em
oughter have been hanged a heap before ever Silver Phil is born. These
two hold-ups, however, turns dep'ty marshals in their old age, an' is
put in to stand watch an' watch an' see that Silver Phil don't work
loose from his hobbles an' go pirootin' off ag'in into parts onknown.
Silver Phil is loaded with fetters,--handcuffs an' laig-locks both--an'
these hold-up sentries is armed to the limit.
"It's the idee of Doc Peets later, when he hears the details, that if
the gyards that time treats Silver Phil with kindness, the little felon
most likely would have remained to be hanged. But they don't: they
abooses Silver Phil; cussin' him out an' herdin' him about like he's
cattle. They're a evil-tempered couple, them dep'ties, an' they don't
give Silver Phil no sort o' peace.
"'As I su'gests yeretofore,' says Doc Peets, when he considers the
case, 'this Silver Phil is a degen'rate. He's like a anamile. He
don't entertain no reg'lar scheme to work free when he waxes sardonic
with the marshal; that's only a bluff. Later, when them gyards takes
to maltreatin' him an' battin' him about, it wakes up the venom in him,
an' his cunnin' gets aroused along with his appetite for revenge.'
"This Silver Phil, who's lean an' slim like I explains at the jump, has
hands no bigger than a cat's paws. It ain't no time when he discovers
that by cuttin' himse'f a bit on the irons, he can shuck the handcuffs
whenever he's disposed. Even then, he don't outline no campaign for
liberty; jest sort o' roominates an' waits.
"It's one partic'lar mornin', some two weeks after Silver Phil's
sentenced that a-way. The marshal gent himse'f ain't about, bein' on
some dooty over to Tucson. Silver Phil is upsta'rs on the top floor of
the 'doby with his gyards. Which he's hotter than a wildcat; the
gyards an' him has been havin' a cussin' match, an' as Silver Phil
outplays 'em talkin', one of 'em's done whacked him over the skelp with
his gun. The blood's tricklin' down Silver Phil's fore'erd as he sits
glowerin'.
"One of the gyards is loadin' a ten-gauge Greener--a whole mouthful of
buckshot in each shell. He's grinnin' at Silver Phil as he shoves the
shells in the gun an' slams her shet.
"'Which I'm loadin' that weepon for you,' says the gyard, contemplatin'
Silver Phil derisive.
"'You be, be you!' replies Silver Phil, his eyes burnin' with rage.
'Which you better look out a whole lot; you-all may get it yourse'f.'
"The gyard laughs ugly an' exasperatin' an' puts the ten-gauge in a
locker along with two or three Winchesters. Then he turns the key on
the firearms an' goes caperin' off to his feed.
"The other gyard, his _compadre_, is settin' on a stool lookin' out a
window. Mebby he's considerin' of his sins. It would be more in his
hand at this time if he thinks of Silver Phil.
"Silver Phil, who's full of wrath at the taunts of the departed gyard,
slips his hands free of the irons. Most of the hide on his wrists
comes with 'em, but Silver Phil don't care. The gyard's back is to him
as that gent sits gazin' out an' off along the dusty trail where it
winds gray an' hot toward Tucson. Silver Phil organises, stealthy an'
cat-cautious; he's out for the gyard's gun as it hangs from his belt,
the butt all temptin' an' su'gestive.
"As Silver Phil makes his first move the laig-locks clanks. It ain't
louder than the jingle of a brace of copper _centouse_ knockin'
together. It's enough, however; it strikes on the y'ear of that
thoughtful gyard like the roar of a '44. He emerges from his reverie
with a start; the play comes cl'ar as noonday to him in a moment.
"The gyard leaps, without even lookin' 'round, to free himse'f from the
clutch of Silver Phil. Which he's the splinter of a second too late.
Silver Phil makes a spring like a mountain lion, laig-locks an' all,
an' grabs the gun. As the gyard goes clatterin' down sta'rs. Silver
Phil pumps two loads into him an' curls him up at the foot. Then
Silver Phil hurls the six-shooter at him with a volley of mal'dictions.
"Without pausin' a moment, Silver Phil grabs the stool an' smashes to
flinders the locker that holds the 10-gauge Greener. He ain't forgot
none; an' he's fair locoed to get that partic'lar weepon for the other
gyard. He rips it from the rack an' shows at the window as his prey
comes runnin' to the rescoo of his pard:
"'Oh, you! Virg Sanders!' yells Silver Phil.
"The second gyard looks up; an' as he does, Silver Phil gives him both
bar'ls. Forty-two buckshot; an' that gyard's so clost he stops 'em
all! As he lays dead, Silver Phil breaks the Greener in two, an'
throws, one after the other, stock an' bar'l at him.
"'Which I'll show you-all what happens when folks loads a gun for me!'
says Silver Phil.
"Nacherally, this artillery practice turns out the entire plaza. The
folks is standin' about the 'doby which confines Silver Phil, wonderin'
whatever that enthoosiast's goin' to do next. No, they don't come
after him, an' I'll tell you why. Shore, thar's twenty gents lookin'
on, any one of whom, so far as personal apprehensions is involved,
would trail Silver Phil single-handed into a wolf's den. Which he'd
feel plumb confident he gets away with Silver Phil an' the wolves
thrown in to even up the odds. Still, no one stretches forth to
capture Silver Phil on this yere voylent o'casion. An' these is the
reasons. Thar's no reg'lar offishul present whose dooty it is to rope
up this Silver Phil. If sech had chanced to be thar, you can put down
a stack he'd come a-runnin', an' him or Silver Phil would have caught
up with the two gyards on their journey into the beyond. But when it
gets down to private people volunteerin' for dooty as marshals, folks
in the Southwest goes some slothful to work. Thar's the friends of the
accoosed--an' as a roole he ain't none friendless--who would mighty
likely resent sech zeal. Also, in the case of Silver Phil, his
captivity grows out of a cattle war. One third the public so far as it
stands about the 'doby where Silver Phil is hived that time is
'Three-D' adherents, mebby another third is 'K-in-a-box' folks, while
the last third is mighty likely nootral. Whichever way it breaks,
however, thar's a tacit stand-off, an' never a sport of 'em lifts a
finger or voice to head off Silver Phil.
"'Which she's the inalien'ble right of Americans onder the
constitootion to escape with every chance they gets,' says one.
"'That's whatever!' coincides his pard; 'an' moreover this ain't our
round-up nohow.'
"It's in that fashion these private citizens adjusts their dooty to the
state while pausin' to look on, in a sperit of cur'osity while Silver
Phil makes his next play.
"They don't wait long. Silver Phil comes out on the roof of a stoop in
front. He's got a Winchester by now, an' promptly throws the muzzle
tharof on a leadin' citizen. Silver Phil allows he'll plug this
dignitary if they don't send up a sport with a file to cut loose the
laig-locks. Tharupon the pop'lace, full of a warm interest by this
time, does better. They gropes about in the war-bags of the Virg
Sanders sharp who stops the buckshot an' gets his keys; a moment after,
Silver Phil is free.
"Still, this ontirin' hold-up goes on menacin' the leadin' citizen as
former. Which now Silver Phil demands a bronco, bridled an' saddled.
He gives the public ten minutes; if the bronco is absent at the end of
ten minutes Silver Phil allows he'll introdooce about a pound of lead
into where that village father does his cogitating. The bronco appears
with six minutes to spar'. As it arrives, the vivacious Silver Phil
jumps off the roof of the stoop--the same bein' low--an' is in the
saddle an' out o' sight while as practised a hand as Huggins is pourin'
out a drink. Where the trail bends 'round a mesa Silver Phil pulls up.
"'Whoop! whoop! whoopee! for Silver Phil,' he shouts.
"Then he waves the Winchester, an' as he spurs 'round the corner of the
hill it's the last that spellbound outfit ever sees of Silver Phil.
"Nacherally now," remarked my old friend, as he refreshed himself with
a mouthful of scotch, "you-all is waitin' an' tryin' to guess wherever
does Dan Boggs get in on this yere deal. An' it won't take no time to
post you; the same bein' a comfort.
"Not one word do we-all wolves of Wolfville hear of the divertin'
adventures of Silver Phil--shootin' up his gyards an' fetchin' himse'f
free--ontil days after. No one in camp has got Silver Phil on his mind
at all; at least if he has he deems him safe an' shore in hock,
a-waitin' to be stretched. Considerin' what follows, I never
experiences trouble in adoptin' Doc Peets' argyments that the eepisodes
wherein this onhappy Silver Phil figgers sort o' aggravates his
intellects ontil he's locoed.
"'Bein' this Silver Phil's a degen'rate,' declar's Peets, explanatory,
'he's easy an' soon to loco. His mind as well as his moral nacher is
onbalanced congenital. Any triflin' jolt, much less than what that
Silver Phil runs up on, an' his fretful wits is shore to leave the
saddle.
"Now that Silver Phil's free, but loonatic like Peets says, an' doubly
vicious by them tantalisin' gyards, it looks like he thinks of nothin'
but wreckin' reprisals on all who's crossed his trail. An' so with
vengeance eatin' at his crim'nal heart he p'ints that bronco's muzzle
straight as a bird flies for Wolfville. Whoever do you-all reckon now
he wants? Cherokee Hall? Son, you've followed off the wrong waggon
track. Silver Phil--imagine the turpitoode of sech a ornery
wretch!--is out for the lovely skelp of Faro Nell who detects him in
his ha'r-copper frauds that time.
"Which the first intimations we has of Silver Phil after that escape,
is one evenin' about fifth drink time--or as you-all says 'four
o'clock.' The sun's still hot an' high over in the west. Thar's no
game goin'; but bein' it's as convenient thar as elsewhere an' some
cooler, Cherokee's settin' back of his layout with Faro Nell as usual
on her lookout perch. Dan Boggs is across the street in the dancehall
door, an' his pet best bronco is waitin' saddled in front. Hot an'
drowsy; the street save for these is deserted.
"It all takes place in a moment. Thar's a clattering rush; an' then,
pony a-muck with sweat an' alkali dust, Silver Phil shows in the
portals of the Red Light. Thar's a flash an' a spit of white smoke as
he fires his six-shooter straight at Faro Nell.
"Silver Phil is quick, but Cherokee is quicker. Cherokee sweeps Faro
Nell from her stool with one motion of his arm an' the bullet that's
searchin' for her lifts Cherokee's ha'r a trifle where he 'most gets
his head in its way.
"Ondoubted, this Silver Phil allows he c'llects on Faro Nell as
planned. He don't shoot twice, an' he don't tarry none, but wheels his
wearied pony, gives a yell, an' goes surgin' off.
"But Silver Phil's got down to the turn of that evil deal of his
existence. He ain't two hundred yards when Dan Boggs is in the saddle
an' ridin' hard. Dan's bronco runs three foot for every one of the
pony of Silver Phil's; which that beaten an' broken cayouse is eighty
miles from his last mouthful of grass.
"As Dan begins to crowd him, Silver Phil turns in the saddle an'
shoots. The lead goes 'way off yonder--wild. Dan, grim an' silent,
rides on without returnin' the fire.
"'Which I wouldn't dishonour them guns of mine,' says Dan, explainin'
later the pheenomenon of him not shootin' none, 'which I wouldn't
dishonour them guns by usin' 'em on varmints like this yere Silver
Phil.'
"As Silver Phil reorganises for a second shot his bronco stumbles.
Silver Phil pitches from the saddle an' strikes the grass to one side.
As he half rises, Dan lowers on him like the swoop of a hawk. It's as
though Dan's goin' to snatch a handkerchief from the ground.
"As Dan flashes by, he swings low from the saddle an' his right hand
takes a troo full grip on that outlaw's shoulder. Dan has the thews
an' muscles of a cinnamon b'ar, an' Silver Phil is only a scrap of a
man. As Dan straightens up in the stirrups, he heaves this Silver Phil
on high to the length of his long arm; an' then he dashes him ag'inst
the flint-hard earth; which the manoover--we-all witnesses it from
mebby a quarter of a mile--which the manoover that a-way is shore
remorseless! This Silver Phil is nothin' but shattered bones an'
bleedin' pulp. He strikes the plains like he's crime from the clouds
an' is dead without a quiver.
"'Bury him? No!' says Old Man Enright to Dave Tutt who asks the
question. 'Let him find his bed where he falls.
"While Enright speaks, an' as Dan rides up to us at the Red Light, a
prompt raven drops down over where this Silver Phil is layin'. Then
another raven an' another--black an' wide of wing--comes floatin' down.
A coyote yells--first with the short, sharp yelp, an' then with that
multiplied patter of laughter like forty wolves at once. That daylight
howl of the coyote alters tells of a death. Shore raven an' wolf is
gatherin'. As Enright says: 'This yere Silver Phil ain't likely to be
lonesome none to-night.'
"'Did you kill him, Dan?' asks Faro Nell.
"'Why, no, Nellie,' replies Dan, as he steps outen the stirrups an'
beams on Faro Nell. She's still a bit onstrung, bein' only a little
girl when all is said. 'Why, no, Nellie; I don't kill him speecific as
Wolfville onderstands the word; but I dismisses him so effectual the
kyard shore falls the same for Silver Phil.'"
CHAPTER II.
Colonel Sterett's Panther Hunt,
"Panthers, what we-all calls 'mountain lions,'" observed the Old
Cattleman, wearing meanwhile the sapient air of him who feels equipped
of his subject, "is plenty furtive, not to say mighty sedyoolous to
skulk. That's why a gent don't meet up with more of 'em while
pirootin' about in the hills. Them cats hears him, or they sees him,
an' him still ignorant tharof; an' with that they bashfully withdraws.
Which it's to be urged in favour of mountain lions that they never
forces themse'fs on no gent; they're shore considerate, that a-way, an'
speshul of themse'fs. If one's ever hurt, you can bet it won't be a
accident. However, it ain't for me to go 'round impugnin' the motives
of no mountain lion; partic'lar when the entire tribe is strangers to
me complete. But still a love of trooth compels me to concede that if
mountain lions ain't cowardly, they're shore cautious a lot. Cattle
an' calves they passes up as too bellicose, an' none of 'em ever faces
any anamile more warlike than a baby colt or mebby a half-grown deer.
I'm ridin' along the Caliente once when I hears a crashin' in the
bushes on the bluff above--two hundred foot high, she is, an' as sheer
as the walls of this yere tavern. As I lifts my eyes, a fear-frenzied
mare an' colt comes chargin' up an' projects themse'fs over the
precipice an' lands in the valley below. They're dead as Joolius
Caesar when I rides onto 'em, while a brace of mountain lions is
skirtin' up an' down the aige of the bluff they leaps from, mewin' an'
lashin' their long tails in hot enthoosiasm. Shore, the cats has been
chasin' the mare an' foal, an' they locoes 'em to that extent they
don't know where they're headin' an' makes the death jump I relates. I
bangs away with my six-shooter, but beyond givin' the mountain lions a
convulsive start I can't say I does any execootion. They turns an'
goes streakin' it through the pine woods like a drunkard to a barn
raisin'.
"Timid? Shore! They're that timid seminary girls compared to 'em is
as sternly courageous as a passel of buccaneers. Out in Mitchell's
canyon a couple of the Lee-Scott riders cuts the trail of a mountain
lion and her two kittens. Now whatever do you-all reckon this old
tabby does? Basely deserts her offsprings without even barin' a tooth,
an' the cow-punchers takes 'em gently by their tails an' beats out
their joovenile brains. That's straight; that mother lion goes
swarmin' up the canyon like she ain't got a minute to live. An' you
can gamble the limit that where a anamile sees its children perish
without frontin' up for war, it don't possess the commonest roodiments
of sand. Sech, son, is mountain lions.
"It's one evenin' in the Red Light when Colonel Sterett, who's got
through his day's toil on that Coyote paper he's editor of, onfolds
concernin' a panther round-up which he pulls off in his yooth.
"'This panther hunt,' says Colonel Sterett, as he fills his third
tumbler, 'occurs when mighty likely I'm goin' on seventeen winters.
I'm a leader among my young companions at the time; in fact, I allers
is. An' I'm proud to say that my soopremacy that a-way is doo to the
dom'nant character of my intellects. I'm ever bright an' sparklin' as
a child, an' I recalls how my aptitoode for learnin' promotes me to be
regyarded as the smartest lad in my set. If thar's visitors, to the
school, or if the selectmen invades that academy to sort o' size us up,
the teacher allers plays me on 'em. I'd go to the front for the
outfit. Which I'm wont on sech harrowin' o'casions to recite a
ode--the teacher's done wrote it himse'f--an' which is entitled
Napoleon's Mad Career. Thar's twenty-four stanzas to it; an' while
these interlopin' selectmen sets thar lookin' owley an' sagacious, I'd
wallop loose with the twenty-four verses, stampin' up and down, an'
accompanyin' said recitations with sech a multitood of reckless
gestures, it comes plenty clost to backin' everybody plumb outen the
room. Yere's the first verse:
I'd drink an' sw'ar an' r'ar an' t'ar
An' fall down in the mud,
While the y'earth for forty miles about
Is kivered with my blood.
"'You-all can see from that speciment that our schoolmaster ain't
simply flirtin' with the muses when he originates that epic; no sir, he
means business; an' whenever I throws it into the selectmen, I does it
jestice. The trustees used to silently line out for home when I
finishes, an' never a yeep. It stuns 'em; it shore fills 'em to the
brim!
"'As I gazes r'arward,' goes on the Colonel, as by one rapt impulse he
uplifts both his eyes an' his nosepaint, 'as I gazes r'arward, I says,
on them sun-filled days, an' speshul if ever I gets betrayed into
talkin' about 'em, I can hardly t'ar myse'f from the subject. I
explains yeretofore, that not only by inclination but by birth, I'm a
shore-enough 'ristocrat. This captaincy of local fashion I assoomes at
a tender age. I wears the record as the first child to don shoes
throughout the entire summer in that neighbourhood; an' many a time an'
oft does my yoothful but envy-eaten compeers lambaste me for the
insultin' innovation. But I sticks to my moccasins; an' to-day shoes
in the Bloo Grass is almost as yooniversal as the licker habit.
"'Thar dawns a hour, however, when my p'sition in the van of Kaintucky
_ton_ comes within a ace of bein' ser'ously shook. It's on my way to
school one dewey mornin' when I gets involved all inadvertent in a
onhappy rupture with a polecat. I never does know how the
misonderstandin' starts. After all, the seeds of said dispoote is by
no means important; it's enough to say that polecat finally has me
thoroughly convinced.
Followin' the difference an' my defeat, I'm witless enough to keep
goin' on to school, whereas I should have returned homeward an' cast
myse'f upon my parents as a sacred trust. Of course, when I'm in
school I don't go impartin' my troubles to the other chil'en; I
emyoolates the heroism of the Spartan boy who stands to be eat by a
fox, an' keeps 'em to myself. But the views of my late enemy is not to
be smothered; they appeals to my young companions; who tharupon puts up
a most onneedful riot of coughin's an' sneezin's. But nobody knows me
as the party who's so pungent.
