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Happy Hawkins

by Robert Alexander Wason · English · Gutenberg #3705 · 586,090 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Happy Hawkins

Author: Robert Alexander Wason


        
Release date: February 1, 2003 [eBook #3705]
                Most recently updated: January 8, 2021

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3705

Credits: Produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed
        Proofreading Team. HTML version by Al Haines.


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HAPPY HAWKINS ***




Produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team. HTML version by Al Haines.









Happy Hawkins


by

Robert Alexander Wason




TO

MY OLD PAL




CONTENTS


      I   THE DIAMOND DOT
     II   CONVINCING A COOK
    III   UNDER FIRE
     IV   PROFESSIONAL DUTY
      V   JUST MONODY--A MAN
     VI   THE RACE
    VII   MENTAL TREATMENT FOR A BROKEN LEG
   VIII   THE LETTER
     IX   ADRIFT AGAIN
      X   A WINTER AT SLOCUM'S LUCK
     XI   DRESS REFORM AT THE DIAMOND DOT
    XII   THE LASSOO DUEL
   XIII   BUSINESS IS BUSINESS
    XIV   THE CHINESE QUESTION
     XV   THE DIAMOND DOT AGAIN
    XVI   THE HIGHER EDUCATION OF WOMAN
   XVII   IN RETIREMENT
  XVIII   CUPID
    XIX   BARBIE MAKES A DISCOVERY
     XX   RICHARD WHITTINGTON ARRIVES
    XXI   HAPPY MAKES A DISCOVERY
   XXII   A FRIENDLY GAME
  XXIII   CAST STEEL
   XXIV   FEMININE LOGIC
    XXV   THE WAYS OF WOMANKIND
   XXVI   A MODERN KNIGHT-ERRANT
  XXVII   THE CREOLE BELLE
 XXVIII   THE DAY OF THE WEDDING
   XXIX   THE FINAL RECKONING
    XXX   THE AFTERGLOW




CHAPTER ONE

THE DIAMOND DOT


I wasn't really a Westerner an' that's why I'm so different from most
of 'em. Take your regular bonie fide Westerner an' when he dies he
don't turn to dust, he turns to alkali; but when it comes my turn to
settle, I'll jest natchely become the good rich soil o' the Indiana
cornbelt.

I was born in Indiana and I never left it till after I was ten years
old. That's about the time boys generally start out to hunt Injuns; but
I kept on goin' till I found mine--but I didn't kill him--nor him me
neither, as far as that goes.

I allus did have the misfortune o' gettin' hungry at the most
inconvenient times, an' after I 'd been gone about two weeks I got
quite powerful hungry, so I natchely got a job waitin' on a lunch
counter back in Omaha. The third day I was there I was all alone in the
front room when in walked an Injun. He was about eight feet high, I
reckon; and the fiercest Injun I ever see. I took one look at him a'
then I dropped behind the counter and wiggled back to the kitchen where
the boss was. I gasped out that the Injuns was upon us an' then I flew
for my firearms.

When the boss discovered that the Injun and fourteen doughnuts, almost
new, had vanished, he was some put out, and after we had discussed the
matter, I acted on his advice and came farther West. That business
experience lasted me a good long while. I don't like business an' I
don't blame any one who has to follow it for a livin' for wantin' to
have a vacation so he can get out where the air is fit to breathe.

Just imagine bein' hived up day after day with nothin' to see but walls
an' nothin' to do but customers. You first got to be friendly with your
visitors to make 'em feel at home, an' then you got to get as much of
their money as you can in order to keep on bein' friendly with 'em in
order to keep on gettin' as much of their money as you can.

Now out in the open a feller don't have to be a hypocrite: once I
worked a whole year for a man who hated me so he wouldn't speak to me;
but I didn't care, I liked the work and I did it an' he raised my wages
twice an' gave me a pony when I quit.

He was the sourest tempered man I ever see; but it was good trainin' to
live with him a spell. Lots of men has streaks of bein' unbearable; but
this man was the only one I ever met up with who was solid that way,
and didn't have one single streak of bein' likeable. He was the only
man I ever see who wouldn't talk to me. I was a noticing sort of a kid
an' I saw mighty early that what wins the hearts o' ninety-nine men out
of a hundred is listenin' to 'em talk. That's why I don't talk much
myself. But you couldn't listen to old Spike Williams, 'cause the'
wasn't no opportunity--he didn't even cuss.