"'It's a tryin' moment. I can see that, once I'm located, I'm goin' to
be as onpop'lar as a b'ar in a hawg pen; I'll come tumblin' from my
pinnacle in that proud commoonity as the glass of fashion an' the mold
of form. You can go your bottom peso, the thought causes me to feel
plenty perturbed.
"'At this peril I has a inspiration; as good, too, as I ever entertains
without the aid of rum. I determines to cast the opprobrium on some
other boy an' send the hunt of gen'ral indignation sweepin' along his
trail.
"'Thar's a innocent infant who's a stoodent at this temple of childish
learnin' an' his name is Riley Bark. This Riley is one of them giant
children who's only twelve an' weighs three hundred pounds. An' in
proportions as Riley is a son of Anak, physical, he's dwarfed mental;
he ain't half as well upholstered with brains as a shepherd dog.
That's right; Riley's intellects, is like a fly in a saucer of syrup,
they struggles 'round plumb slow. I decides to uplift Riley to the
public eye as the felon who's disturbin' that seminary's sereenity.
Comin' to this decision, I p'ints at him where he's planted four seats
ahead, all tangled up in a spellin' book, an' says in a loud whisper to
a child who's sittin' next:
"'Throw him out!'
"'That's enough. No gent will ever realise how easy it is to direct a
people's sentiment ontil he take a whirl at the game. In two minutes
by the teacher's bull's-eye copper watch, every soul knows it's pore
Riley; an' in three, the teacher's done drug Riley out doors by the
ha'r of his head an' chased him home. Gents, I look back on that
yoothful feat as a triumph of diplomacy; it shore saves my standin' as
the Beau Brummel of the Bloo Grass.
"'Good old days, them!' observes the Colonel mournfully, 'an' ones
never to come ag'in! My sternest studies is romances, an' the
peroosals of old tales as I tells you-all prior fills me full of moss
an' mockin' birds in equal parts. I reads deep of _Walter Scott_ an'
waxes to be a sharp on Moslems speshul. I dreams of the Siege of Acre,
an' Richard the Lion Heart; an' I simply can't sleep nights for honin'
to hold a tournament an' joust a whole lot for some fair lady's love.
"'Once I commits the error of my career by joustin' with my brother
Jeff. This yere Jeff is settin' on the bank of the Branch fishin' for
bullpouts at the time, an' Jeff don't know I'm hoverin' near at all.
Jeff's reedic'lous fond of fishin'; which he'd sooner fish than read
_Paradise Lost_. I'm romancin' along, sim'larly bent, when I notes
Jeff perched on the bank. To my boyish imagination Jeff at once turns
to be a Paynim. I drops my bait box, couches my fishpole, an' emittin'
a impromptoo warcry, charges him. It's the work of a moment; Jeff's
onhossed an' falls into the Branch.
"'But thar's bitterness to follow vict'ry. Jeff emerges like Diana
from the bath an' frales the wamus off me with a club. Talk of puttin'
a crimp in folks! Gents when Jeff's wrath is assuaged I'm all on one
side like the leanin' tower of Pisa. Jeff actooally confers a skew-gee
to my spinal column.
"'A week later my folks takes me to a doctor. That practitioner puts
on his specs an' looks me over with jealous care.
"'"Whatever's wrong with him, Doc?" says my father.
"'"Nothin'," says the physician, "only your son Willyum's five inches
out o' plumb."
"'Then he rigs a contraption made up of guy-ropes an' stay-laths, an' I
has to wear it; an' mebby in three or four weeks he's got me warped
back into the perpendic'lar.'
"'But how about this cat hunt?" asks Dan Boggs. 'Which I don't aim to
be introosive none, but I'm camped yere through the second drink
waitin' for it, an' these procrastinations is makin' me kind o' batty.'
"'That panther hunt is like this,' says the Colonel turnin' to Dan.
'At the age of seventeen, me an' eight or nine of my intimate brave
comrades founds what we-all denom'nates as the "Chevy Chase Huntin'
Club." Each of us maintains a passel of odds an' ends of dogs, an' at
stated intervals we convenes on hosses, an' with these fourscore curs
at our tails goes yellin' an' skally-hootin' up an' down the
countryside allowin' we're shore a band of Nimrods.
"'The Chevy Chasers ain't been in bein' as a institootion over long
when chance opens a gate to ser'ous work. The deep snows in the
Eastern mountains it looks like has done drove a panther into our
neighbourhood. You could hear of him on all sides. Folks glimpses him
now an' then. They allows he's about the size of a yearlin' calf; an'
the way he pulls down sech feeble people as sheep or lays desolate some
he'pless henroost don't bother him a bit. This panther spreads a
horror over the county. Dances, pra'er meetin's, an' even poker
parties is broken up, an' the social life of that region begins to bog
down. Even a weddin' suffers; the bridesmaids stayin' away lest this
ferocious monster should show up in the road an' chaw one of 'em while
she's _en route_ for the scene of trouble. That's gospel trooth! the
pore deserted bride has to heel an' handle herse'f an' never a friend
to yoonite her sobs with hers doorin' that weddin' ordeal. The old
ladies present shakes their heads a heap solemn.
"'"It's a worse augoory," says one, "than the hoots of a score of
squinch owls."
"'When this reign of terror is at its height, the local eye is rolled
appealin'ly towards us Chevy Chasers. We rises to the opportoonity.
Day after day we're ridin' the hills an' vales, readin' the milk white
snow for tracks. An' we has success. One mornin' I comes up on two of
the Brackenridge boys an' five more of the Chevy Chasers settin' on
their hosses at the Skinner cross roads. Bob Crittenden's gone to turn
me out, they says. Then they p'ints down to a handful of close-wove
bresh an' stunted timber an' allows that this maraudin' cat-o-mount is
hidin' thar; they sees him go skulkin' in.
"'Gents, I ain't above admittin' that the news puts my heart to a
canter. I'm brave; but conflicts with wild an' savage beasts is to me
a novelty an' while I faces my fate without a flutter, I'm yere to say
I'd sooner been in pursoot of minks or raccoons or some varmint whose
grievous cap'bilities I can more ackerately stack up an' in whose merry
ways I'm better versed. However, the dauntless blood of my grandsire
mounts in my cheek; an' as if the shade of that old Trojan is thar
personal to su'gest it, I searches forth a flask an' renoos my sperit;
thus qualified for perils, come in what form they may, I resolootely
stands my hand.
"'Thar's forty dogs if thar's one in our company as we pauses at the
Skinner crossroads. An' when the Crittenden yooth returns, he brings
with him the Rickett boys an' forty added dogs. Which it's worth a
ten-mile ride to get a glimpse of that outfit of canines! Thar's every
sort onder the canopy: thar's the stolid hound, the alert fice, the
sapient collie; that is thar's individyool beasts wherein the hound, or
fice, or collie seems to preedominate as a strain. The trooth is
thar's not that dog a-whinin' about our hosses' fetlocks who ain't
proudly descended from fifteen different tribes, an' they shorely makes
a motley mass meetin'. Still, they're good, zealous dogs; an' as
they're going to go for'ard an' take most of the resks of that panther,
it seems invidious to criticise 'em.
"'One of the Twitty boys rides down an' puts the eighty or more dogs
into the bresh. The rest of us lays back an' strains our eyes. Thar
he is! A shout goes up as we descries the panther stealin' off by a
far corner. He's headin' along a hollow that's full of bresh an' baby
timber an' runs parallel with the pike. Big an' yaller he is; we can
tell from the slight flash we gets of him as he darts into a second
clump of bushes. With a cry--what young Crittenden calls a "view
halloo,"--we goes stampedin' down the pike in pursoot.
"'Our dogs is sta'nch; they shore does themse'fs proud. Singin' in
twenty keys, reachin' from growls to yelps an' from yelps to shrillest
screams, they pushes dauntlessly on the fresh trail of their terrified
quarry. Now an' then we gets a squint of the panther as he skulks from
one copse to another jest ahead. Which he's goin' like a arrow; no
mistake! As for us Chevy Chasers, we parallels the hunt, an'
continyoos poundin' the Skinner turnpike abreast of the pack, ever an'
anon givin' a encouragin' shout as we briefly sights our game.
"'Gents,' says Colonel Sterett, as he ag'in refreshes himse'f, 'it's
needless to go over that hunt in detail. We hustles the flyin' demon
full eighteen miles, our faithful dogs crowdin' close an' breathless at
his coward heels. Still, they don't catch up with him; he streaks it
like some saffron meteor.
"'Only once does we approach within strikin' distance; that's when he
crosses at old Stafford's whiskey still. As he glides into view,
Crittenden shouts:
"'"Thar he goes!"
"'For myse'f I'm prepared. I've got one of these misguided
cap-an'-ball six-shooters that's built doorin' the war; an' I cuts that
hardware loose! This weepon seems a born profligate of lead, for the
six chambers goes off together. Which you should have seen the Chevy
Chasers dodge! An' well they may; that broadside ain't in vain! My
aim is so troo that one of the r'armost dogs evolves a howl an' rolls
over; then he sets up gnawin' an' lickin' his off hind laig in frantic
alternations. That hunt is done for him. We leaves him doctorin'
himse'f an' picks him up two hours later on our triumphant return.
"'As I states, we harries that foogitive panther for eighteen miles an'
in our hot ardour founders two hosses. Fatigue an' weariness begins to
overpower us; also our prey weakens along with the rest. In the half
glimpses we now an' ag'in gets of him its plain that both pace an'
distance is tellin' fast. Still, he presses on; an' as thar's no spur
like fear, that panther holds his distance.
"'But the end comes. We've done run him into a rough, wild stretch of
country where settlements is few an' cabins roode. Of a sudden, the
panther emerges onto the road an' goes rackin' along the trail. We
pushes our spent steeds to the utmost.
"'Thar's a log house ahead; out in the stump-filled lot in front is a
frowsy woman an' five small children. The panther leaps the rickety
worm-fence an' heads straight as a bullet for the cl'arin'! Horrors!
the sight freezes our marrows! Mad an' savage, he's doo to bite a hunk
outen that devoted household! Mutooally callin' to each other, we
goads our hosses to the utmost. We gain on the panther! He may wound
but he won't have time to slay that fam'ly.
"'Gents, it's a soopreme moment! The panther makes for the female
squatter an' her litter, we pantin' an' pressin' clost behind. The
panther is among 'em; the woman an' the children seems transfixed by
the awful spectacle an' stands rooted with open eyes an' mouths. Our
emotions shore beggars deescriptions.
"'Now ensooes a scene to smite the hardiest of us with dismay. No
sooner does the panther find himse'f in the midst of that he'pless bevy
of little ones, than he stops, turns round abrupt, an' sets down on his
tail; an' then upliftin' his muzzle he busts into shrieks an' yells an'
howls an' cries, a complete case of dog hysterics! That's what he is,
a great yeller dog; his reason is now a wrack because we harasses him
the eighteen miles.
"'Thar's a ugly outcast of a squatter, mattock in hand, comes tumblin'
down the hillside from some'ers out back of the shanty where he's been
grubbin':
"'"What be you-all eediots chasin' my dog for?" demands this onkempt
party. Then he menaces us with the implement.
"'We makes no retort but stands passive. The great orange brute whose
nerves has been torn to rags creeps to the squatter an' with mournful
howls explains what we've made him suffer.
"'No, thar's nothin' further to do an' less to be said. That
cavalcade, erstwhile so gala an' buoyant, drags itself wearily
homeward, the exhausted dogs in the r'ar walkin' stiff an' sore like
their laigs is wood. For more'n a mile the complainin' howls of the
hysterical yeller dog is wafted to our y'ears. Then they ceases; an'
we figgers his sympathizin' master has done took him into the shanty
an' shet the door.
"'No one comments on this adventure, not a word is heard. Each is
silent ontil we mounts the Big Murray hill. As we collects ourse'fs on
this eminence one of the Brackenridge boys holds up his hand for a
halt. "Gents," he says, as--hosses, hunters an' dogs--we-all gathers
'round, "gents, I moves you the Chevy Chase Huntin' Club yereby stands
adjourned _sine die_." Thar's a moment's pause, an' then as by one
impulse every gent, hoss an' dog, says "Ay!" It's yoonanimous, an'
from that hour till now the Chevy Chase Huntin' Club ain't been nothin'
save tradition. But that panther shore disappears; it's the end of his
vandalage; an' ag'in does quadrilles, pra'rs, an poker resoom their
wonted sway. That's the end; an' now, gents, if Black Jack will caper
to his dooties we'll uplift our drooped energies with the usual forty
drops."
CHAPTER III.
How Faro Nell Dealt Bank.
"Riches," remarked the Old Cattleman, "riches says you! Neither
you-all nor any other gent is competent to state whether in the
footure he amasses wealth or not. The question is far beyond the
throw of your rope."
My friend's tone breathed a note of strong contradiction while his
glance was the glance of experience. I had said that I carried no
hope of becoming rich; that the members of my tribe were born with
their hands open and had such hold of money as a riddle has of water.
It was this which moved him to expostulatory denial.
"This matter of wealth, that a-way," he continued, "is a mighty sight
a question of luck. Shore, a gent has to have capacity to grasp a
chance an' savey sufficient to get his chips down right. But this
chance, an' whether it offers itse'f to any specific sport, is
frequent accident an' its comin' or failure to come depends on
conditions over which the party about to be enriched ain't got no
control. That's straight, son! You backtrack any fortune to its
beginning an some'ers along the trail or at the farthest end you'll
come up with the fact that it took a accident or two, what we-all
darkened mortals calls 'luck,' to make good the play. It's like
gettin' shot gettin' rich is; all you has to do is be present
personal at the time, an' the bullet does the rest.
"You distrusts these doctrines. You shore won't if you sets down
hard an' thinks. Suppose twenty gents has made a surround an' is
huntin' a b'ar. Only one is goin' to down him. An' in his clumsy
blunderin' the b'ar is goin' to select his execootioner himse'f.
That's a fact; the party who downs the b'ar, final, ain't goin' to
pick the b'ar out; the b'ar's goin' to pick him out. An' it's the
same about wealth; one gent gets the b'ar an' the other nineteen--an'
they're as cunnin' an' industr'ous as the lucky party--don't get
nothing--don't even get a shot. I repeats tharfore, that you-all
settin' yere this evenin', firin' off aimless observations, don't
know whether you'll quit rich or not."
At the close of his dissertation, my talkative companion puffed a
cloud which seemed to hang above his venerable head in a fashion of
heavy blue approval. I paused as one impressed by the utter wisdom
of the old gentleman. Then I took another tack.
"Speaking of wealth," I said, "tell me concerning the largest money
you ever knew to be won or lost at faro--tell me a gambling story."
"Tell you-all a gamblin' tale," he repeated, and then mused as if
lost in retrospection. "If I hesitates it's because of a multitoode
of incidents from which to draw. I've beheld some mighty cur'ous
doin's at the gamblin' tables. Once I knows a party who sinks his
hopeless head on the layout an' dies as he loses his last chip. This
don't happen in Wolfville none. No, I don't say folks ain't cashed
in at farobank in that excellent hamlet an' gone singin' to their
home above; but it ain't heart disease. Usual it's guns; the same
bein' invoked by sech inadvertencies as pickin' up some other gent's
bet.
"Tell you-all a story about gamblin'! Now I reckons the time Faro
Nell rescoos Cherokee Hall from rooin is when I sees the most
_dinero_ changed in at one play. You can gamble that's a thrillin'
eepisode when Faro Nell steps in between Cherokee an' the destroyer.
It's the gossip of the camp for days, an' when Wolfville discusses
anything for days that outfit's plumb moved.
"This gent who crowds Cherokee to the wall performs the feat
deliberate. He organises a sort o' campaign ag'in Cherokee; what you
might term a fiscal dooel, an' at the finish he has Cherokee
corralled for his last _peso_. It's at that p'int Nell cuts in an'
redeems the sityooation a heap. It's all on the squar'; this
invadin' sport simply outlucks the bank. That, an' the egreegious
limit Cherokee gives him, is what does the trick.
"In Wolfville, we-all allers recalls that sharp-set gent who comes
after Cherokee with respect. In fact he wins our encomiums before he
sets in ag'in Cherokee--before ever he gets his second drink at the
Red Light bar. He comes ramblin' over with Old Monte from Tucson one
evenin'; that's the first glimpse we has of him. An' for a hour,
mebby, followin' his advent, seein' the gen'ral herd is busy with the
mail, he has the Red Light to himse'f.
"On this yere o'casion, thar's likewise present in Wolfville--he's
been infringin' 'round some three days--a onsettled an' migratory
miscreant who's name is Ugly Collins. He's in a heap of ill repoote
in the territories, this Ugly Collins is; an' only he contreebutes
the information when he arrives in camp that his visit is to be
mighty temp'rary, Enright would have signed up Jack Moore to take his
guns an' stampede him a lot.
"At the time I'm talkin' of, as thar's no one who's that abandoned as
to go writin' letters to Ugly Collins, it befalls he's plenty
footloose. This leesure on the part of Ugly Collins turns out some
disastrous for that party. Not havin' no missives to read leaves him
free to go weavin' about permiscus an' it's while he's strayin' here
an' thar that he tracks up on this stranger who's come after Cherokee.
"Ugly Collins sees our pilgrim in the Red Light an', except Black
Jack,--who of course is present offishul--the stranger's alone. He's
weak an' meek an' shook by a cough that sounds like the overture to a
fooneral. Ugly Collins, who's a tyrannizin' cowardly form of
outcast, sizes him up as a easy prey. He figgers he'll have a heap
of evil fun with him, Ugly Collins does. Tharupon he approaches the
consumptive stranger:
"'You-all seems plenty ailin', pard,' says Ugly Collins.
"'Which I shore ain't over peart none,' retorts the stranger.
"'An' you-all can put down a bet,' returns Ugly Collins, 'I learns of
your ill-health with regrets. It's this a-way: I ain't had no
exercise yet this evenin'; an' as I tracks in yere, I registers a vow
to wallop the first gent I meets up with to whom I've not been
introdooced ;--merely by way of stretchin' my muscles. Now I must
say--an' I admits it with sorrow--that you-all is that onhappy sport.
It's no use; I knows I'll loathe myse'f for crawlin' the hump of a
gent who's totterin' on the brink of the grave; but whatever else can
I do? Vows is vows an' must be kept, so you might as well prepare
yourse'f for a cloud of sudden an' painful vicissitoodes.'
"As Ugly Collins says this he kind o' reaches for the invalid gent
where he's camped in a cha'r. It's a onfortunate gesture; the
invalid--as quick as a rattlesnake,--prodooces a derringer, same as
Doc Peets allers packs, from his surtoot an' the bullet carries away
most of Ugly Collins' lower jaw.
"'You-all is goin' to be a heap sight more of a audience than a
orator yereafter, Collins,' says Doc Peets, as he ties up the
villain's visage that a-way. 'Also, you oughter be less reckless an'
get the address of your victims before embarkin' on them
skelp-collectin' enterprises of yours. That gent you goes ag'inst is
Doc Holliday; as hard a game as lurks anywhere between the Slope an'
the Big Muddy.'
"Does the Stranglers do anything to this Holliday? Why, no, not
much; all they does is present him with a Colt's-44 along with the
compliments of the camp.
"'An' it's to be deplored,' says Enright, when he makes the
presentation speech to Holliday, 'that you-all don't have this weepon
when you cuts loose at Collins instead of said jimcrow derringer. In
sech events, that hoss-thief's death would have been assured. Shore!
shootin' off Collins' jaw is good as far as it goes, but it can't be
regyarded as no sech boon as downin' him complete.
"It's after supper when this Holliday encounters Cherokee; the two
has a conference. This Holliday lays bar' his purpose.
"'Which I'm yere,' says this Holliday, 'not only for your money, but
I wants the camp.' Then he goes for'ard an' proposes that they plays
till one is broke; an, if it's Cherokee who goes down, he is to vamos
the outfit while Holliday succeeds to his game. 'An' the winner is
to stake his defeated adversary to one thousand dollars wherewith to
begin life anew,' concloodes this Holliday.
"'Which what you states seems like agreeable offers,' says Cherokee,
an' he smiles clever an' gentlemanly. 'How strong be you-all, may I
ask?'
"'Thirty thousand dollars in thirty bills,' replies this Holliday.
'An' now may I enquire how strong be you? I also likes to know how
long a trail I've got to travel.'
"'My roll is about forty thousand big,' says Cherokee. Then he goes
on: 'It's all right; I'll open a game for you at second drink time
sharp.'
"'That's comfortin' to hear,' retorts this Holliday. 'The
chances,--what with splits an' what with the ten thousand you
oversizes me,--is nacherally with you; but I takes 'em. If I lose, I
goes back with a even thousand; if I win, you-all hits the trail with
a thousand, while I'm owner of your roll an' bank. Does that
onderstandin' go?'
"'It goes!' says Cherokee. Then he turns off for a brief powwow with
Faro Nell.
"'But thar's one thing you-all forgets, Cherokee,' says Nell. 'If he
breaks you, he's got to go on an' break me. I've a bundle of three
thousand; he's got to get it all before ever the play is closed.
Tell this yere Holliday party that.'
"Cherokee argues ag'in it; but Nell stamps 'round an' starts to weep
some, an' at that, like every other troo gent, he gives in abject.
"'Thar's a bet I overlooks,' observes Cherokee, when he resoomes his
talk with this Holliday; 'it's my partner. It's only a little matter
of three thousand, but the way the scheme frames itse'f up, after I'm
down an' out, you'll have to break my partner before Wolfville's all
your own.'
"'That's eminent satisfactory,' returns this Holliday. 'An' I freely
adds that your partner is a dead game sport to take so brief a
fortune an'--win all, lose all--go after more'n twenty times as much.
Your partner's a shore enough optimist that a-way.'
"Cherokee don't make no retort. This Holliday ain't posted none that
the partner Cherokee's mentionin' is Faro Nell, an' Cherokee allows
he won't onbosom himse'f on that p'int onless his hand is forced.
"When the time arrives to open the game, the heft of Wolfville's
public is gathered at the Red Light. The word goes 'round as to the
enterprisin' Holliday bein' out for Cherokee's entire game; an' the
prospect of seein' a limit higher than a cat's back, an' a dooel to
the death, proves mighty pop'lar. The play opens to a full house,
shore!
"'What limit do you give me?' says this Holliday, with a sort o'
cough, at the same time settin' in opposite to Cherokee. 'Be
lib'ral; I ain't more'n a year to live, an' I've got to play 'em high
an' hard to get average action. If I'm in robust health now, with a
long, useful life before me, the usual figgers would do. Considerin'
my wasted health, however, I shore hopes you'll say something like
the even thousand.'
"'Which I'll do better than that,' returns Cherokee, as he snaps the
deck in the box, 'I'll let you fix the limit to suit yourse'f. Make
it the ceilin' if the sperit moves you.'
"'That's gen'rous!' says Holliday. 'An' to mark my appreciation
tharof, I'll jest nacherally take every resk of splits an' put ten
thousand in the pot, coppered; ten thousand in the big squar'; an'
ten thousand, coppered, on the high kyard.'
"Son, we-all sports standin' lookin' on draws a deep breath. Thirty
thousand in three ten thousand dollar bets, an' all on the layout at
once, marks a epock in Wolfville business life wherefrom folks can
onblushin'ly date time! Thar it lays however, an' the two sharps
most onmoved tharby is Cherokee an' Holliday themse'fs.
"'Turn your game!' says this Holliday, when his money is down, an'
leanin' back to light a seegyar.
"Cherokee makes the turn. Never does I witness action so sudden an'
complete! It's shore the sharpest! The top kyard as the deck lays
in the box is a ten-spot. An' as the papers is shoved forth, how do
you-all reckon they falls! I'm a Mexican! if they don't come
seven-king! This Holliday wins all along; Cherokee is out thirty
thousand an' only three kyards showed! How's that for perishin'
flesh an' blood!
"I looks at Cherokee; his face is as ca'm as a Injun's; he's too
finely fibred a sport to so much as let a eyelash quiver. This
Holliday is equally onemotional. Cherokee shoves over three yaller
chips.
"'Call 'em ten thousand each,' says Cherokee. Then he waits for this
Holliday to place his next bets.
"'Since you-all has exackly that sum left in your treasury,' observes
this Holliday, puffin' his seegyar, 'I reckons I'll let one of these
yaller tokens go, coppered, on the high kyard ag'in. You-all doubles
or breaks right yere.'
"The turn falls trey-eight. Cherokee takes in that ten thousand
dollar chip.
"'Bein's that I'm still playin' on velvet,' remarks this Holliday,
an' his tone is listless an' languid like he's only half interested,
'I'll go twenty thousand on the high kyard, open. This trip we omits
the copper.'
"The first kyard to show is a deuce. It's better than ten to one
Cherokee will win. But disapp'intment chokes the camp; the next
kyard is a ace, an' Cherokee's swept off his moccasins. The bank is
broke; and to signify as much, Cherokee turns his box on its side,
counts over forty thousand dollars to this Holliday an' gets up from
the dealer's cha'r.
"As Cherokee rises, Faro Nell slides off the lookout's stool an' into
the vacated cha'r. When Cherokee loses the last bet I hears Nell's
teeth come together with a click. I don't dare look towards her at
the time; but now, when she turns the box back, takes out the deck,
riffles an' returns it to its place I gives her a glance. Nell's as
game as Cherokee. As she sets over ag'inst this lucky invalid her
colour is high an' her eyes like two stars.
"'An' now you've got to break me,' says Nell to this Holliday.
'Also, we restores the _statu quo_, as Colonel Sterett says in that
_Coyote_ paper, an' the limit retreats to a even hundred dollars.'
"'Be you-all the partner Mister Hall mentions?' asks this Holliday,
at the same time takin' off his sombrero an' throwin' away his
seegyar.
"Nell says she is.
"'Miss,' says this Holliday, 'I feels honoured to find myse'f across
the layout from so much sperit an' beauty. A limit of one hundred,
says you; an' your word is law! As a first step then, give me three
thousand dollars worth of chips an' make 'em fifty dollars each.
I'll take the same chance with you on that question of splits I does
former, an' I wants a hundred on every kyard, middle to win ag'in the
ends.'
"The deal begins; Nell is winner from the jump; she takes in three
bets to lose one plumb down to the turn. This Holliday calls the
turn for the limit; an' loses. The kyards go into the box ag'in an'
a next deal ensooes. So it continyoos; an' Nell beats this Holliday
hard for half a hour. Nell sees she's in luck; an' she feels that
strong she concloods to press it some.
"'The limit's five hundred!' says Nell to this Holliday. 'Come after
me!'
"Holliday bows like he's complimented. 'I'm after you; an' I comes
a-runnin',' he says.
"Down goes his money all over the lay-out; only now its five hundred
instead of one hundred.
"It's no avail, this Holliday still loses. At the end of a hour Nell
sizes up her roll; she's a leetle over forty thousand strong; jest
where Cherokee stands at the start.
"Nell pauses as she's about to put the deck in the box for a deal.
She looks at this Holliday a heap thoughtful. That look excites Dan
Boggs who's been on the brink of fits since ever the play begins,
he's that 'motional.
"'Don't raise the limit, Nell!' says Dan in a awful whisper. 'That's
where Cherokee's weak at the go-off. He ought never to have thrown
away the limit.'
"Nell casts her eyes--they're burnin' like coals!--on Dan. I can see
his bluff about Cherokee bein' weak has done decided her mind.
"'Cherokee does right,' says Nell to Dan, 'like Cherokee allers does.
An' I'll do the same as Cherokee. Stranger,' goes on Nell, turnin'
from Dan to this Holliday; 'go as far as you likes. The bridle's off
the hoss.'
"'An' much obleeged to you, Miss!' says this Holliday, with another
of them p'lite bows. 'As the kyards goes in the box, I makes you the
same three bets I makes first to Mister Hall. Ten thousand,
coppered, in the pot; ten thousand, open, in the big squar'; an' ten
thousand on the high kyard, coppered.'
"'An' now as then,' says Nell, sort o' catchin' her breath, 'the
ten-spot's the soda kyard!'
"Son, it won't happen ag'in in a billion years! Nell's right hand
shakes a trifle--she's only a child, mind, an' ain't got the nerves
that goes with case-hardened sports--as she shoves the ten-spot
forth. But it's comin' her way; her luck holds; as certain as we all
sets yere drinkin' toddy, the same two kyards shows for her as for
Cherokee, but this time they falls 'king-seven'; the bank wins, an'
pore Holliday is cleaned out.
"'Thar, Cherokee,' says Nell, an' thar's a soft smile an' a sigh of
deep content goes with the observation, 'thar's your bank ag'in; only
it's thirty thousand stronger than it is four hours ago.'
"'Your bank, ladybird, you means!' says Cherokee.
"'Well, our bank, then,' retorts Nell. 'What's the difference?
Don't you-all tell me we're partners?' Then Nell motions to Black
Jack. 'The drinks is on me, Jack,' she says; 'see what the house
will have.'"
CHAPTER IV.
How The Raven Died.
"Which if you-all is out to hear of Injuns, son," observed the Old
Cattleman, doubtfully, "the best I can do is shet my eyes an' push along
regyardless, like a cayouse in a storm of snow. But I don't guarantee no
facts; none whatever! I never does bend myse'f to severe study of
savages an' what notions I packs concernin' 'em is the casual frootes of
what I accidental hears an' what I sees. It's only now an' then, as I
observes former, that Injuns invades Wolfville; an' when they does,
we-all scowls 'em outen camp--sort o' makes a sour front, so as to break
'em early of habits of visitin' us. We shore don't hone none to have 'em
hankerin' 'round.
"Nacherally, I makes no doubt that if you goes clost to Injuns an'
studies their little game you finds some of 'em good an' some bad, some
gaudy an' some sedate, some cu'rous an' some indifferent, same as you
finds among shore-enough folks. It's so with mules an' broncos;
wherefore, then, may not these differences exist among Injuns? Come
squar' to the turn, you-all finds white folks separated the same. Some
gents follows off one waggon track an' some another; some even makes a
new trail.
"Speakin' of what's opposite in folks, I one time an' ag'in sees two
white chiefs of scouts who frequent comes pirootin' into Wolfville from
the Fort. Each has mebby a score of Injuns at his heels who pertains to
him personal. One of these scout chiefs is all buck-skins, fringes,
beads an' feathers from y'ears to hocks, while t'other goes garbed in a
stiff hat with a little jim crow rim--one of them kind you deenom'nates
as a darby--an' a diag'nal overcoat; one chief looks like a dime novel on
a spree an' t'other as much like the far East as he saveys how. An' yet,
son, this voylent person in buckskins is a Second Lootenent--a mere boy,
he is--from West P'int; while that outcast in the reedic'lous hat is
foaled on the plains an' never does go that clost to the risin' sun as to
glimpse the old Missouri. The last form of maverick bursts frequent into
Western bloom; it's their ambition, that a-way, to deloode you into
deemin' 'em as fresh from the States as one of them tomatter airtights.
"Thar's old gent Jeffords; he's that sort. Old Jeffords lives for long
with the Apaches; he's found among 'em when Gen'ral Crook--the old 'Grey
Fox'--an' civilisation and gatlin' guns comes into Arizona arm in arm. I
used to note old Jeffords hibernatin' about the Oriental over in Tucson.
I shore reckons he's procrastinatin' about thar yet, if the Great Sperit
ain't done called him in. As I says, old Jeffords is that long among the
Apaches back in Cochise's time that the mem'ry of man don't run none to
the contrary. An' yet no gent ever sees old Jeffords wearin' anything
more savage than a long-tail black surtoot an' one of them stove pipe
hats. Is Jeffords dangerous? No, you-all couldn't call him a distinct
peril; still, folks who goes devotin' themse'fs to stirrin' Jeffords up
jest to see if he's alive gets disasterous action. He has long grey ha'r
an' a tangled white beard half-way down his front; an' with that old plug
hat an' black coat he's a sight to frighten children or sour milk!
Still, Jeffords is all right. As long as towerists an' other inquisitive
people don't go pesterin' Jeffords, he shore lets 'em alone. Otherwise,
you might as well be up the same saplin' with a cinnamon b'ar; which
you'd most likely hear something drop a lot!
"For myse'f, I likes old Jeffords, an' considers him a pleasin'
conundrum. About tenth drink time he'd take a cha'r an' go camp by
himse'f in a far corner, an' thar he'd warble hymns. Many a time as I
files away my nosepaint in the Oriental have I been regaled with,
Jesus, Lover of my soul,
Let me to Thy bosom fly,
While the nearer waters roll,
While the tempest still is high,
as emanatin' from Jeffords where he's r'ared back conductin' some
personal services. Folks never goes buttin' in interferin' with these
concerts; which it's cheaper to let him sing.
"Speakin' of Injuns, as I su'gests, I never does see over-much of 'em in
Wolfville. An' my earlier experiences ain't thronged with 'em neither,
though while I'm workin' cattle along the Red River I does carom on
Injuns more or less. Thar's one old hostile I recalls speshul; he's a
fool Injun called Black Feather;--Choctaw, he is. This Black Feather's
weakness is fire-water; he thinks more of it than some folks does of
children.
"Black Feather used to cross over to where Dick Stocton maintains a store
an' licker house on the Upper Hawgthief. Of course, no gent sells these
Injuns licker. It's ag'in the law; an' onless you-all is onusual eager
to make a trip to Fort Smith with a marshal ridin' herd on you doorin'
said visit, impartin' of nosepaint to aborigines is a good thing not to
do. But Black Feather, he'd come over to Dick Stocton's an' linger
'round the bar'ls of Valley Tan, an' take a chance on stealin' a snifter
or two while Stocton's busy.
"At last Stocton gets tired an' allows he'll lay for Black Feather. This
yere Stocton is a mighty reckless sport; he ain't carin' much whatever he
does do; he hates Injuns an' shot guns, an' loves licker, seven-up, an'
sin in any form; them's Stocton's prime characteristics. An' he gets
mighty weary of the whiskey-thievin' Black Feather, an' lays for him.
"One evenin' this aggravatin' Black Feather crosses over an' takes to
ha'ntin' about Dick Stocton's licker room as is his wont. It looks like
Black Feather has already been buyin' whiskey of one of them boot-laig
parties who takes every chance an' goes among the Injuns an' sells 'em
nosepaint on the sly. 'Fore ever he shows up on the Upper Hawgthief that
time, this Black Feather gets nosepaint some'ers an' puts a whole quart
of it away in the shade; an' he shore exhibits symptoms. Which for one
thing he feels about four stories tall!
"Stocton sets a trap for Black Feather. He fills up the tin cup into
which he draws that Valley Tan with coal-oil--karoseen you-all calls
it--an' leaves it, temptin' like, settin' on top a whiskey bar'l. Shore!
it's the first thing Black Feather notes. He sees his chance an' grabs
an' downs the karoseen; an' Stocton sort o' startin' for him, this Black
Feather gulps her down plump swift. The next second he cuts loose the
yell of that year, burns up about ten acres of land, and starts for Red
River. No, I don't know whether the karoseen hurts him none or not; but
he certainly goes squatterin' across the old Red River like a wounded
wild-duck, an' he never does come back no more.
"But, son, as you sees, I don't know nothin' speshul or much touchin'
Injuns, an' if I'm to dodge the disgrace of ramblin' along in this
desultory way, I might better shift to a tale I hears Sioux Sam relate to
Doc Peets one time in the Red Light. This Sam is a Sioux, an a mighty
decent buck, considerin' he's Injun; Sam is servin' the Great Father as a
scout with the diag'nal-coat, darby-hat sharp I mentions. Peets gives
this saddle-tinted longhorn a 4-bit piece, an' he tells this yarn. It
sounds plenty childish; but you oughter b'ar in mind that savages,
mental, ain't no bigger nor older than ten year old young-ones among the
palefaces.
"'This is the story my mother tells me,' says Sioux Sam, 'to show me the
evils of cur'osity. "The Great Sperit allows to every one the right to
ask only so many questions," says my mother, "an' when they ask one more
than is their right, they die."
"'This is the story of the fate of _Kaw-kaw-chee_, the Raven, a Sioux
Chief who died long ago exackly as my mother told me. The Raven died
because he asked too many questions an' was too cur'ous. It began when
Sublette, who was a trader, came up the _Mitchi-zoor-rah_, the Big-Muddy,
an' was robbed by the Raven's people. Sublette was mad at this, an' said
next time he would bring the Sioux a present so they would not rob him.
So he brought a little cask of fire-water an' left it on the bank of the
Big-Muddy. Then Sublette went away, an' twenty of the Raven's young men
found the little cask. An' they were greedy an' did not tell the camp;
they drank the fire-water where it was found.
"'The Raven missed his twenty young men an' when he went to spy for them,
behold! they were dead with their teeth locked tight an' their faces an'
bodies writhen an' twisted as the whirlwind twists the cottonwoods. Then
the Raven thought an' thought; an' he got very cur'ous to know why his
young men died so writhen an' twisted. The fire-water had a whirlwind in
it, an' the Raven was eager to hear. So he sent for Sublette.