We was snowed up for two weeks one time an' I took a vow 'at I'd make
him talk. I tried every subject I'd ever heard of; but he didn't even
grunt. Just when things was clearin' off, I sez to him, usin' my
biggest trump: "Spike," sez I, "do you know what they say about you?"

"No," sez he, "but you know what I say about them," an' he went on with
his packin'.

I thought for a while 'at the year I'd spent with Spike Williams was a
total loss; but jest the contrary. It had kept me studyin' an' schemin'
an' analysin' until, after that year had been stored away to season, I
discovered it was the best year I'd ever put in, an' while I hadn't got
overly well acquainted with Spike, I had become mighty friendly with
myself and was surprised to find out how much the' was to me.

Did you ever think of that? You start out an' a feller comes along an'
throws an opinion around your off fore foot an' you go down in a heap
an' that opinion holds you fast for some time. When you start on again
another feller ropes you with a new opinion, an' the first thing you
know you are all cluttered up an' loaded down with other fellers'
opinions, an' the' ain't enough o' your own self left to tell what
you're like; but after that winter with Spike I was pretty well able to
dodge an opinion until I had time to learn what it meant.

But the main good I got out of Spike was learnin' how to take old Cast
Steel Judson. It was some years after this before I met up with him;
but the good effect hadn't worn off and me an' Cast Steel just merged
together like butter an' a hot penny. I wasn't much more 'an a kid even
then, but law! I wish I knew just half as much now as I thought I did
then. My self respect was certainly a bulky article those days an' I
wasn't in the habit of undervaluin' my own judgment--not to any great
extent; but that habit o' study I'd formed with Spike was my balance
wheel, an' I generally managed to keep my conceit from shuttin' out the
entire landscape. The' wasn't a great deal escaped my eye, 'cause I
begun to notice purty tol'able young that experience is consid'able
like a bank account: takes a heap o' sweat to get her started, but
she's comfortable to draw on in a pinch.

Ol' man Judson was a curious affair, had his own way o' doin' every
blessed thing, an' whenever he hired a man he always went through the
same rigamarole. "Now what I'm contractin' for," he'd say, "is just
only your time an' whatever part o' your thinkin' apparatus as is
needed in doin' YOUR share o' my business. If I detail you to sit in
the shade an' count clouds, I don't want no argument, I want the clouds
counted. When I don't specially express a hungerin' for any of your
advice, that's the very time when you don't need to give any. Whenever
you think you have a kick comin'--why think again. Then if you still
see the kick, make it to the foreman. If that don't work make it to me;
but when you make it to me, you want to be mighty sure it will hold
water. Above all things I hate a liar, a coward, an' a sneak. Now get
busy 'cause life is short an' time is fleetin'."

That was the way he used to talk, an' some used to set him down as a
tyrant, an' some had him guessed in as a rough old codger with a soft
heart,--everybody took a guess at him,--but the blood in the turnip was
that ol' Jabez Judson was purty tol'able sizey when you carne to fence
him in. Everybody called him Cast Steel Judson, an' you might work
through the langwidge five times without adding much to the
description. Hard he was an' stern an' no bend to him; but at the same
time you could count on him acting up to his nature. He wa'n't no
hypocrite, an' th''s a heap o' comfort jest in that. A feller ain't got
no kick comin' when a rattler lands on him; but if a wood dove was to
poison him, he'd have a fair right to be put out. The only child 'at
Cast Steel had was one daughter; but that don't indicate that paternity
was one long vacation for Jabez. Barbie--her full name was Barbara--was
the sweetest an' the gamest an' the most surpriseable creature a human
being ever met up with, an' ol' Jabez could 'a' got along handier with
seven sons than he did with that one girl. Oh, the eyes of her were
like the two stars over old Savage, snappin' an' twinklin' an'
sparklin' in the clear winter nights, or soft an' shy an' tender when
the hazy spring moon cuddles up to them. She wasn't afraid of anything
'at walks the face o' the earth, an' Jabez had a hard time gettin' used
to this--'cause he thought she ought to be afraid o' him.

Still, he fair worshipped her, an' if he'd been given full charge o'
the earth for jest one day, an' anything would 'a' pestered the girl
durin' that day, why the map-maker would sure have had a job on the day
follerin'; 'cause from his standpoint, that girl was what the sun shone
for an' the rain rained for an' the blossoms blossomed for.

We was allus havin' a lot o' Easterners string along during the summer,
an' they generally was easy to entice into makin' a little visit with
us. Some of 'em would spend their time crackin' stones an' makin' up
tales about their bein' speciments o' the Zelooic age or the Palazoric
age or some such a fool thing. They was mostly heathens, an' it didn't
do no good to spring the Bible on 'em--in fact after we got able to
read their signs we never contraried 'em at all, but just let 'em heave
out any tale they could think up an' pretend 'at we believed it; an'
hanged if I don't begin to suspicion that the' 's a heap o' truth in
some o' their nonsense.

Purty near every one of 'em insisted that at one time all those
mountains, even old Savage, had been under water, an' they'd take us
out an' show us the signs; but we couldn't stomach that until we found
out that this was one o' the Injun traditions too, an' then we give in.

Well, one o' these strays was what they call an astronomer. His
speciality was the stars, nothing less; an' he knew 'em by name an'
could tell you how far off they are an' what they weigh an' how many
moons they had an'--oh, he knew 'em the same as I know the home herd,
an' he didn't only know what they had done--he knew what they was
a-goin' to do, an' when he called the turn on 'em, why they up an' done
it. Comets an' eclipses an' sech like miracles were jest the same to
this feller as winter an' summer was to me, an' we fed him until he
like to founder himself, tryin' to hold him through the winter; but at
last he had to go, an' after he'd gone Cast Steel was purty
down-hearted for quite a spell.

"It ain't fair, Happy," sez he to me one day after the astronomer had
gone.

"No," sez I, "I reckon it will rain before mornin'."

"I mean it ain't a fair shake," sez he. "Jupiter has eight of 'em an'
we ain't but one an' the' ain't nobody lives there, while--"

"What do you happen to be talkin' of?" sez I.

"Why moons," sez he. "It seems too doggone bad for that confounded
planet to have eight moons an' no one to enjoy 'em while my little girl
jest dotes on 'em an' we only have one--an' IT don't work more'n half
the time."

That was Cast Steel: he didn't look on life or death, or wealth or
poverty, or anything else except in the way it applied to Barbie--but
she was worth it, she was worth it, an' I never blamed him none.

But you needn't get the idea that Jabez was one o' these fond an'
lovin' parents what sez: "My child, right if perfectly convenient, but
right or wrong, my child." Not on your future prospects! Jabez, he sez:
"My child, right from the shoes up, if the Rocky Mountains has to be
ground to powder to make her so."

I remember the day she was six year old; he hardly ever laid out the
details for her conduct, he jest sort o' schemed out a general plan and
left her free to adjust herself to it, like a feller does with a dog or
a pony he expects to keep a long time an' don't want to turn into a
machine. He had told Barbie he didn't want her to ride nothin' 'at
wasn't safe. Well, on the mornin' she became a six-year-old he came out
o' the side door an' saw her disappearin' in the distance on top a big
pinto 'at he had sent over for Buck Harmon to bust; it havin' already
pitched Spider Kelley an' dislocated his shoulder.

"Who roped that pony for her?" yelled Cast Steel.

"I did," sez I. "She said 'at this was her birthday an' she was tired
of actin' like a kid an' intended to ride a real ridin' hoss."

"If a hair of her head is injured, hell won't hide ya!" sez Cast Steel,
an' his lip trembled an' his eyes fairly smoked.

"She's jest as safe as if she was in her bed," sez I, as gentle as I
could. "I taught her how to ride, an' I ain't ashamed o' the job. She
can give Spider Kelley cards an' spades an' beat him to it every time.
But as far as that goes--"

I didn't get to finish because here she come, tearin' back on the
pinto. Her hair was flyin', her eyes was dancin', an' she was
laughin'--laughin' out loud. Light an' easy she pulled the pinto up
beside us an' calls out: "Oh, daddy, this is lovely, this is
mag-ni-fi-cent"--the little scamp used to pick up big words from the
Easterners, an' when she had one to fit she never wasted time on a
measly little ranch word--"oh, I'm never goin' to ride old Kate again."

"Git off that pony," sez Jabez, makin' a reach for the bit; but the
pony shied, whirled, an' purty nigh kicked his head off. He stood still
in a daze while Barbie was circling the pony an' gettin' him quiet
again.

"How's she goin' to get off?" asked Jabez, turnin' to me.

"Simply climb down," sez I purty short. I had some temper those days,
an' I hadn't got over his insinuations, an' I didn't intend to.

"She'll be killed!" sez Jabez. I never said a word.

"She'll be killed!" he repeated, an' his voice was filled with anguish.