"'Then the Raven an' Sublette had a big talk. They agreed not to hurt
each other; an' Sublette was to come an' go an' trade with the Sioux; an'
they would never rob him.
"'At this, Sublette gave the Raven some of the whirlwind that so killed
an' twisted the twenty young men. It was a powder, white; an' it had no
smell. Sublette said its taste was bitter; but the Raven must not taste
it or it would lock up his teeth an' twist an' kill him. For to swallow
the white powder loosed the whirlwind on the man's heart an' it bent him
an' twisted him like the storms among the willows.
"'But the Raven could give the powder to others. So the Raven gave it in
some deer's meat to his two squaws; an' they were twisted till they died;
an' when they would speak they couldn't, for their teeth were held tight
together an' no words came out of their mouths,--only a great foam. Then
the Raven gave it to others that he did not love; they were twisted an'
died. At last there was no more of the powder of the whirlwind; the
Raven must wait till Sublette came up the Big-Muddy again an' brought him
more.
"'There was a man, the Gray Elk, who was of the Raven's people. The Gray
Elk was a _Choo-ayk-eed_, a great prophet. And the Gray Elk had a wife;
she was wise an' beautiful, an' her name was Squaw-who-has-dreams. But
Gray Elk called her _Kee-nee-moo-sha_, the Sweetheart.
"'While the Raven waited for Sublette to bring him more powder of the
whirlwind, a star with a long tail came into the sky. This star with the
tail made the Raven heap cur'ous. He asked Gray Elk to tell him about
it, for he was a prophet. The Raven asked many questions; they fell from
him like leaves from a tree in the month of the first ice. So the Gray
Elk called _Chee-bee_, the Spirit; an' the Spirit told the Gray Elk.
Then the Gray Elk told the Raven.'
"'It was not a tail, it was blood--star blood; an' the star had been bit
an' was wounded, but would get well. The Sun was the father of the
stars, an' the Moon was their mother. The Sun, _Gheezis_, tried ever to
pursue an' capture an' eat his children, the stars. So the stars all ran
an' hid when the Sun was about. But the stars loved their mother who was
good an' never hurt them; an' when the Sun went to sleep at night an'
_Coush-ee-wan_, the Darkness, shut his eyes, the Moon an' her children
came together to see each other. But the star that bled had been caught
by the Sun; it got out of his mouth but was wounded. Now it was
frightened, so it always kept its face to where the Sun was sleeping over
in the west. The bleeding star, _Sch-coo-dah_, would get well an' its
wound would heal.
"'Then the Raven wanted to know how the Gray Elk knew all this. An' the
Gray Elk had the Raven into the medicine lodge that night; an' the Raven
heard the spirits come about an' heard their voices; but he could not
understand. Also, the Raven saw a wolf all fire, with wings like the
eagle which flew overhead. Also he heard the Thunder, _Boom-wa-wa_,
talking with the Gray Elk; but the Raven couldn't understand. The Gray
Elk told the Raven to draw his knife an' stab with it in the air outside
the medicine lodge. An' when he did, the Raven's blade an' hand came
back covered with blood. Still, the Raven was cur'ous an' kept askin' to
be told how the Gray Elk knew these things. An' the Gray Elk at last
took the Raven to the Great Bachelor Sycamore that lived alone, an' asked
the Raven if the Bachelor Sycamore was growing. An' the Raven said it
was. Then Gray Elk asked him how he knew it was growing. An' the Raven
said he didn't know. Then Gray Elk said he did not know how he knew
about _Sch-coo-dah_, the star that was bit. This made the Raven angry,
for he was very cur'ous; an' he thought the Gray Elk had two tongues.
"'Then it came the month of the first young grass an' Sublette was back
for furs. Also he brought many goods; an' he gave to the Raven more of
the powder of the whirlwind in a little box, At once the Raven made a
feast of ducks for the Gray Elk; an' he gave him of the whirlwind powder;
an' at once his teeth came together an' the Gray Elk was twisted till he
died.
"'Now no one knew that the Raven had the powder of the whirlwind, so they
could not tell why all these people were twisted and went to the Great
Spirit. But the Squaw-who-has-dreams saw that it was the Raven who
killed her husband, the Gray Elk, in a vision. Then the
Squaw-who-has-dreams went into the mountains four days an' talked with
_Moh-kwa_, the Bear who is the wisest of the beasts. The Bear said it
was the Raven who killed the Gray Elk an' told the Squaw-who-has-dreams
of the powder of the whirlwind.
"'Then the Bear an' the Squaw-who-has-dreams made a fire an' smoked an'
laid a plot. The Bear did not know where to find the powder of the
whirlwind which the Raven kept always in a secret place. But the Bear
told the Squaw-who-has-dreams that she should marry the Raven an' watch
until she found where the powder of the whirlwind was kept in its secret
place; an' then she was to give some to the Raven, an' he, too, would be
twisted an' die. There was a great danger, though; the Raven would,
after the one day when they were wedded, want to kill the
Squaw-who-has-dreams. So to protect her, the Bear told her she must
begin to tell the Raven the moment she was married to him the
Story-that-never-ends. Then, because the Raven was more cur'ous than
even he was cruel, he would put off an' put off giving the powder of the
whirlwind to the Squaw-who-has-dreams, hoping to hear the end of the
Story-that-never-ends. Meanwhile the Squaw-who-has-dreams was to watch
the Raven until she found the powder of the whirlwind in its secret place.
"'Then the wise Bear gave the Squaw-who-has-dreams a bowlful of words as
seed, so she might plant them an' raise a crop of talk to tell the
Story-that-never-ends. An' the Squaw-who-has-dreams planted the
seed-words, an' they grew an' grew an' she gathered sixteen bundles of
talk an' brought them to her wigwam. After that she put beads in her
hair, an' dyed her lips red, an' rubbed red on her cheeks, an' put on a
new blanket; an' when the Raven saw her, he asked her to marry him. So
they were wedded; an' the Squaw-who-has-dreams went to the teepee of the
Raven an' was his wife.
"'But the Raven was old an' cunning like _Yah-mee-kee_, the Beaver, an'
he said, "He is not wise who keeps a squaw too long!" An' with that he
thought he would kill the Squaw-who-has-dreams the next day with the
powder of the whirlwind. But the Squaw-who-has-dreams first told the
Raven that she hated _When-dee-goo_, the Giant; an' that she should not
love the Raven until he had killed _When-dee-goo_. She knew the Giant
was too big an' strong for the Raven to kill with his lance, an' that he
must get his powder of the whirlwind; she would watch him an' learn its
secret place. The Raven said he would kill the Giant as the sun went
down next day.
"'Then the Squaw-who-has-dreams told the Raven the first of the
Story-that-never-ends an' used up one bundle of talk; an' when the story
ended for that night, the Squaw-who-has-dreams was saying: "An' so, out
of the lake that was red as the sun came a great fish that was green,
with yellow wings, an' it walked also with feet, an' it came up to me an'
said: "But then she would tell no more that night; nor could the Raven,
who was crazy with cur'osity, prevail on her. "I must now sleep an'
dream what the green fish with the yellow wings said," was the reply of
the Squaw-who-has-dreams, an' she pretended to slumber. So the Raven,
because he was cur'ous, put off her death.
"'All night she watched, but the Raven did not go to the secret place
where he had hidden the powder of the whirlwind. Nor the next day, when
the sun went down, did the Raven kill the Giant. But the
Squaw-who-has-dreams took up again the Story-that-never-ends an' told
what the green fish with the yellow wings said; an' she used up the
second bundle of talk. When she ceased for that time, the
Squaw-who-has-dreams was saying: "An' as night fell, _Moh-kwa_, the Bear,
called to me from his canyon, an' said for me to come an' he would show
me where the great treasure of fire-water was buried for you who are the
Raven. So I went into the canyon, an' _Moh-kwa_, the Bear, took me by
the hand an' led me to the treasure of fire-water which was greater an'
richer than was ever seen by any Sioux."
"'Then the Squaw-who-has-dreams would tell no more that night, while the
Raven eat his fingers with cur'osity. But he made up a new plan not to
twist the Squaw-who-has-dreams until she showed him the treasure of
fire-water an' told him the end of the Story-that-never-ends. On her
part, however, the Squaw-who-has-dreams, as she went to sleep, wept an'
tore the beads from her hair an' said the Raven did not love her; for he
had not killed the Giant as he promised. She said she would tell no more
of the Story-that-never-ends until the Giant was dead; nor would she show
to a husband who did not love her the great treasure of fire-water which
_Moh-kwa_, the Bear, had found. At this, the Raven who was hot to have
the treasure of firewater an' whose ears rang with cur'osity to hear the
end of the Story-that-never-ends saw that he must kill the Giant.
Therefore, when the Squaw-who-has-dreams had ceased to sob and revile
him, an' was gone as he thought asleep, the Raven went to his secret
place where he kept the powder of the whirlwind an' took a little an'
wrapped it in a leaf an' hid the leaf in the braids of his long hair.
Then the Raven went to sleep.
"'When the Raven was asleep the Squaw-who-has-dreams went also herself to
the secret place an' got also a little of the powder of the whirlwind.
An' the next morning she arose early an' gave the powder of the whirlwind
to the Raven on the roast buffalo, the _Pez-hee-kee_, which was his food.
"'When the Raven had eaten, the Squaw-who-has-dreams went out of the
teepee among the people an' called all the Sioux to come an' see the
Raven die. So the Sioux came gladly, and the Raven was twisted an'
writhen with the power of the whirlwind wrenching at his heart; an' his
teeth were tight like a trap; an' no words, but only foam, came from his
mouth; an' at last the Spirit, the _Chee-bee_, was twisted out of the
Raven; an' the Squaw-who-has-dreams was revenged for the death of the
Gray Elk whom she loved an' who always called her _Kee-nee-moo-sha_, the
Sweetheart, because it made her laugh.
"'When the Raven was dead, the Squaw-who-has-dreams went to the secret
place an' threw the powder of the whirlwind into the Big-Muddy; an' after
that she distributed her fourteen bundles of talk that were left among
all the Sioux so that everybody could tell how glad he felt because the
Raven was twisted and died. An' for a week there was nothing but
happiness an' big talk among the Sioux; an' _Moh-kwa_, the Bear, came
laughing out of his canyon with the wonder of listening to it; while the
Squaw-who-has-dreams now, when her revenge was done, went with
_When-dee-goo_, the Giant, to his teepee and became his squaw. So now
everything was ended save the Story-that-never-ends.'
"When Sioux Sam gets this far," concluded the Old Cattleman, "he says,
'an' my mother's words at the end were: "An' boys who ask too many
questions will die, as did the Raven whose cur'osity was even greater
than his cruelty."'"
CHAPTER V.
The Queerness of Dave Tutt.
"Which these queernesses of Dave's," observed the Old Cattleman, "has
already been harrowin' an' harassin' up the camp for mighty likely
she's two months, when his myster'ous actions one evenin' in the Red
Light brings things to a climax, an' a over-strained public, feelin'
like it can b'ar no more, begins to talk.
"It's plumb easy to remember this Red Light o'casion, for jest prior to
Dave alarmin' us by becomin' melodious, furtive--melody bein' wholly
onnacheral to Dave, that a-way--thar's a callow pin-feather party comes
caperin' in an' takin' Old Man Enright one side, asks can he yootilise
Wolfville as a strategic p'int in a elopement he's goin' to pull off.
"'Which I'm out to elope a whole lot from Tucson,' explains this
pin-feather party to Enright, 'an' I aims to cinch the play. I'm a
mighty cautious sport, an' before ever I hooks up for actooal
freightin' over any trail, I rides her once or twice to locate wood and
water, an' pick out my camps. Said system may seem timorous, but it's
shore safer a heap. So I asks ag'in whether you-all folks has any
objections to me elopin' into Wolfville with my beloved, like I
suggests. I ain't out to spring no bridals on a onprotected outfit,
wherefore I precedes the play with these queries.'
"'But whatever's the call for you to elope at all?' remonstrates
Enright. 'The simple way now would be to round up this lady's paternal
gent, an' get his consent.'
"'Seein' the old gent,' says the pin-feather party, ''speshully when
you lays it smoothly off like that, shore does seem simplicity itse'f.
But if you was to prance out an' try it some, it would be found plenty
complex. See yere!' goes on the pin-feather party, beginnin' to roll
up his sleeve, 'you-all impresses me as more or less a jedge of
casyooalities. Whatever now do you think of this? 'An' the
pin-feather party exhibits a bullet wound in his left fore-arm, the
same bein' about half healed.
"'Colt's six-shooter,' says Enright.
"'That's straight,' says the pin-feather party, buttonin' up his
sleeve; 'you calls the turn. I wins out that abrasion pleadin' with
the old gent. Which I tackles him twice. The first time he opens on
me with his 44-gun before ever I ends the sentence. But he misses.
Nacherally, I abandons them marital intentions for what you-all might
call the "nonce" to sort o' look over my hand ag'in an' see be I right.
Do my best I can't on earth discern no reasons ag'in the nuptials.
Moreover, the lady--who takes after her old gent a heap--cuts in on the
play with a bluff that while she don't aim none to crowd my hand, she's
doo to begin shootin' me up herse'f if I don't show more passionate
anxiety about leadin' her to the altar. It's then, not seein' why the
old gent should go entertainin' notions ag'in me, an' deemin' mebby
that when he blazes away that time he's merely pettish and don't really
mean said bullet none, that I fronts up ag'in.'
"'An' then,' asks Enright, 'whatever does this locoed parent do?'
"'Which I jest shows you what,' says the pin-feather party. 'He gets
the range before ever I opens my mouth, an' plugs me. At that I begins
to half despair of winnin' his indorsements. I leaves it to you-all;
be I right?'
"'Why,' says Enright, rubbin' his fore'erd some doobious, 'it would
look like the old gent is a leetle set ag'in you. Still, as the
responsible chief of this camp, I would like to hear why you reckons
Wolfville is a good place to elope to. I don't s'ppose it's on account
of them drunkards over in Tucson makin' free with our good repoote an'
lettin' on we're light an' immoral that a-way?'
"'None whatever!' says the pin-feather party. 'It's on account of you
wolves bein' regyarded as peaceful, staid, an' law abidin' that I first
considers you. Then ag'in, thar ain't a multitood of places clost
about Tucson to elope to nohow; an' I can't elope far on account of my
roll.'
"The replies of this pin-feather party soothes Enright an' engages him
on that side, so he ups an' tells the 'swain,' as Colonel Sterett calls
him later in the Coyote, to grab off his inamorata an' come a-runnin'.
"'Which, givin' my consent,' says Enright when explainin' about it
later, 'is needed to protect this tempest-tossed lover in the
possession of his skelp. The old gent an' that maiden fa'r has got him
between 'em, an' onless we opens up Wolfville as a refooge, it looks
like they'll cross-lift him into the promised land.'
"But to go back to Dave."
Here my old friend paused and called for refreshments. I seized the
advantage of his silence over a glass of peach and honey, to suggest an
eagerness for the finale of the Tucson love match.
"No," responded my frosty friend, setting down his glass, "we'll pursoo
the queernesses of Dave. That Tucson elopement 'is another story a
heap,' as some wise maverick says some'ers, an' I'll onload it on you
on some other day.
"When Dave evolves the cadencies in the Red Light that evenin', thar's
Enright, Moore an' me along with Dan Boggs, bein' entertained by
hearin' Cherokee Hall tell us about a brace game he gets ag'inst in Las
Vegas one time.
"'This deadfall--this brace I'm mentionin',' says Cherokee, 'is over on
the Plaza. Of course, I calls this crooked game a "brace" in speakin'
tharof to you-all sports who ain't really gamblers none. That's to be
p'lite. But between us, among a'credited kyard sharps, a brace game is
allers allooded to as "the old thing." If you refers to a game of
chance as "the old thing," they knows at once that every chance is
'liminated an' said deevice rigged for murder.'
"'That's splendid, Cherokee,' says Faro Nell, from her lookout's roost
by his shoulder; 'give 'em a lecture on the perils of gamblin' with
strangers.'
"Thar's no game goin' at this epock an' Cherokee signifies his
willin'ness to become instructive.
"'Not that I'm no beacon, neither,' says Cherokee, 'on the rocky
wreck-sown shores of sport; an' not that I ever resorts to onderhand
an' doobious deals myse'f; still, I'm cap'ble of p'intin' out the
dangers. Scientists of my sort, no matter how troo an' faithful to the
p'int of honour, is bound to savey all kyard dooplicities in their
uttermost depths, or get left dead on the field of finance. Every gent
should be honest. But more than honest--speshully if he's out to buck
faro-bank or set in on casyooal games of short-kyards--every gent
should be wise. In the amoosements I mentions to be merely honest
can't be considered a complete equipment. Wherefore, while I never
makes a crooked play an' don't pack the par'fernalia so to do, I'm
plenty astoote as to how said tricks is turned.
"'Which sports has speshulties same as other folks. Thar's Texas
Thompson, his speshulty is ridin' a hoss; while Peets's speshulty is
shootin' a derringer, Colonel Sterett's is pol'tics, Enright's is
jestice, Dave's is bein' married, Jack Moore's is upholdin' law an'
order, Boggs's is bein' sooperstitious, Missis Rucker's is composin'
bakin' powder biscuits, an' Huggins's is strong drink.'
"'Whatever is my speshulty, Cherokee?' asks Faro Nell, who's as
immersed as the rest in these settin's forth; 'what do you-all reckon
now is my speshulty?'
"'Bein' the loveliest of your sex,' says Cherokee, a heap emphatic, an'
on that p'int we-all strings our game with his.
"'That puts the ambrosia on me,' says Faro Nell, blushin' with
pleasure, an' she calls to Black Jack.
"'As I observes,' goes on Cherokee, 'every sport has his speshulty.
Thar's Casino Joe; his is that he can "tell the last four."
Nacherally, bein' thus gifted, a game of casino is like so much money
in the bank for Joe. Still, his gifts ain't crooked, they're genius;
Joe's simply born able to "tell the last four."
"'Which, you gents is familiar by repoote at least with the several
plans for redoocin' draw-poker to the prosaic level of shore-things.
Thar's the "bug" an' the "foot-move" an' the "sleeve holdout" an'
dozens of kindred schemes for playin' a cold hand. An' thar's
optimists, when the game is easy, who depends wholly on a handkerchief
in their laps to cover their nefariousness. If I'm driven to counsel a
gent concernin' poker it would be to never play with strangers; an'
partic'lar to never spec'late with a gent who sneezes a lot, or turns
his head an' talks of draughts of cold air invading' the place, or says
his foot's asleep an' gets up to stampede about the room after a hand
is dealt an' prior to the same bein' played. It's four to one this
afflicted sharp is workin' a holdout. Then that's the "punch" to mark
a deck, an' the "lookin' glass" to catch the kyards as they're dealt.