"Get down off the pony, Barbie," sez I, an' she threw her little leg
over the saddle an' hit the grass like an antelope. The pony never
stirred. Ol' Jabez stood watchin' her with his eyes poppin' out. "Turn
the brute loose!" he shouts. "What for?" sez she. "'Cause I say so!" he
fairly roars.

Well, she walks up, pats the pinto on the nose, an' slips the bridle
off his head. He just stands still an' watches her as mild as a pint o'
cream.

"Rope that pony," sez Cast Steel to me.

"Get one o' your own men to rope it," sez I.

He looked into my eyes a moment an' then he called to George Hendricks
to rope the pinto; but when George hove in sight with his rope the
pinto took to his heels an' made for the horizon. "There goes a
ninety-dollar saddle," sez Jabez to me, "an' it's all your damned
nonsense."

"It ain't either," sez Barbie, as fierce as a wounded bear, "it's all
your damned nonsense. Happy has been trainin' that pony nights for my
birthday an'--"

"Barbara!" yells Jabez, "what do you mean by usin' such langwidge? I'll
line you out for this. You know mighty well--"

"Now you play accordin' to the rule," sez Barbie. "You was teachin' me
to play seven up last week an' you said that everybody had to play by
the same rule. I reckon that goes in cussin' too."

Well, they looked into each other's eyes for quite some while, an' then
Jabez sez: "Go into the house, Barbara, an' we'll both think it over,
an' as soon as we get time we'll settle it."

"All right," sez Barbie, an' she turns around an' marches to the house,
her little head held like a colonel's. Just before she reached the
house she turned an' calls: "You'll get the pinto for me, won't you,
Happy?" I sort o' half nodded my head, an' she went on into the house.

"Did you ever see such grit?" sez Cast Steel, "an' her only six. Kids
oughtn't to act so grown up at six, had they, Happy?"

"I reckon 'at kids are pretty much like colts an' puppies an' other
young things: give 'em dolls to play with an' they'll play like
children, but start 'em out on cards an' ponies, an' range 'em off with
nothin' but grown folks, an' they're bound to have ways like grown
folks'."

Jabez fidgeted around a while, an' then he sez, "Are you goin' to try
to catch the pinto?

"I am goin' to catch it," sez I, rollin' a cigarette.

He kind o' nervoused around a few minutes longer an' then he sez, "What
did you mean a while ago?"

"Jest whatever I said," sez I. "I don't know what you're a-referrin'
to, but if I said it, that's what I meant."

"When I asked you to rope the pinto you told me to git one o' my own
men to rope it; what does that mean?"

"It means that when a man tells me that hell can't hide me from his
wrath, I 'm free to consider myself foot loose. A man don't want to
slaughter none of his own hands, an' if it should be that any one feels
called upon to go after my hide, I don't want to feel that the time I
'm wastin' in takin' care o' that hide rightfully belongs to another
man who is payin' for it. Therefore I have quit. I'm goin' to rope the
pinto for Barbie, but I wouldn't do it for you, an' when I get back
I'll call around for what's comin' to me."

"Well, go an' be hanged! You always was the most obstinate,
high-headed, bull-intellected thin-skin 'at ever drew down top wages
for punchin' cows. You're nothin' more than a kid, an' yet you swell
around an' expect a man--"

"Well, I don't expect nothin' from you, ceptin' my wages," sez I.

"You go to Jericho, will you!" snaps Jabez. "You don't need to think
that I'd try to argue any man on earth into workin' for me. I can get
an army o' riders as good or better than you--but the gel likes you,
Happy, an'--"

"An' that's why I 'm goin' after the pinto," sez I, an' I flopped onto
a pony an' sailed out to a little glen in the foothills where I knew I
'd find him, an' as soon as I had towed him back to the corral I put my
saddle on the old beast I had rode there an' set off.

Just as I rode around the edge o' the corral, ol' man Judson stood
there grittin' his teeth. "What are you ridin' that old skin for?" sez
he.

"'Cause it's the only pony I got," sez I.

"You leave it here an' take your pick out o' the five-year-olds," sez
he.

"All I want out o' this ranch is what I have earned," sez I.

"If you don't get something 'at your pride'll earn some day, I'm the
biggest fool this side o' the big ditch. Here's your pay. You've been a
fair hand, but don't forget that I never hire a man twice, an' I've
hired you once already."