Then thar's sech manoovers as stockin' a deck, an' shiftin' a cut, an'
dealin' double. Thar's gents who does their work from the bottom of a
deck---puts up a hand on the bottom, an' confers it on a pard or on
themse'fs as dovetails with their moods. He's a one-arm party--shy his
right arm, he is--who deals a hand from the bottom the best I ever
beholds.
"'No, I don't regyard crooked folks as dangerous at poker, only you've
got to watch 'em. So long as your eye is on 'em a heap attentive
they're powerless to perform their partic'lar miracle, an' as a result,
since that's the one end an' aim of their efforts, they becomes mighty
inocuous. As a roole, crooked people ain't good players on the squar',
an' as long as you makes 'em play squar', they're yours.
"'But speakin' of this devious person on the Las Vegas Plaza that time:
The outfit is onknown to me--I'm only a pilgrim an' a stranger an'
don't intend to tarry none--when I sets up to the lay-out. I ain't got
a bet down, however, before I sees the gent who's dealin', sign-up the
seven to the case-keep, an' instanter I feels like I'd known that bevy
of bandits since long before the war. Also, I realises their methods
after I takes a good hard look. That dealer's got what post
gradyooates in faro-bank robbery calls a "end squeeze" box; the deck is
trimmed--"wedges" is the name--to put the odds ag'in the evens, an'
sanded so as to let two kyards come at a clatter whenever said
pheenomenon is demanded by the exigencies of their crimes; an' thar you
be. No, it's a fifty-two-kyard deck all right, an' the dealer depends
on "puttin' back" to keep all straight. An' I'm driven to concede
that the put-back work of said party is like a romance; puttin' back's
his speshulty. His left hand would sort o' settle as light as a dead
leaf over the kyard he's after that a-way--not a tenth part of a
second--an' that pasteboard would come along, palmed, an' as his hand
floats over the box as he's goin' to make the next turn the kyard would
reassoome its cunnin' place inside. An' all as smoothly serene as
pray'r meetin's.'
"'An', nacherally, you denounces this felon,' says Colonel Sterett,
who's come in an' who's integrity is of the active sort.
"'Nacherally, I don't say a word,' retorts Cherokee. 'I ain't for
years inhabited these roode an' sand-blown regions, remote as they be
from best ideals an' high examples of the East, not to long before have
learned the excellence of that maxim about lettin' every man kill his
own snakes. I says nothin'; I merely looks about to locate the victim
of them machinations with a view of goin' ag'inst his play.'
"It's when Cherokee arrives at this place in his recitals that Dave
evolves his interruptions. He's camped by himse'f in a reemote corner
of the room, an' he ain't been noticin' nobody an' nobody's been
noticin' him. All at once, in tones which is low but a heap
discordant, Dave hums to himse'f something that sounds like:
'Bye O babe, lie still in slumber,
Holy angels gyard thy bed.'
"At this, Cherokee in a horrified way stops, an' we-all looks at each
other. Enright makes a dispar'in' gesture towards Dave an' says:
"'Gents, first callin' your attention to the fact that Dave ain't
over-drinkt an' that no nosepaint theery is possible in accountin' for
his acts, I asks you for your opinions. As you knows, this thing's
been goin' for'ard for some time, an' I desires to hear if from any
standp'int of public interest do you-all figger that steps should be
took?'
"In order to fully onderstand Enright in all he means, I oughter lay
bar' that Dave's been conductin' himse'f in a manner not to be
explained for mighty likely she's eight weeks. Yeretofore, thar's no
more sociable sport an' none whose system is easier to follow in all
Wolfville than Dave. While holdin' himse'f at what you might call
'par' on all o'casions, Dave is still plenty minglesome an' fraternal
with the balance of the herd, an' would no more think of donnin' airs
or puttin' on dog than he'd think of blastin' away at one of us with
his gun. Yet eight weeks prior thar shorely dawns a change.
"Which the first symptom--the advance gyard as it were of Dave's
gettin' queer--is when Dave's standin' in front of the post-office.
Thar's a faraway look to Dave at the time, like he's tryin' to settle
whether he's behind or ahead on some deal. While thus wropped in this
fit of abstraction Dan Boggs comes hybernatin' along an' asks Dave to
p'int into the Red Light for a smell of Valley Tan. Dave sort o'
rouses up at this an' fastens on Dan with his eyes, half truculent an'
half amazed, same as if he's shocked at Dan's familiarity. Then he
shakes his head decisive.
"'Don't try to braid this mule's tail none!' says Dave, an' at that he
strides off with his muzzle in the air. Boggs is abashed.
"'Which these insultin' bluffs of Dave's,' says Boggs, as we canvasses
the play a bit later, 'would cut me to the quick, but I knows it ain't
on the level, Dave ain't himse'f when he declines said nosepaint--his
intellects ain't in camp.'
"This ontoward an' onmerited rebuke to Boggs is followed, by further
breaks as hard to savey. Dave ain't no two days alike. One time he's
that haughty he actooally passes Enright himse'f in the street an' no
more heed or recognition than if Wolfville's chief is the last Mexican
to come no'th of the line. Then later Dave is effoosive an' goes about
riotin' in the s'ciety of every gent whereof he cuts the trail. One
day he won't drink; an' the next he's tippin' the canteen from sun-up
till he's claimed by sleep. Which he gets us mighty near distracted;
no one can keep a tab on him. What with them silences an'
volyoobilities, sobrieties an' days of drink, an' all in bewilderin'
alternations, he's shore got us goin' four ways at once.
"'In spite of the fact,' continyooes Dan Boggs when we're turnin'
Dave's conduct over in our minds an' rummagin' about for reasons; 'in
spite of the fact, I says, that I'm plenty posted in advance that I'm
up ag'inst a gen'ral shout of derision on account of me bein'
sooperstitious, I'm yere to offer two to one Dave's hoodooed.
Moreover, I can name the hoodoo.'
"'Whatever is it then?' asks Texas Thompson; 'cut her freely loose an'
be shore of our solemn consid'ration.'
"'It's opals,' says Boggs. 'Them gems as every well-instructed gent is
aware is the very spent of bad luck. Dave's wearin' one in his shirt
right now. It's that opal pin wherewith he decks himse'f recent while
he's relaxin' with nosepaint in Tucson. I'm with him at the time an' I
says to him: "Dave, I wouldn't mount that opal none. Which all opals
is implacable hoodoos, an' it'll likely conjure up your rooin." But I
might as well have addressed that counsel to a buffalo bull for all the
respectful heed I gains. Dave gives me a grin, shets one eye plenty
cunnin', an' retorts: "Dan, you're envious; you wants that ornament
yourse'f an' you're out to try an make me diskyard it in your favour.
Sech schemes, Dan, can't make the landin'. Opals that a-way is as
harmless as bull snakes. Also, I knows what becomes my looks; an'
while I ain't vain, still, bein' married as you're aware, it's wisdom
in me to seize every openin' for enhancin' my pulcritoode. The better
I looks, the longer Tucson Jennie loves me; an' I'm out to reetain that
lady's heart at any cost." No, I don't onbend in no response,' goes on
Boggs. 'Them accoosations of Dave about me honin' for said bauble is
oncalled for. I'd no more pack a opal than I'd cut for deal an' embark
on a game of seven-up with a ghost. As I states, the luck of opals is
black.'
"'I was wont to think so,' says Enright, 'but thar once chances a play,
the same comin' off onder my personal notice, that shakes my
convictions on that p'int. Thar's a broke-down sport--this yere's long
ago while I'm briefly sojournin' in Socorro--who's got a opal, an' he
one day puts it in hock with a kyard sharp for a small stake. The
kyard gent says he ain't alarmed none by these charges made of opals
bein' bad luck. It's a ring, an' he sticks it on his little finger.
Two days later he goes broke ag'in four jacks.
"'This terrifies him; he begins to believe in the evil innocences of
opals. He presents the jewelry to a bar-keep, who puts it up, since
his game limits itse'f to sellin' licker an', him bein' plenty careful
not to drink none himse'f, his contracted destinies don't offer no
field for opals an' their malign effects. In less time than a week,
however, his wife leaves him; an' also that drink-shop wherein he
officiates is blown down by a high wind.
"'That bar-keep emerges from the rooms of his domestic hopes an' the
desolation of that gin mill, an' endows a lady of his acquaintance with
this opal ornament. It ain't twenty-four hours when she cuts loose an'
weds a Mexican.
"'Which by this time, excitement is runnin' high, an' you-all couldn't
have found that citizen in Socorro with a search warrant who declines
to believe in opals bein' bad luck. On the hocks of these catastrophes
it's the common notion that nobody better own that opal; an' said
malev'lent stone in the dooal capac'ty of a cur'osity an' a warnin' is
put in the seegyar case at the Early Rose s'loon. The first day it's
thar, a jeweller sharp come in for his daily drinks--he runs the
jewelry store of that meetropolis an' knows about diamonds an' sim'lar
jimcracks same as Peets does about drugs--an' he considers this
talisman, scrootinisin' it a heap clost. "Do you-all believe in the
bad luck of opals?" asks a pard who's with him. "This thing ain't no
opal," says the jeweller sharp, lookin' up; "it's glass."
"'An' so it is: that baleful gewgaw has been sailin' onder a alias; it
ain't no opal more'n a Colt's cartridge is a poker chip. An', of
course, it's plain the divers an' several disasters, from the loss of
that kyard gent's bank-roll down to the Mexican nuptials of the
ill-advised lady to whom I alloodes, can't be laid to its charge. The
whole racket shocks an' shakes me to that degree,' concloods Enright,
'that to-day I ain't got no settled views on opals', none whatever.'
"'Jest the same, I thinks it's opals that's the trouble with Dave,'
declar's Boggs, plenty stubborn an' while the rest of us don't yoonite
with him, we receives his view serious an' respectful so's not to jolt
Boggs's feelin's.
"Goin' back, however, to when Dave sets up the warble of 'Bye O baby!'
that a-way, we-all, followin' Enright's s'licitation for our thoughts,
abides a heap still an' makes no response. Enright asks ag'in: 'What
do you-all think?'
"At last Boggs, who as I sets forth frequent is a nervous gent, an' one
on whom silence soon begins to prey, ag'in speaks up. Bein' doubtful
an' mindful of Enright's argyment ag'in his opal bluff, however, Boggs
don't advance his concloosions this time at all emphatic. In a tone
like he's out ridin' for information himse'f, Boggs says:
"'Mebby, if it ain't opals, it's a case of straight loco.'
"'While I wouldn't want to readily think Dave locoed,' says Enright,
'seein' he's oncommon firm on his mental feet, still he's shore got
something on his mind. An' bein' it is something, it's possible as you
says that Dave's intellects is onhossed.'
"'Whatever for a play would it be,' says Cherokee, 'to go an' ask Dave
himse'f right now?'
"'I'd be some slow about propoundin' sech surmises to Dave,' says
Boggs. 'He might get hostile; you can put a wager on it, he'd turn out
disagree'ble to a degree, if he did. No, you-all has got to handle a
loonatic with gloves. I knows a gent who entangles himse'f with a
loonatic, askin' questions, an' he gets all shot up.'
"'I reckons, however,' says Cherokee, 'that I'll assoome the resk.
Dave an' me's friends; an' I allows if I goes after him in ways both
soft an' careless, so as not to call forth no suspicions, he'll take it
good-humoured even if he is locoed.'
"We-all sets breathless while Cherokee sa'nters down to where Dave's
still wropped in them melodies.
"'Whatever be you hummin' toones for, Dave?' asks Cherokee all
accidental like.
"'Which I'm rehearsin',' says Dave, an' he shows he's made impatient.
'Don't come infringin' about me with no questions,' goes on Dave. 'I'm
like the ancient Romans, I've got troubles of my own; an' no sport who
calls himse'f my friend will go aggravatin' me with ontimely
inquis'tiveness.' Then Dave gets up an' pulls his freight an' leaves
us more onsettled than at first.
"For a full hour, we does nothin' but canvass this yere question of
Dave's aberrations. At last a idee seizes us. Thar's times when
Dave's been seen caucusin' with Missis Rucker an' Doc Peets. Most
likely one of 'em would be able to shed a ray on Dave. By a excellent
coincidence, an' as if to he'p us out, Peets comes in as Texas Thompson
su'gests that mebby the Doc's qualified to onravel the myst'ry.
"'Tell you-all folks what's the matter with Dave?' says Peets. 'Pards,
it's simply not in the deck. Meanin' no disrespects--for you gents
knows me too well to dream of me harborin' anything but feelin's of the
highest regyards for one an' all--I'll have to leave you camped in
original darkness. It would be breakin' professional confidences.
Shore, I saveys Dave's troubles an' the causes of these vagaries of
his; jest the same the traditions of the medical game forces me to hold
'em sacred an' secret.'
"'Tell us at least, Doc,' says Enright, 'whether Dave's likely to grow
voylent. If he is, it's only proper that we arranges to tie him down.'
"'Dave may be boisterous later,' says Peets, an' his reply comes slow
an' thoughtful, like he's considerin'; 'he may make a joyful uproar,
but he won't wax dangerous.' This yere's as far as Peets'll go; he
declines to talk longer, on professional grounds.
"'Which suspense, this a-way,' says Boggs, after Peets is gone, 'an' us
no wiser than when he shows in the door, makes me desp'rate. I'll
offer the motion: Let's prance over in a bunch, an' demand a
explanation of Missis Rucker. Dave's been talkin' to her as much as
ever he has to Peets, an' thar's no professional hobbles on the lady;
she's footloose, an' free to speak.'
"'We waits on you, Marm,' says Enright, when ten minutes later Boggs,
Cherokee, Texas Thompson an' he is in the kitchen of the O. K.
Restauraw where Missis Rucker is slicin' salt hoss an' layin' the
fragrant foundations of supper; 'we waits on you-all to ask your
advice. Dave Tutt's been carryin' on in a manner an' form at once
doobious an' threatenin'. It ain't too much to say that we-all fears
the worst. We comes now to invite you to tell us all you knows of Dave
an' whatever it is that so onsettles him. Our idee is that you
onderstands a heap about it.'
"'See yere, Sam Enright,' retorts Missis Rucker, pausin' over the salt
hoss, 'you ain't doin' yourse'f proud. You better round up this herd
of inebriates an' get 'em back to the Red Light. Thar's nothin' the
matter with Dave; leastwise if it was the matter with you, you'd be
some improved. Dave Tutt's a credit to this camp; never more so than
now; the same bein' a mighty sight more'n I could say of any of you-all
an' stick to the trooth.'
"'Then you does know, Missis Rucker,' says Enright, 'the secret that's
gnawin' at Dave.'
"'Know it,' replies Misses Rucker, 'of course, I knows it. But I don't
propose to discuss it none with you tarrapins. I ain't got no patience
with sech dolts! Now that you-all is yere, however, I'll give you
notice that to-morry you can begin to do your own cookin' till you
hears further word from me. I'm goin' to be otherwise an' more
congenially engaged. Most likely I'll be back in my kitchen ag'in in a
day or two; but I makes no promises. An' ontil sech time as I shows
up, you-all can go scuffle for yourse'fs. I've got more important
dooties jest now on my hands than cookin' chuck for sots.'
"As Missis Rucker speaks up mighty vigorous, an' as none of us has the
nerve to ask her further an' take the resk of turnin' loose her temper,
we lines out ag'in for the Red Light no cl'arer than what we was.
"'I could ask her more questions,' says Enright, 'but, gents, I didn't
deem it wise. Missis Rucker is a most admirable character; but I'm
sooperstitious about crowdin' her too clost. Like Boggs says about
opals, thar's plenty of bad luck lurkin' about Missis Rucker's environs
if you only goes about its deevelopment the right way.'
"'The sityooation is too many for me,' says Boggs, goin' up to the bar
for a drink, 'I gives it up. I ain't got a notion left, onless it is
that Dave's runnin' for office; that is, I might entertain sech a
thought only thar ain't no office.'
"'The next day Missis Rucker abandons her post; an' we tharupon finds
that feedin' ourse'fs keeps us busy an' we don't have much time to
discuss Dave. Also, Dave disappears;--in fact, both Dave an' Missis
Rucker fades from view.
"It's about fo'rth drink time the evenin' of the third day, an' most of
us is in the Red Light. Thar's a gloom overhangs us like a fog. Mebby
it's the oncertainties which envelops Dave, mebby it's because Missis
Rucker's done deserted an' left us to rustle for ourse'fs or starve.
Most of us is full of present'ments that something's due to happen.
"All at once, an' onexpected, Dave walks in. A sigh of relief goes up,
for the glance we gives him shows he's all right--sane as
Enright--clothed an' in his right mind as set fo'th in holy writ.
Also, his countenance is a wrinkle of glee.
"'Gents,' says Dave, an' his air is that patronisin' it would have been
exasperatin' only we're so relieved, 'gents, I'm come to seek
congratyoolations an' set 'em up. Peets an' that motherly angel,
Missis Rucker, allows I'll be of more use yere than in my own house,
whereat I nacherally floats over. Coupled with a su'gestion that we
drinks, I wants to say that he's a boy, an' that I brands him "Enright
Peets Tutt."'"
CHAPTER VI.
With the Apache's Compliments.
"Ondoubted," observed the Old Cattleman, during one of our long
excursive talks, "ondoubted, the ways an' the motives of Injuns is past
the white man's findin' out. He's shore a myst'ry, the Injun is! an'
where the paleface forever fails of his s'lootion is that the latter
ropes at this problem in copper-colour from the standp'int of the
Caucasian. Can a dog onderstand a wolf? Which I should remark not!
"It's a heap likely that with Injuns, the white man in his turn is jest
as difficult to solve. An' without the Injun findin' onusual fault
with 'em, thar's a triangle of things whereof the savage accooses the
paleface. The Western Injuns at least--for I ain't posted none on
Eastern savages, the same bein' happily killed off prior to my
time--the Western Injuns lays the bee, the wild turkey, an' that weed
folks calls the 'plantain,' at the white man's door. They-all descends
upon the Injun hand in hand. No, the Injun don't call the last-named
veg'table a 'plantain;' he alloodes to it as 'the White Man's Foot.'
"Thar's traits dominant among Injuns which it wouldn't lower the
standin' of a white man if he ups an' imitates a whole lot. I once
encounters a savage--one of these blanket Injuns with feathers in his
ha'r--an' bein' idle an' careless of what I'm about, I staggers into
casyooal talk with him. This buck's been East for the first time in
his darkened c'reer an' visited the Great Father in Washin'ton. I asks
him what he regyards as the deepest game he in his travels goes
ag'inst. At first he allows that pie, that a-way, makes the most
profound impression. But I bars pie, an' tells him to su'gest the
biggest thing he strikes, not on no bill of fare. Tharupon,
abandonin' menoos an' wonders of the table, he roominates a moment an'
declar's that the steamboat--now that pie is exclooded--ought to get
the nomination.
"'The choo-choo boat,' observes this intelligent savage, 'is the
paleface's big medicine.'
"'You'll have a list of marvels,' I says, 'to avalanche upon the people
when you cuts the trail of your ancestral tribe ag'in?'
"'No,' retorts the savage, shakin' his head ontil the skelp-lock whips
his y'ears, an' all mighty decisive; 'no; won't tell Injun nothin'.'
"'Why not?' I demands.
"'If I tell,' he says, 'they no believe. They think it all heap lie.'
"Son, consider what a example to travellers is set by that ontootered
savage? That's what makes me say thar be traits possessed of Injuns,
personal, which a paleface might improve himse'f by copyin'.
"Bein' white myse'f, I'm born with notions ag'in Injuns. I learns of
their deestruction with relief, an' never sees one pirootin' about,
full of life an' vivacity, but the spectacle fills me with vain
regrets. All the same thar's a load o' lies told East concernin' the
Injun. I was wont from time to time to discuss these red folks with
Gen'ral Stanton, who for years is stationed about in Arizona,
an'--merely for the love he b'ars to fightin'--performs as chief of
scouts for Gen'ral Crook.
"'Our divers wars with the Apaches,' says Gen'ral Stanton, 'comes more
as the frootes of a misdeal by a locoed marshal than anything else
besides. When Crook first shows up in Arizona--this is in the long
ago--an' starts to inculcate peace among the Apaches, he gets old
Jeffords to bring Cochise to him to have a pow-wow. Jeffords rounds up
Cochise an' herds him with soft words an' big promises into the
presence of Crook. The Grey Fox--which was the Injun name for
Crook--makes Cochise a talk. Likewise he p'ints out to the chief the
landmarks an' mountain peaks that indicates the Mexican line. An' the
Grey Fox explains to Cochise that what cattle is killed an' what skelps
is took to the south'ard of the line ain't goin' to bother him a bit.
But no'th'ard it's different; thar in that sacred region cattle killin'
an' skelp collectin' don't go. The Grey Fox shoves the information on
Cochise that every trick turned on the American side of the line has
done got to partake of the characteristics of a love affair, or the
Grey Fox with his young men in bloo--his walk-a-heaps an' his
hoss-warriors--noomerous as the grass, they be--will come down on
Cochise an' his Apaches like a coyote on a sage hen or a pan of milk
from a top shelf an' make 'em powerful hard to find.
"'Cochise smokes an' smokes, an' after considerin' the bluff of the
Grey Fox plenty profound, allows he won't call it. Thar shall be peace
between the Apache an' the paleface to the no'th'ard of that line.
Then the Grey Fox an' Cochise shakes hands an' says "How!" an' Cochise,
with a bolt or two of red calico wherewith to embellish his squaws,
goes squanderin' back to his people, permeated to the toes with
friendly intentions.
"'Sech is Cochise's reverence for his word, coupled with his fear of
the Grey Fox, that years float by an' every deefile an' canyon of the
Southwest is as safe as the aisles of a church to the moccasins of the
paleface. Thus it continyoos ontil thar comes a evenin' when a jimcrow
marshal, with more six-shooters than hoss sense, allows he'll apprehend
Cochise's brother a whole lot for some offense that ain't most likely
deuce high in the category of troo crime. This ediot offishul reaches
for the relative of Cochise; an' as the latter--bein' a savage an'
tharfore plumb afraid of captivity--leaps back'ard like he's met up
with a rattlesnake, the marshal puts his gun on him an' plugs him so
good that he cashes in right thar. The marshal says later in
explanation of his game that Cochise's brother turns hostile an' drops
his hand on his knife. Most likely he does; a gent's hands--even a
Apache's--has done got to be some'ers.
"'But the killin' overturns the peaceful programmes built up between
the Grey Fox an' Cochise. When the old chief hears of his brother
bein' downed, he paints himse'f black an' red an' sends a bundle of
arrows tied with a rattlesnake skin to the Grey Fox with a message to
count his people an' look out for himse'f. The Grey Fox, who realises
that the day of peace has ended an' the sun gone down to rise on a
mornin' of trouble, fills the rattlesnake skin with cartridges an'
sends 'em back with a word to Cochise to turn himse'f loose. From that
moment the war-jig which is to last for years is on. After Cochise
comes Geronimo, an' after Geronimo comes Nana; an' one an' all, they
adds a heap of spice to life in Arizona. It's no exaggeration to put
the number of palefaces who lose their ha'r as the direct result of
that fool marshal layin' for Cochise's brother an' that Injun's
consequent cuttin' off, at a round ten thousand. Shore! thar's scores
an' scores who's been stood up an' killed in the hills whereof we never
gets a whisper. I, myse'f, in goin' through the teepees of a Apache
outfit, after we done wipes 'em off the footstool, sees the long ha'r
of seven white women who couldn't have been no time dead.
"'Who be they? Folks onknown who's got shot into while romancin' along
among the hills with schemes no doubt of settlement in Californy.
"'With what we saveys of the crooelties of the Apaches, thar's likewise
a sperit of what book-sharps calls chivalry goes with 'em an' albeit on
one ha'r-hung o'casion I profits mightily tharby, I'm onable to give it
a reason. You wouldn't track up on no sim'lar weaknesses among the
palefaces an' you-all can put down a stack on that.
"'It's when I'm paymaster,' says the Gen'ral, reachin' for the canteen,
'an' I starts fo'th from Fort Apache on a expedition to pay off the
nearby troops. I've got six waggons an' a escort of twenty men. For
myse'f, at the r'ar of the procession, I journeys proudly in a
amb'lance. Our first camp is goin' to be on top of the mesa out a
handful of miles from the Fort.
"'The word goes along the line to observe a heap of caution an' not
straggle or go rummagin' about permiscus, for the mountains is alive
with hostiles. It's five for one that a frownin' cloud of 'em is
hangin' on our flanks from the moment we breaks into the foothills.
No, they'd be afoot; the Apaches ain't hoss-back Injuns an' only fond
of steeds as food. He never rides on one, a Apache don't, but he'll
camp an' build a fire an' eat a corral full of ponies if you'll furnish
'em, an' lick his lips in thankfulness tharfore. But bein' afoot won't
hinder 'em from keepin' up with my caravan, for in the mountains the
snow is to the waggon beds an' the best we can do, is wriggle along the
trail like a hurt snake at a gait which wouldn't tire a papoose.
"'We've been pushin' on our windin' uphill way for mighty likely half a
day, an' I'm beginnin'--so dooms slows is our progress--to despair of
gettin' out on top the mesa before dark, when to put a coat of paint on
the gen'ral trouble the lead waggon breaks down. I turns out in the
snow with the rest, an' we-all puts in a heated an' highly profane
half-hour restorin' the waggon to health. At last we're onder headway
ag'in, an' I wades back through the snow to my amb'lance.
"'As I arrives at the r'ar of my offishul waggon, it occurs to me that
I'll fill a pipe an' smoke some by virchoo of my nerves, the same bein'
torn and frayed with the many exasperations of the day. I gives my
driver the word to wait a bit, an' searchin' forth my tobacco outfit
loads an' lights my pipe. I'm planted waist deep in the mountain
snows, but havin' on hossman boots the snow ain't no hardship.
"'While I'm fussin' with my pipe, the six waggons an' my twenty men
curves 'round a bend in the trail an' is hid by a corner of the canyon.
I reflects at the time--though I ain't really expectin' no perils--that
I'd better catch up with my escort, if it's only to set the troops a
example. As I exhales my first puff of smoke and is on the verge of
tellin' my driver to pull out--this yere mule-skinner is settin' so
that matters to the r'ar is cut off from his gaze by the canvas cover
of my waggon--a slight noise attracts me, an' castin' my eye along the
trail we've been climbin', I notes with feelin's of disgust a full
dozen Apaches comin'. An' it ain't no hyperbole to say they're shore
comin' all spraddled out.
"'In the lead for all the deep snow, an' racin' up on me like the wind,
is a big befeathered buck, painted to the eyes; an' in his right fist,
raised to hurl it, is a 12-foot lance. As I surveys this pageant, I
realises how he'pless, utter, I be, an' with what ca'mness I may,
adjusts my mind to the fact that I've come to the end of my trails.
He'pless? Shore! I'm stuck as firm in the snow as one of the pines
about me; my guns is in the waggon outen immediate reach; thar I stands
as certain a prey to that Apache with the lance as he's likely to go up
ag'inst doorin' the whole campaign. Why, I'm a pick-up! I remembers
my wife an' babies, an' sort o' says "Goodbye!" to 'em, for I'm as
certain of my finish as I be of the hills, or the snows beneath my
feet. However, since it's all I can do, I continyoos to smoke an'
watch my execootioners come on.
"'The big lance Injun is the dominatin' sperit of the bunch. As he
draws up to me--he's fifty foot in advance of the others--he makes his
lance shiver from p'int to butt. It fairly sings a death song! I can
feel it go through an' through me a score of times. But I stands thar
facin' him; for, of course, I wants it to go through from the front. I
don't allow to be picked up later with anything so onfashionable as a
lance wound in my back. That would be mighty onprofessional!
"'You onderstands that what now requires minutes in the recital don't
cover seconds as a play. The lance Injun runs up to within a rod of me
an' halts. His arm goes back for a mighty cast of the lance; the
weepon is vibrant with the very sperit of hate an' malice. His eyes,
through a fringe of ha'r that has fallen over 'em, glows out like a
cat's eyes in the dark.
"We stands thar--I still puffin my pipe, he with his lance raised--an'
we looks on each other--I an' that paint-daubed buck! I can't say
whatever is his notion of me, but on my side I never beholds a savage
who appeals to me as a more evil an' forbiddin' picture!
"'As I looks him over a change takes place. The fire in his eyes dies
out, his face relaxes its f'rocity, an' after standin' for a moment an'
as the balance of the band arrives, he turns the lance over his arm an'
with the butt presented, surrenders it into my hand. You can gamble I
don't lose no time in arguin' the question, but accepts the lance with
all that it implies. Bringin' the weepon to a 'Right Shoulder' an'
with my mind relieved, I gives the word to my mule-skinner--who's
onconscious of the transactions in life an' death goin' on behind his
back--an' with that, we-all takes up our march an' soon comes up on the
escort where it's ag'in fixed firm in the snow about a furlong to the
fore. My savages follows along with me, an' each of 'em as grave as
squinch owls an' tame as tabby cats.
"'Joke? no; them Apaches was as hostile as Gila monsters! But
beholdin' me, as they regyards it--for they don't in their ontaught
simplicity make allowance for me bein' implanted in the snow, gunless
an' he'pless--so brave, awaitin' deestruction without a quiver, their
admiration mounts to sech heights it drowns within 'em every thought of
cancellin' me with that lance, an' tharupon they pays me their savage
compliments in manner an' form deescribed. They don't regyard
themse'fs as surrenderin' neither; they esteems passin' me the lance as
inauguratin' a armistice an' looks on themse'fs as guests of honor an'
onder my safegyard, free to say "How!" an' vamos back to the warpath
ag'in whenever the sperit of blood begins to stir within their breasts.
I knows enough of their ways to be posted as to what they expects; an'
bein', I hopes, a gent of integrity, I accedes to 'em that exact status
which they believes they enjoys.
"'They travels with me that day, eats with me that evenin' when we
makes our camp, has a drink with me all 'round, sings savage hymns to
me throughout the night, loads up with chuck in the mornin', offers me
no end of flattery as a dead game gent whom they respects, says
_adios_; an' then they scatters like a flock of quail. Also, havin'
resoomed business on old-time lines, they takes divers shots at us with
their Winchesters doorin' the next two days, an' kills a hoss an'
creases my sergeant. Why don't I corral an' hold 'em when they're in
my clutch? It would have been breakin' the trooce as Injuns an' I
onderstands sech things; moreover, they let me go free without
conditions when I was loser by every roole of the game.'"
CHAPTER VII.
The Mills of Savage Gods.
"Thar might, of course, be romances in the West," observed the Old
Cattleman, reflectively, in response to my question, "but the folks
ain't got no time. Romance that a-way demands leesure, an' a party has
to be more or less idlin' about to get what you-all might style
romantic action. Take that warjig whereof I recently relates an'
wherein this yere Wild Bill Hickox wipes out the McCandlas gang--six to
his Colt's, four to his bowie, an' one to his Hawkins rifle; eleven in
all--I asks him myse'f later when he's able to talk, don't he regyard
the eepisode as some romantic. An' Bill says, 'No, I don't notice no
romance tharin; what impresses me most is that she's shore a zealous
fight--also, mighty busy.'
"Injuns would be romantic, only they're so plumb ignorant they never
once saveys. Thar's no Injun word for 'romantic'; them benighted
savages never tumblin' to sech a thing as romance bein' possible. An'
yet said aborigines engages in plays which a eddicated Eastern taste
with leesure on its hands an' gropin' about for entertainment would
pass on as romantic.
"When I'm pesterin' among the Osages on that one o'casion that I'm
tryin' to make a round-up of my health, the old buck Strike Axe relates
to me a tale which I allers looks on as possessin' elements. Shore;
an' it's as simple an' straight as the sights of a gun. It's about a
squaw an' three bucks, an' thar's enough blood in it to paint a waggon.
Which I reckons now I'll relate it plain an' easy an' free of them
frills wherewith a professional racontoor is so prone to overload his
narratives.
"The Black Cloud is a Osage medicine man an' has high repoote about
Greyhoss where he's pitched his teepee an' abides. He's got a squaw,
Sunbright, an' he's plenty jealous of this yere little Sunbright. The
Black Cloud has three squaws, an' Sunbright is the youngest. The
others is Sunbright's sisters, for a Osage weds all the sisters of a
fam'ly at once, the oldest sister goin' to the front at the nuptials to
deal the weddin' game for the entire outfit.
"Now this Sunbright ain't over-enamoured of Black Cloud; he's only a
half-blood Injun for one thing, his father bein' a buffalo-man (negro)
who's j'ined the Osages, an' Sunbright don't take kindly to his nose
which is some flatter than the best rools of Osage beauty demands; an'
likewise thar's kinks in his ha'r. Still, Sunbright sort o' keeps her
aversions to herse'f, an' if it ain't for what follows she most likely
would have travelled to her death-blankets an' been given a seat on a
hill with a house of rocks built 'round her--the same bein' the usual
burial play of a Osage--without Black Cloud ever saveyin' that so far
from interestin' Sunbright, he only makes her tired.
"Over south from Black Cloud's Greyhoss camp an' across the Arkansaw
an' some'ers between the Polecat an' the Cimmaron thar's livin' a young
Creek buck called the Lance. He's straight an' slim an' strong as the
weepon he's named for; an' he like Black Cloud is a medicine sharp of
cel'bration an' stands way up in the papers. The Creeks is never weary
of talkin' about the Lance an' what a marvel as a medicine man he is;
also, by way of insultin' the Osages, they declar's onhesitatin' that
the Lance lays over Black Cloud like four tens, an' offers to bet
hosses an' blankets an' go as far as the Osages likes that this is troo.
"By what Strike Axe informs me,--an' he ain't none likely to overplay
in his statements--by what Strike Axe tells me, I says, the Lance must
shore have been the high kyard as a medicine man. Let it get dark with
the night an' no moon in the skies, an' the Lance could take you-all
into his medicine lodge, an' you'd hear the sperits flappin' their
pinions like some one flappin' a blanket, an' thar'd be whisperin's an'
goin's on outside the lodge an' in, while fire-eyes would show an' burn
an' glower up in the peak of the teepee; an' all plenty skeary an'
mystifiyin'. Besides these yere accomplishments the Lance is one of
them mesmerism sports who can set anamiles to dreamin'. He could call
a coyote or a fox, or even so fitful an' nervous a prop'sition as a
antelope; an' little by little, snuffin' an' snortin', or if it's a
coyote, whinin', them beasts would approach the Lance ontil they're
that clost he'd tickle their heads with his fingers while they stands
shiverin' an' sweatin' with apprehensions. You can put a bet on it,
son, that accordin' to this onbiassed buck, Strike Axe, the Lance is
ondoubted the big medicine throughout the Injun range.
"As might be assoomed, the Black Cloud is some heated ag'in the Lance
an' looks on him with baleful eye as a rival. Still, Black Cloud has
his nerve with him constant, an' tharfore one day when the Osages an'
Creeks has been dispootin' touchin' the reespective powers of him an'
the Lance, an' this latter Injun offers to come over to Greyhoss an'
make medicine ag'in him, Black Cloud never hesitates or hangs back like
a dog tied onder a waggon, but calls the bluff a heap prompt an' tells
the Lance to come.
"Which the day is set an' the Lance shows in the door, as monte sharps
would say. Black Cloud an' the Lance tharupon expands themse'fs, an'
delights the assembled Creeks an' Osages with their whole box of
tricks, an' each side is braggin' an' boastin' an' puttin' it up that
their gent is most likely the soonest medicine man who ever buys black
paint. It's about hoss an' hoss between the two.
"Black Cloud accompanies himse'f to this contest with a pure white pony
which has eyes red as roobies--a kind o' albino pony--an' he gives it
forth that this milk-coloured bronco is his 'big medicine' or familiar
sperit. The Lance observes that the little red-eyed hoss is mighty
impressive to the savages, be they Creeks or Osages. At last he says
to Black Cloud:
"'To show how my medicine is stronger than yours, to-morry I'll make
your red-eyed big medicine bronco go lame in his off hind laig.'
"Black Cloud grins scornful at this; he allows that no sport can make
his white pony go lame.
"He's plumb wrong; the next mornin' the white pony is limpin' an'
draggin' his off hind hoof, an' when he's standin' still he p'ints the
toe down like something's fetched loose. Black Cloud is sore; but he
can't find no cactus thorn nor nothin' to bring about the lameness an'
he don't know what to make of the racket. Black Cloud's up ag'inst it,
an' the audience begins to figger that the Lance's' medicine is too
strong for Black Cloud.
"What's the trouble with the red-eyed pony? That's simple enough, son.
The Lance done creeps over in the night an' ties a hossha'r tight about
the pony's laig jest above the fetlock. Black Cloud ain't up to no
sech move, the same bein' a trade secret of the Lance's an' bein' the
hossha'r is hid in the ha'r on the pony's laig, no one notes its
presence.
"After Black Cloud looks his red-eyed big medicine pony all over an'
can't onderstand its lameness, the Lance asks him will he cure it.
Black Cloud, who's sc'owlin' like midnight by now, retorts that he
will. So he gets his pipe an' fills it with medicine tobacco an' blows
a mouthful of smoke in the red-eyed pony's nose. Sech remedies don't
work; that pony still limps on three laigs, draggin' the afflicted
member mighty pensive.