"Now look here, Jabez," sez I, "I ain't so old as I'll get if I live as
long as I may, but I'm old enough to know that it's just as easy, to
find a good boss as it is to find a good man. I've done my work without
fussin', an' you've seen me in a pinch or two; an' yet this very
mornin' you intimated than I 'd risk Barbie on a pony she couldn't
ride. The' ain't nothin' I wouldn't do for that child, but you don't
understand her, an' if you go on in your high-handed way with her you
're in for the sorrow o' your life--mark my words."

"Here's your money. You ain't got sense enough to know your place an' I
'm glad to be shut of you." Jabez handed me my pay an' stamped over to
the ranch house, while I kept on down the valley trail.

When I reached the turn I twisted about in my saddle an' looked at the
cluster o' buildings. They looked soft an' gray with old Mount Savage
standin' on guard back of 'em, an' the' was a bigger lump under my
necktie than I generally wore. I didn't have mach call to go anywhere,
an' I sat there on my old pony, wonderin' whether or not it paid to be
game.

If my mother had been alive, jest at that point would have been where
the West would have lost the benefit of my personal supervision--but
then if my mother had lived I shouldn't never 'a' left home. I stood a
stepmother six months out o' respect to my Dad, but I wouldn't 'a'
stood that one a year--well, anyway, not unless I'd been chained an'
muzzled.

It's a funny thing to me how a man can drink an' fight an' carry on for
a year at a clip an' then all of a sudden feel a hurtin' somewhere
inside that nothin' wouldn't help but a little pettin'. He knows
doggone well 'at there ain't none comin' to him, so he hides it by
cuttin' up a little worse than usual but it's there, an' Gee! but it
does rest heavy when it comes. Why, take me even now when the' wouldn't
nothin' but a grizzly bear have the nerve to coddle me, an' yet week
before last I felt so blue an' solitary 'at I couldn't 'a' told to save
me whether I was homesick or whether it was only 'cause the beans was a
little sour.

I sat there on the old pony a good long time, an' then I heaved a sigh
'at made me swell out like an accordion, an' headed back to the valley
trail. When I turned around, there, standin' in the trail before me
with a streak down each cheek, stood Barbie.

"Ya ain't goin', are ya?" sez she.

"I got to go, honey," sez I.

"Ain't ya never comin' back?" asked she.

"Oh, I'll come back some day, ridin' a big black hoss with silver
trimmed leather--an' what shall I bring little Barbie?" sez I, tryin'
to be gay.

"Just bring me yourself, Happy, that's all the present I want. I love
you because you're the handsomest man in the world"--yes, it was me she
meant, only o' course that was some years ago an' the child was
unthinkable young--"an' cause you tell me the nicest stories, an' train
pintos, an'--an' I'm goin' to marry you when I grow up."

"Marry me, kitten?" sez I, laughin' free an' natural this time. "Why,
bless your heart, where did you ever hear o' marriage?"

"My Daddy tells me of my mother, an' what a beautiful lady she was, an'
how happy they were together--an' I'm goin' to marry you when you come
back."

"Well, Barbie," sez I right soberly, "you be true to me an' I'll be
true to you, an' now we'll kiss to bind the promise."

So I lifted her to my saddle an' kissed her. "How did you get here,
child?" sez I.

She didn't answer for a minute. "I rode old Kate," said she at last,
"but I didn't want you to know it. She's over behind that rock. And
now, Happy, don't you dare to forget me. Good-bye."

I set her down in the road with her eyes misty an' her white teeth set
in her lips, an' my own eyes were so hazy like that I couldn't see her
when I looked back, an' then I rode away down the valley trail.




CHAPTER TWO

CONVINCING A COOK


I'm as wild as any comet when I first swing out o' my regular orbit,
an' I rode on an' on, sometimes puttin' up for the night at a ranch
house an' sometimes campin' out in the open, where I'd lay till dawn
gazin' up at the stars an' wonderin' how things were goin', back at the
Diamond Dot. I mooned on until at last I wound up in the Pan Handle
without a red copper, an' my pony sore footed an' lookin' like what a
crow gets when the coyotes invite him out to dinner.

I drew rein one night along side a most allurin' camp fire. I had
noticed the herd when I came along in, an' they was dandies; big solid
five-year-olds, hog fat, but they wasn't contented--kept fidgetin'
around. When I struck the fire, a fair haired young feller was readin'
a book, two Greasers an' a half blood Injun was playin' poker with an
old bunch o' whiskers 'at wasn't a ridin' man at all while the cook had
turned in without washin' the dishes.

"If anybody's at home," sez I, "I'd like to ask permission to set down
an' rest."

"Why, certainly, make yourself at home," sez the fair hair. The balance
o' the bunch only give me the side eye.