"At last the Lance gives Black Cloud a patronisin' smile an' says that
his medicine'll cure the pony sound an' well while you're crackin' off
a gun. He walks up to the pony an' looks long in its red eyes; the
pony's y'ears an' tail droops, its head hangs down, an' it goes mighty
near to sleep. Then the Lance rubs his hand two or three times up an'
down the lame laig above the fetlock an' elim'nates that hossha'r
ligature an' no one the wiser. A moment after, he wakes up the
red-eyed pony an' to the amazement of the Osages an' the onbounded
delight of the Creeks, the pony is no longer lame, an' the laig so late
afflicted is as solid an' healthy as a sod house. What's bigger
medicine still, the red-eyed pony begins to follow the Lance about like
a dog an' as if it's charmed; an' it likewise turns in to bite an' r'ar
an' pitch an' jump sideways if Black Cloud seeks to put his paw on him.
Then all the Injuns yell with one voice: 'The Lance has won the Black
Cloud's big medicine red-eyed pony away from him.'
"The Lance is shore the fashion, an' Black Cloud discovers he ain't a
four-spot by compar'son. His repootation is gone, an' the Lance is
regyarded as the great medicine along the Arkansaw.
"Sunbright is lookin' on at these manoovers an' her heart goes out to
the Lance; she falls more deeply in love with him than even the
red-eyed bronco does. That evenin' as the Lance is goin' to his camp
onder the cottonwoods, he meets up with Sunbright standin' still as a
tree in his path with her head bowed like a flower that's gone to
sleep. The Lance saveys; he knows Sunbright; likewise he knows what
her plantin' herse'f in his way an' her droopin' attitoode explains.
He looks at her, an' says;
"'I am a guest of the Osages, an' to-night is not the night. Wait
ontil the Lance is in his own teepee on the Polecat; then come.'
"Sunbright never moves, never looks up; but she hears an' she knows
this is right. No buck should steal a squaw while he's a guest. The
Lance walks on an' leaves her standin', head bowed an' motionless.
"Two days later the Lance is ag'in in his own teepee. Sunbright counts
the time an' knows that he must be thar. She skulks from the camp of
Black Cloud an' starts on her journey to be a new wife to a new husband.
"Sunbright is a mile from camp when she's interrupted. It's Black
Cloud who heads her off. Black Cloud may not be the boss medicine man,
but he's no fool, an' his eyes is like a wolf's eyes an' can see in the
dark. He guesses the new love which has stampeded Sunbright.
"Injuns is a mighty cur'ous outfit. Now if Sunbright had succeeded in
gettin' to the lodge of her new husband, the divorce between her an'
Black Cloud would have been complete. Moreover, if on the day
followin' or at any time Black Cloud had found her thar, he wouldn't so
much as have wagged a y'ear or batted a eye in recognition. He
wouldn't have let on he ever hears of a squaw called 'Sunbright.' This
ca'mness would be born of two causes. It would be ag'in Injun
etiquette to go trackin' about makin' a onseemly uproar an' disturbin'
the gen'ral peace for purely private causes. Then ag'in it would be
beneath the dignity of a high grade savage an' a big medicine sharp to
conduct himse'f like he'd miss so trivial a thing as a squaw.
"But ontil Sunbright fulfils her elopement projects an' establishes
herse'f onder the protectin' wing of her new love, she's runnin' resks.
She's still the Black Cloud's squaw; an' after she pulls her marital
picket pin an' while she's gettin' away, if the bereaved Black Cloud
crosses up with her he's free, onder the license permitted to Injun
husbands, to kill her an' skelp her an' dispose of her as consists best
with his moods.
"Sunbright knows this; an' when she runs ag'in the Black Cloud in her
flight, she seats herse'f in the long prairie grass an' covers her head
with her blanket an' speaks never a word.
"'Does Sunbright so love me,' says Black Cloud, turnin' aheap ugly,
'that she comes to meet me? Is it for me she has combed her h'ar an'
put on a new feather an' beads? Does she wear her new blanket an'
paint her face bright for Black Cloud? Or does she dress herse'f like
the sun for that Creek coyote, the Lance?'" Sunbright makes no reply,
Black Cloud looks at her a moment an' then goes on: "It's for the
Lance! Good! I will fix the Sunbright so she will be a good squaw to
my friend, the Lance, an' never run from his lodge as she does now from
Black Cloud's.' With that he stoops down, an' a slash of his knife
cuts the heel-tendons of Sunbright's right foot. She groans, and
writhes about the prairie, while Black Cloud puts his knife back in his
belt, gets into his saddle ag'in an' rides away.
"The next day a Creek boy finds the body of Sunbright where she rolls
herse'f into the Greyhoss an' is drowned.
"When the Lance hears the story an' sees the knife slash on Sunbright's
heel, he reads the trooth. It gives him a bad heart; he paints his
face red an' black an thinks how he'll be revenged. Next day he sends
a runner to Black Cloud with word that Black Cloud has stole his hoss.
This is to arrange a fight on virtuous grounds. The Lance says that in
two days when the sun is overhead Black Cloud must come to the three
cottonwoods near the mouth of the Cimmaron an' fight, or the Lance on
the third day an' each day after will hunt for him as he'd hunt a wolf
ontil Black Cloud is dead. The Black Cloud's game, an' sends word that
on the second day he'll be thar by the three cottonwoods when the sun
is overhead; also, that he will fight with four arrows.
"Then Black Cloud goes at once, for he has no time to lose, an' kills a
dog near his lodge. He cuts out its heart an' carries it to the rocky
canyon where the rattlesnakes have a village. Black Cloud throws the
dog's heart among them an' teases them with it; an' the rattlesnakes
bite the dog's heart ag'in an' ag'in ontil it's as full of p'isen as a
bottle is of rum. After that, Black Cloud puts the p'isened heart in
the hot sun an' lets it fret an' fester ontil jest before he goes to
his dooel with the Lance. As he's about to start, Black Cloud dips the
four steel arrowheads over an' over in the p'isened heart, bein'
careful to dry the p'isen on the arrowheads; an' now whoever is touched
with these arrows so that the blood comes is shore to die. The biggest
medicine in the nation couldn't save him.
"Thar's forty Osage and forty Creek bucks at the three cottonwoods to
see that the dooelists get a squar' deal. The Lance an' Black Cloud is
thar; each has a bow an' four arrows; each has made medicine all night
that he may kill his man.
"But the dooel strikes a obstacle.
"Thar's a sombre, sullen sport among the Osages who's troo name is the
'Bob-cat,' but who's called the 'Knife Thrower.' The Bob-cat is one of
the Osage forty. Onknown to the others, this yere Bob-cat--who it
looks like is a mighty impressionable savage--is himse'f in love with
the dead Sunbright. An' he's hot an' cold because he's fearful that in
this battle of the bows the Lance'll down Black Cloud an' cheat him,
the Bob-cat, of his own revenge. The chance is too much; the Bob-cat
can't stand it an' resolves to get his stack down first. An' so it
happens that as Black Cloud an' the Lance, painted in their war
colours, is walkin' to their places, a nine-inch knife flickers like a
gleam of light from the hand of the Bob-cat, an' merely to show that he
ain't called the 'Knife Thrower' for fun, catches Black Cloud flush in
the throat, an' goes through an' up to the gyard at the knife-haft.
Black Cloud dies standin', for the knife p'int bites his spine.
"No, son, no one gets arrested; Injuns don't have jails, for the mighty
excellent reason that no Injun culprit ever vamoses an' runs away.
Injun crim'nals, that a-way, allers stands their hands an' takes their
hemlock. The Osages, who for Injuns is some shocked at the Bob-cat's
interruption of the dooel--it bein' mighty onparliamentary from their
standp'ints--tries the Bob-cat in their triboonals for killin' Black
Cloud an' he's decided on as guilty accordin' to their law. They
app'ints a day for the Bob-cat to be shot; an' as he ain't present at
the trial none, leavin' his end of the game to be looked after by his
reelatives, they orders a kettle-tender or tribe crier to notify the
Bob-cat when an' where he's to come an' have said sentence execooted
upon him. When he's notified, the Bob-cat don't say nothin'; which is
satisfactory enough, as thar's nothin' to be said, an' every Osage
knows the Bob-cat'll be thar at the drop of the handkerchief if he's
alive.
"It so turns out; the Bob-cat's thar as cool as wild plums. He's
dressed in his best blankets an' leggin's; an' his feathers an' gay
colours makes him a overwhelmin' match for peacocks. Thar's a white
spot painted over his heart.
"The chief of the Osages, who's present to see jestice done, motions to
the Bob-cat, an' that gent steps to a red blanket an' stands on its
edge with all the blanket spread in front of him on the grass. The
Bob-cat stands on the edge, as he saveys when he's plugged that he'll
fall for'ard on his face. When a gent gets the gaff for shore, he
falls for'ard. If a party is hit an' falls back'ards, you needn't get
excited none; he's only creased an' 'll get over it.
"Wherefore, as I states, the Bob-cat stands on the edge of the blanket
so it's spread out in front to catch him as he drops. Thar's not a
word spoke by either the Bob-cat or the onlookers, the latter openin'
out into a lane behind so the lead can go through. When the Bob-cat's
ready, his cousin, a buck whose name is Little Feather, walks to the
front of the blanket an' comes down careful with his Winchester on the
white mark over the Bob-cat's heart. Thar's a moment's silence as the
Bob-cat's cousin runs his eye through the sights; thar's a flash an' a
hatful of gray smoke; the white spot turns red with blood; an' then the
Bob-cat falls along on his face as soft as a sack of corn.
"What becomes of the Lance? It's two weeks later when that scientist
is waited on by a delegation of Osages. They reminds him that
Sunbright has two sisters, the same bein' now widows by virchoo of the
demise of that egreegious Black Cloud. Also, the Black Cloud was rich;
his teepee was sumptuous, an' he's left a buckskin coat with ivory elk
teeth sewed onto it plenty as stars at night. The coat is big
medicine; moreover thar's the milk-white big medicine bronco with red
eyes. The Osage delegation puts forth these trooths while the Lance
sets cross-laiged on a b'arskin an' smokes willow bark with much
dignity. In the finish, the Osage outfit p'ints up to the fact that
their tribe is shy a medicine man, an' a gent of the Lance's
accomplishments who can charm anamiles an' lame broncos will be a
mighty welcome addition to the Osage body politic. The Lance lays down
his pipe at this an' says, 'It is enough!' An' the next day he sallies
over an' weds them two relicts of Black Cloud an' succeeds to that dead
necromancer's estate an' both at one fell swoop. The two widows
chuckles an' grins after the manner of ladies, to get a new husband so
swift; an' abandonin' his lodge on the Polecat the Lance sets up his
game at Greyhoss, an' onless he's petered, he's thar dealin' it yet."
CHAPTER VIII.
Tom and Jerry; Wheelers.
"Obstinacy or love, that a-way, when folks pushes 'em to excess, is shore
bad medicine. Which I'd be aheap loath to count the numbers them two
attribootes harries to the tomb. Why, son, it's them sentiments that
kills off my two wheel mules, Tom an' Jerry."
The Old Cattleman appeared to be on the verge of abstract discussion. As
a metaphysician, he was not to be borne with. There was one method of
escape; I interfered to coax the currents of his volubility into other
and what were to me, more interesting channels.
"Tell me of the trail; or a story about animals," I urged. "You were
saying recently that perfect systems of oral if not verbal communication
existed among mules, and that you had listened for hours to their gossip.
Give me the history of one of your freighting trips and what befell along
the trail; and don't forget the comment thereon--wise, doubtless, it
was--of your long-eared servants of the rein and trace-chain."
"Tell you what chances along the trail? Son, you-all opens a wide-flung
range for my mem'ry to graze over. I might tell you how I'm lost once,
freightin' from Vegas into the Panhandle, an' am two days without
water--blazin' Jooly days so hot you couldn't touch tire, chain, or
bolt-head without fryin' your fingers. An' how at the close of the
second day when I hauls in at Cabra Springs, I lays down by that cold an'
blessed fountain an' drinks till I aches. Which them two days of thirst
terrorises me to sech degrees that for one plumb year tharafter, I never
meets up with water when I don't drink a quart, an' act like I'm layin'
in ag'in another parched spell.
"Or I might relate how I stops over one night from Springer on my way to
the Canadian at a Triangle-dot camp called Kingman. This yere is a
one-room stone house, stark an' sullen an' alone on the desolate plains,
an' no scenery worth namin' but a half-grown feeble spring. This Kingman
ain't got no windows; its door is four-inch thick of oak; an' thar's
loopholes for rifles in each side which shows the sports who builds that
edifice in the stormy long-ago is lookin' for more trouble than comfort
an' prepares themse'fs. The two cow-punchers I finds in charge is scared
to a standstill; they allows this Kingman's ha'nted. They tells me how
two parties who once abides thar--father an' son they be--gets downed by
a hold-up whose aim is pillage, an' who comes cavortin' along an'
butchers said fam'ly in their sleep. The cow-punchers declar's they
hears the spooks go scatterin' about the room as late as the night before
I trails in. I ca'ms 'em--not bein' subject to nerve stampedes myse'f,
an' that same midnight when the sperits comes ha'ntin' about ag'in, I
turns outen my blankets an' lays said spectres with the butt of my mule
whip--the same when we strikes a light an' counts 'em up bein' a couple
of kangaroo rats. This yere would front up for a mighty thrillin' tale
if I throws myse'f loose with its reecital an' daubs in the colour plenty
vivid an' free.
"Then thar's the time I swings over to the K-bar-8 ranch for corn--bein'
I'm out of said cereal--an' runs up on a cow gent, spurs, gun-belt, big
hat an' the full regalia, hangin' to the limb of a cottonwood, dead as
George the Third, an' not a hundred foot from the ranch door. An' how
inside I finds a half-dozen more cow folks, lookin' grave an' sayin'
nothin'; an' the ranch manager has a bloody bandage about his for'ead,
an' another holdin' up his left arm, half bandage an' half sling, the
toot ensemble, as Colonel Sterett calls it, showin' sech recent war that
the blood's still wet on the cloths an' drops on the floor as we talks.
An' how none of us says a word about the dead gent in the cottonwood or
of the manager who's shot up; an' how that same manager outfits me with
ten sacks of mule-food an' I goes p'intin' out for the Southeast an'
forgets all I sees an' never mentions it ag'in.
"Then thar's Sim Booth of the Fryin' Pan outfit, who's one evenin' camped
with me at Antelope Springs; an' who saddles up an' ropes onto the laigs
of a dead Injun where they're stickin' forth--bein' washed free by the
rains--an' pulls an' rolls that copper-coloured departed outen his
sepulchre a lot, an' then starts his pony off at a canter an' sort o'
fritters the remains about the landscape. Sim does this on the argyment
that the obsequies, former, takes place too near the spring. This yere
Sim's pony two months later steps in a dog hole when him an' Sim's goin'
along full swing with some cattle on a stampede, an' the cayouse falls on
Sim an' breaks everything about him incloosive of his neck. The other
cow-punchers allers allow it's because Sim turns out that aborigine over
by Antelope Springs. Now sech a eepisode, properly elab'rated, might
feed your attention an' hold it spellbound some.
"Son, if I was to turn myse'f loose on, great an' little, the divers
incidents of the trail, it would consoome days in the relation. I could
tell of cactus flowers, blazin' an' brilliant as a eye of red fire ag'in
the brown dusk of the deserts; or of mile-long fields of Spanish bayonet
in bloom; or of some Mexican's doby shinin' like a rooby in the sunlight
a day's journey ahead, the same one onbroken mass from roof to ground of
the peppers they calls _chili_, all reddenin' in the hot glare of the day.
"Or, if you has a fancy for stirrin' incident an' lively scenes, thar's a
time when the rains has raised the old Canadian ontil that quicksand ford
at Tascosa--which has done eat a hundred teams if ever it swallows
one!--is torn up complete an' the bottom of the river nothin' save
b'ilin' sand with a shallow yere an' a hole deep enough to drown a house
scooped out jest beyond. An' how since I can't pause a week or two for
the river to run down an' the ford to settle, I goes spraddlin' an'
tumblin' an' swimmin' across on Tom, my nigh wheeler, opens negotiations
with the LIT ranch, an' Bob Roberson, has his riders round-up the
pasture, an' comes chargin' down to the ford with a bunch of one thousand
ponies, all of 'em dancin' an' buckin' an' prancin' like chil'en outen
school. Roberson an' the LIT boys throws the thousand broncos across an'
across the ford for mighty likely it's fifty times. They'd flash 'em
through--the whole band together--on the run; an' then round 'em up on
the opp'site bank, turn 'em an' jam 'em through ag'in. When they ceases,
the bottom of the river is tramped an' beat out as hard an' as flat as a
floor, an' I hooks up an' brings the waggons over like the
ford--bottomless quicksand a hour prior--is one of these yere asphalt
streets.
"Or I might relate about a cowboy tournament that's held over in the flat
green bottom of Parker's arroya; an' how Jack Coombs throws a rope an'
fastens at one hundred an' four foot, while Waco Simpson rides at the
herd of cattle one hundred foot away, ropes, throws an' ties down a
partic'lar steer, frees his lariat an' is back with the jedges ag'in in
forty-eight seconds. Waco wins the prize, a Mexican
saddle--stamp-leather an' solid gold she is--worth four hundred dollars,
by them onpreecedented alacrities.
"Or, I might impart about a Mexican fooneral where the hearse is a
blanket with two poles along the aige, the same as one of these battle
litters; of the awful songs the mournful Mexicans sings about departed;
of the candles they burns an' the dozens of baby white-pine crosses they
sets up on little jim-crow stone-heaps along the trail to the tomb;
meanwhiles, howlin' dirges constant.
"Now I thinks of it I might bresh up the recollections of a mornin' when
I rolls over, blankets an' all, onto something that feels as big as a
boot-laig an' plenty squirmy; an' how I shows zeal a-gettin' to my feet,
knowin' I'm reposin' on a rattlesnake who's bunked in ag'in my back all
sociable to warm himse'f. It's worth any gent's while to see how heated
an' indignant that serpent takes it because of me turnin' out so early
and so swift.
"Then thar's a mornin' when I finds myse'f not five miles down the wind
from a prairie fire; an' it crackin' an' roarin' in flame-sheets twenty
foot high an' makin' for'ard jumps of fifty foot. What do I do? Go
for'ard down the wind, set fire to the grass myse'f, an' let her burn
ahead of me. In two minutes I'm over on a burned deestrict of my own,
an' by the time the orig'nal flames works down to my fire line, my own
speshul fire is three miles ahead an I myse'f am ramblin' along cool an'
saloobrious with a safe, shore area of burnt prairie to my r'ar.
"An' thar's a night on the Serrita la Cruz doorin' a storm, when the
lightnin' melts the tire on the wheel of my trail-waggon, an' me layin'
onder it at the time. An' it don't even wake me up. Thar's the time,
too, when I crosses up at Chico Springs with eighty Injuns who's been
buffalo huntin' over to the South Paloduro, an' has with 'em four hundred
odd ponies loaded with hides an' buffalo beef an' all headed for their
home-camps over back of Taos. The bucks is restin' up a day or two when
I rides in; later me an' a half dozen jumps a band of antelopes jest
'round a p'int of rocks. Son, you-all would have admired to see them
savages shoot their arrows. I observes one young buck a heap clost. He
holds the bow flat down with his left hand while his arrows in their
cow-skin quiver sticks over his right shoulder. The way he would flash
his right hand back, yank forth a arrow, slam it on his bow, pull it to
the head an' cut it loose, is shore a heap earnest. Them missiles would
go sailin' off for over three hundred yards, an' I sees him get seven
started before ever the first one strikes the ground. The Injuns
acquires four antelope by this archery an' shoots mebby some forty
arrows; all of which they carefully reclaims when the excitement
subsides. She's trooly a sperited exhibition an' I finds it mighty
entertainin'.
"I throws these hints loose to show what might be allooded to by way of
stories, grave and gay, of sights pecooliar to the trail if only some
gent of experience ups an' devotes himse'f to the relations. As it is,
however, an' recurrin' to Tom an' Jerry--the same bein' as I informs you,
my two wheel mules--I reckons now I might better set forth as to how they
comes to die that time. It's his obstinacy that downs Jerry; while pore,
tender Tom perishes the victim--volunteer at that--of the love he b'ars
his contrary mate.
"Them mules, Tom an' Jerry, is obtained by me, orig'nal in Vegas.
They're the wheelers of a eight-mule team; an' I gives Frosty--who's a
gambler an' wins 'em at monte of some locoed sport from Chaparita--twelve
hundred dollars for the outfit. Which the same is cheap an' easy at
double the _dinero_.
"These mules evident has been part an' passel of the estates of some
Mexican, for I finds a cross marked on each harness an' likewise on both
waggons. Mexicans employs this formal'ty to run a bluff on any evil
sperit who may come projectin' round. Your American mule skinner never
makes them tokens. As a roole he's defiant of sperits; an' even when he
ain't he don't see no refooge in a cross. Mexicans, on the other hand,
is plenty strong on said symbol. Every mornin' you beholds a Mexican
with a dab of white on his fore'erd an' on each cheek bone, an' also on
his chin where he crosses himse'f with flour; shore, the custom is
yooniversal an' it takes a quart of flour to fully fortify a full-blown
Greaser household ag'inst the antic'pated perils of the day.
"No sooner am I cl'ar of Vegas--I'm camped near the Plaza de la
Concepcion at the time--when I rounds up the eight mules an' looks 'em
over with reference to their characters. This is jest after I acquires
'em. It's allers well for a gent to know what he's ag'inst; an' you can
put down a stack the disp'sitions of eight mules is a important problem.
"The review is plenty satisfactory. The nigh leader is a steady
practical person as a lead mule oughter be, an' I notes by his ca'm
jedgmatical eye that he's goin' to give himse'f the benefit of every
doubt, an' ain't out to go stampedin' off none without knowin' the reason
why. His mate at the other end of the jockey-stick is nervous an'
hysterical; she never trys to solve no riddles of existence herse'f, this
Jane mule don't, but relies on her mate Peter an' plays Peter's system
blind. The nigh p'inter is a deecorous form of mule with no bad habits;
while his mate over the chain is one of these yere hard, se'fish, wary
parties an' his little game is to get as much of everything except work
an' trouble as the lay of the kyards permits. My nigh swing mule is a
wit like I tells you the other day. Which this jocose anamile is the
life of the team an' allers lettin' fly some dry, quaint observation.
This mule wag is partic'lar excellent at a bad ford or a hard crossin',
an his gay remarks, full of p'int as a bowie knife, shorely cheers an'
uplifts the sperits of the rest. The off swing is a heedless creature
who regyards his facetious mate as the very parent of fun, an' he goes
about with his y'ear cocked an' his mouth ajar, ready to laugh them 'hah,
hah!' laughs of his'n at every word his pard turns loose.
"Tom an' Jerry is different from the others. Bein' bigger an' havin'
besides the respons'bilities of the hour piled onto them as wheel mules
must, they cultivates a sooperior air an is distant an' reserved in their
attitoodes towards the other six. As to each other their pose needs more
deescription. Tom, the nigh wheeler--the one I rides when drivin'--is
infatyooated with Jerry. I hears a sky-sharp aforetime preach about
Jonathan an' David. Yet I'm yere to assert, son, that them sacred people
ain't on speakin' terms compared to the way that pore old lovin' Tom mule
feels towards Jerry.
"This affection of Tom's is partic'lar amazin' when you-all recalls the
fashion in which the sullen Jerry receives it. Doorin' the several years
I spends in their s'ciety I never once detects Jerry in any look or word
of kindness to Tom. Jerry bites him an' kicks him an' cusses him out
constant; he never tol'rates Tom closter than twenty foot onless at times
when he orders Tom to curry him. Shore, the imbecile Tom submits. On
sech o'casions when Jerry issues a summons to go over him, usin' his
upper teeth for a comb an' bresh, Tom is never so happy. Which he digs
an' delves at Jerry's ribs that a-way like it's a honour; after a half
hour, mebby, when Jerry feels refreshed s'fficient, he w'irls on Tom an'
dismisses him with both heels.
"'I track up on folks who's jest the same,' says Dan Boggs, one time when
I mentions this onaccountable infatyooation of Tom. 'This Jerry loves
that Tom mule mate of his, only he ain't lettin' on. I knows a lady
whose treatment of her husband is a dooplicate of Jerry's. She metes out
the worst of it to that long-sufferin' shorthorn at every bend in the
trail; it looks like he never wins a good word or a soft look from her
once. An' yet when that party cashes in, whatever does the lady do?
Takes a hooker of whiskey, puts in p'isen enough to down a dozen wolves,
an' drinks off every drop. 'Far'well, vain world, I'm goin' home,' says
the lady; 'which I prefers death to sep'ration, an' I'm out to jine my
beloved husband in the promised land.' I knows, for I attends the
fooneral of that family--said fooneral is a double-header as the lady,
bein' prompt, trails out after her husband before ever he's pitched his
first camp--an' later assists old Chandler in deevisin' a epitaph, the
same occurrin' in these yere familiar words:
"She sort o got the drop on him,
In the dooel of earthly love;
Let's hope he gets an even break
When they meets in heaven above."
"'Thar,' concloods Dan, 'is what I regyards as a parallel experience to
this Tom an' Jerry. The lady plays Jerry's system from soda to hock, an'
yet you-all can see in the lights of that thar sooicide how deep she
loves him.'
"'That's all humbug, Dan,' says Enright; 'the lady you relates of isn't
lovin'. She's only locoed that a-way.'
"'Whyever if she's locoed, then,' argues Dan, 'don't they up an' hive her
in one of their madhouse camps? She goes chargin' about as free an'
fearless as a cyclone.'
"'All the same,' says Texas Thompson, 'her cashin' in don't prove no
lovin' heart. Mebby she does it so's to chase him up an' continyoo
onbroken them hectorin's of her's. I could onfold a fact or two about
that wife of mine who cuts out the divorce from me in Laredo that would
lead you to concloosions sim'lar. But she wasn't your wife; an' I don't
aim to impose my domestic afflictions on this innocent camp, which bein'
troo I mootely stands my hand.'
"This Jerry's got one weakness however, I don't never take advantage of
it. He's scared to frenzy if you pulls a gun. I reckons, with all them
crimes of his'n preyin' on his mind, that he allows you're out, to shoot
him up. Jerry is ca'm so long as your gun's in the belt, deemin' it as
so much onmeanin' ornament. But the instant you pulls it like you're
goin' to put it in play, he onbuckles into piercin' screams. I reaches
for my six-shooter one evenin' by virchoo of antelopes, an' that's the
time I discovers this foible of Jerry's. I never gets a shot. At the
sight of the gun Jerry evolves a howl an' the antelopes tharupon hits two
or three high places an' is miles away. Shore, they thinks Jerry is some
new breed of demon.
"When I turns to note the cause of Jerry's clamours he's loppin' his
fore-laigs over Tom's back an' sobbin' an' sheddin' tears into his mane.
Tom sympathises with Jerry an' says all he can to teach him that the
avenger ain't on his trail. Nothin' can peacify Jerry, however, except
jammin' that awful six-shooter back into its holster. I goes over Jerry
that evenin' patiently explorin' for bullet marks, but thar ain't none.
No one's ever creased him; an' I figgers final by way of a s'lootion of
his fits that mighty likely Jerry's attended some killin' between
hoomans, inadvertent, an' has the teeth of his apprehensions set on aige.
"Jerry is that high an' haughty he won't come up for corn in the mornin'
onless I petitions him partic'lar an' calls him by name. To jest whoop
'Mules!' he holds don't incloode him. Usual I humours Jerry an' shouts
his title speshul, the others bein' called in a bunch. When Jerry hears
his name he walks into camp, delib'rate an' dignified, an' kicks every
mule to pieces who tries to shove in ahead.
"Once, feelin' some malignant myse'f, I tries Jerry's patience out. I
don't call 'Jerry,' merely shouts 'Mules' once or twice an' lets it go at
that. Jerry, when he notices I don't refer to him partic'lar lays his
y'ears back; an' although his r'ar elevation is towards me I can see he's
hotter than a hornet. The faithful Tom abides with Jerry; though he
tells him it's feed time an' that the others with a nosebag on each of
'em is already at their repasts. Jerry only gets madder an' lays for Tom
an' tries to bite him. After ten minutes, sullen an' sulky, hunger beats
Jerry an' he comes bumpin' into camp like a bar'l down hill an' eases his
mind by wallopin' both hind hoofs into them other blameless mules,
peacefully munchin' their rations. Also, after Jerry's let me put the
nosebag onto him he reeverses his p'sition an' swiftly lets fly at me.
But I ain't in no trance an' Jerry misses. I don't frale him; I saveys
it's because he feels hoomiliated with me not callin' him by name.
"As a roole me an' Jerry gets through our dooties harmonious. He can
pull like a lion an' never flinches or flickers at a pinch. It's shore a
vict'ry to witness the heroic way Jerry goes into the collar at a hard
steep hill or some swirlin', rushin' ford. Sech bein' Jerry's work
habits I'm prepared to overlook a heap of moral deeficiencies an' never
lays it up ag'in Jerry that he's morose an' repellant when I flings him
any kindnesses.
"But while I don't resent 'em none by voylence, still Jerry has habits
ag'inst which I has to gyard. You-all recalls how long ago I tells you
of Jerry's, bein' a thief. Shore, he can't he'p it; he's a born
kleptomaniac. Leastwise 'kleptomaniac' is what Colonel Sterett calls it
when he's tellin' me of a party who's afflicted sim'lar.
"'Otherwise this gent's a heap respectable,' says the Colonel. 'Morally
speakin' thar's plenty who's worse. Of course, seein' he's crowdin'
forty years, he ain't so shamefully innocent neither. He ain't no
debyootanty; still, he ain't no crime-wrung debauchee. I should say he
grades midway in between. But deep down in his system this person's a
kleptomaniac, an' at last his weakness gets its hobbles off an' he turns
himse'f loose, an' begins to jest nacherally take things right an' left.
No, he don't get put away in Huntsville; they sees he's locoed an' he's
corraled instead in one of the asylums where thar's nothin' loose an'
little kickin' 'round, an' tharfore no temptations.'
"Takin' the word then from Colonel Sterett, Jerry is a kleptomaniac. I
used former to hobble Jerry but one mornin' I'm astounded to see what
looks like snow all about my camp. Bein' she's in Joone that snow theery
don't go. An' it ain't snow, it's flour; this kleptomaniac Jerry creeps
to the waggons while I sleeps an' gets away, one after the other, with
fifteen fifty-pound sacks of flour. Then he entertains himse'f an' Tom
by p'radin' about with the sacks in his teeth, shakin' an' tossin' his
head an' powderin' my 'Pride of Denver' all over the plains. Which Jerry
shore frosts that scenery plumb lib'ral.
"It's the next night an' I don't hobble Jerry; I pegs him out on a
lariat. What do you-all reckon now that miscreant does? Corrupts pore
Tom who you may be certain is sympathisin' 'round, an' makes Tom go to
the waggons, steal the flour an' pack it out to him where he's pegged.
The soopine Tom, who otherwise is the soul of integrity, abstracts six
sacks for his mate an' at daybreak the wretched Jerry's standin' thar,
white as milk himse'f, an' flour a foot deep in a cirkle whereof the
radius is his rope Tom's gazin' on Jerry in a besotted way like he allows
he's certainly the greatest sport on earth.
"Which this last is too much an' I ropes up Jerry for punishment. I
throws an' hawgties Jerry, an' he's layin' thar on his side. His eye is
obdoorate an' thar's neither shame nor repentance in his heart. Tom is
sort o' sobbin' onder his breath; Tom would have swapped places with
Jerry too quick an' I sees he has it in his mind to make the offer, only
he knows I'll turn it down."
"The other six mules comes up an' loafs about observant an' respectful.
They jestifies my arrangements; besides Jerry is mighty onpop'lar with
'em by reason of his heels. I can hear Peter the little lead mule sayin'
to Jane, his mate: 'The boss is goin' to lam Jerry a lot with a
trace-chain. Which it's shore comin' to him!'
"I w'irls the chain on high an' lays it along Jerry's evil ribs,
_kerwhillup_! Every other link bites through the hide an' the chain
plows a most excellent an' wholesome furrow. As the chain descends, the
sympathetic Tom jumps an' gives a groan. Tom feels a mighty sight worse
than his _companero_. At the sixth wallop Tom can't b'ar no more, but
with tears an' protests comes an' stands over Jerry an' puts it up he'll
take the rest himse'f. This evidence of brotherly love stands me off,
an' for Tom's sake I desists an' throws Jerry loose. That old
scoundrel--while I sees he's onforgivin' an' a-harbourin' of hatreds
ag'in me--don't forget the trace-chain an' comports himse'f like a
law-abidin' mule for months. He even quits bitin' an' kickin' Tom, an'
that lovin' beast seems like he's goin' to break his heart over it,
'cause he looks on it as a sign that Jerry's gettin' cold.
"But thar comes a day when I loses both Tom an' Jerry. It's about second
drink time one August mornin' an' me an' my eight mules goes scamperin'
through a little Mexican plaza called Tramperos on our way to the
Canadian. Over by a 'doby stands a old fleabitten gray mare; she's shore
hideous.
"Now if mules has one overmasterin' deloosion it's a gray mare; she's the
religion an' the goddess of the mules. This knowledge is common; if
you-all is ever out to create a upheaval in the bosom of a mule the
handiest, quickest lever is a old gray mare. The gov'ment takes
advantage of this aberration of the mules. Thar's trains of pack mules
freightin' to the gov'ment posts in the Rockies. They figgers on three
hundred pounds to the mule an' the freight is packed in panniers. The
gov'ment freighters not bein' equal to the manifold mysteries of a
diamond-hitch, don't use no reg'lar shore-enough pack saddle but takes
refooge with their ignorance in panniers.
"Speakin' gen'ral, thar's mebby two hundred mules in one of these
gov'ment pack trains. An' in the lead, followed, waited on an'
worshipped by the mules, is a aged gray mare. She don't pack nothin' but
her virchoo an' a little bell, which last is hung 'round her neck. This
old mare, with nothin' but her character an' that bell to encumber her,
goes fa'rly flyin' light. But go as fast an' as far as she pleases, them
long-y'eared locoed worshippers of her's won't let her outen their
raptured sight. The last one of 'em, panniers, freight an' all, would go
surgin' to the topmost pinnacle of the Rockies if she leads the way.
"An' at that this gray mare don't like mules none; she abhors their
company an' kicks an' abooses 'em to a standstill whenever they draws
near. But the fool mules don't care; it's ecstacy to simply know she's
livin' an' that mule's cup of joy is runnin' over who finds himse'f
permitted to crop grass within forty foot of his old, gray bell-bedecked
idol.
"We travels all day, followin' glimpsin' that flea-bitten cayouse at
Tramperos. But the mules can't think or talk of nothin' else. It
arouses their religious enthoosiasm to highest pitch; even the cynic
Jerry gets half-way keyed up over it. I looks for trouble that night;
an' partic'lar I pegs out Jerry plenty deep and strong. The rest is
hobbled, all except Tom. Gray mare or not, I'll gamble the outfit Tom
wouldn't abandon Jerry, let the indoocement be ever so alloorin'.
"Every well-organised mule team that a-way allers carries along a bronco.
This little steed, saddled an' bridled, trots throughout the day by the
side of the off-wheeler, his bridle-rein caught over the wheeler's hame.
The bronco is used to round up the mules in event they strays or declines
in the mornin' to come when called. Sech bein' the idee, the cayous is
allers kept strictly in camp.
"'James' is my bronco's name; an' the evenin', followin' the vision of
that Tramperos gray mare I makes onusual shore 'that James stays with me.
Not that gray mares impresses James--him bein' a boss an' bosses havin'
religious convictions different from mules--or is doo to prove
temptations to him; but he might conceal other plans an' get strayed
prosecootin' of 'em to a finish. I ties James to the trail-waggon, an'
followin' bacon, biscuits, airtights an' sech, the same bein' my froogal
fare when on the trail, I rolls in onder the lead-waggon 'an' gives
myse'f up to sleep.
"Exactly as I surmises, when I turns out at sun-up thar's never a mule in
sight. Every one of them idolaters goes poundin' back, as fast as ever
he can with hobbles on, to confess his sins an' say his pray'rs at the
shrine of that old gray mare. Even Jerry, whose cynicism should have
saved him, pulls his picket-pin with the rest an', takin' Tom along, goes
curvin' off. It ain't more than ten minutes, you can gamble! when James
an' me is on their trails.
"One by one, I overtakes the team strung all along between my camp an'
Tramperos. Peter, the little lead mule, bein' plumb agile an' a sharp on
hobbles, gets cl'ar thar; an' I finds him devourin' the goddess gray mare
with heart an' soul an' eyes, an' singin' to himse'f the while in low,
satisfied tones.
"As one after the other I passes the pilgrim mules I turns an' lifts
about a squar' inch of hide off each with the blacksnake whip I'm
carryin', by way of p'intin' out their heresies an arousin' in 'em a
eagerness to get back to their waggons an' a' upright, pure career. They
takes the chastisement humble an' dootiful, an' relinquishes the thought
of reachin' the goddess gray mare.
"When I overtakes old Jerry I pours the leather into him speshul, an' the
way him an' his pard Tom goes scatterin' for
Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/13709