"Would you need any more help?" I asked, most respectful.

"No, thank you," sez the young feller, "I think we'll make it all
right."

"You have a nice bunch here," sez I, "an' I thought perhaps you might
want to get 'em to market in good shape. I am referrin' to the cows"--I
continued, kind o' takin' the cover off my voice.

"We expect to get them to market in good shape," sez the fair-hair,
uncoilin' his dignity. I rolled a cigarette.

"What makes you think we won't get them to market in good shape?" sez
he.

"'Cause your cook's got a sour temper, an' the' ain't no one bossin'
the job--'at knows how," sez I, mild an' open-faced, an' lookin' into
the fire. The fair-hair straightens up with a snort, while the
pot-openers begin to cuss sort o' growly.

"Where are you from an' how long have you been making my business your
own?" asked the fair-hair.

"Oh, I come from up no'th a ways; but I ain't ever made your business
mine. I never saw your outfit until twenty minutes ago--but I've seen
other outfits."

"Can you handle cattle?" sez he.

"Yes," sez I--"and men."

"Well, I think you can join us," sez he, kind o' slow. "The cattle
don't seem to be as gentle as they did when we started. I think it is
because we are short handed and have to be a little too rough with
them." I didn't answer.

"Well, do you want the job?" sez he.

"Who's the foreman?" sez I.

"I am in charge," he answers stiff like.

"You're the owner, I know, but who's in charge o' the men?"

"I take full supervision," sez he.

"I don't want the job," sez I.

"All right," he snaps, "I don't recall havin' sent for you."

"No offense," sez I, "but up my way it's generally polite to inquire
about the appetite. If any one was to ask me, I'd say I was hungry. If
any one was to urge me, I'd be obliged to meet up with a little food."
I looked him gently in the eyes. He dropped his an' looked put out.

"Tell you the truth, I'm havin' a dog's time of it with my cook. He's
gone to bed an' I don't think there's a thing to eat."

"What'll the night riders do?" I asked.

"Oh, they'll raise Cain as usual, but that's all the good it'll do 'em."

"That ain't all they'll do," sez I. "Chances are they'll take it out on
the cattle, an' they may--they may even go so far as to get the cattle
to cut up until the day shift has to turn out an' help quiet 'em."

"Is that the reason?" he asked, his face lightin' up.

"I don't know for sure, but that's my first guess," sez I.

He looked down at his feet an' I looked him over. He was a nice
lookin', well built boy, but he was up against it for about the first
time, an' I saw his finish. "I would take the job o' foreman," I sez.

"I hire you--ten a month advance over regular wages, an' you to begin
to-morrow."

"No," sez I, "me to begin to-night--with supper."

"All right," sez he, laughin', "help yourself."

I walked over to the cook wagon, as I hit the shadow I loosened my
guns, an' the very minute they slipped in their holsters my
lone-sickness rolled off like a cloud an' the hurtin' melted out o' my
inwards. They was somethin' rolled up in a Navajo under the cook wagon
an' I sized it up. It appeared to be seven feet long, but I kicked it
in the ribs. Things began to happen at once. A huge creature of a man
slid out on the opposite side of the cook wagon, an' when he came
around the tail of it he was holdin' a bear gun so it would explode
without much ceremony. He was usin' some language an' his speed was a
thing to covet; but I just stood with my back to the fire, waitin'
until I could get a chance to introduce myself. He was in the light,
an' he was enough to make a man reform. Nigger, Greaser, Injun--oh, he
was the hardest lookin' specimen I had ever seen, an' the think that
occurred to me was that some time a woman had rocked him to sleep
an'--kissed him. That's the queer thing about me. My face don't change,
but I never got into a mess in my life without some outlandish, foreign
idea poppin' into my head an' tryin' to hog my attention.

My attention wasn't much required just at that moment anyhow. He held
the bear gun loose in his hand an' swore on like the roar of a mountain
torrent. Once I glanced over my shoulder an' saw a pained look on the
fair-hair's face, while the ante-up bunch was grinning wickedly an'
waitin' for my finish. Me lookin' younger an' easier at that time than
I really was, proved a big thing in my favor. Well, as soon as the
mongrel cook had cussed himself clean an' dry, he yells at me, "Who in
the hell are you an' what in the hell do you want?"

"I'm the new foreman," sez I in a school-girl voice, "an' I want my
supper."

He wasn't prepared for it an' dropped his gun to his side while he
began to narrate false an' profane eulogies about my breedin' an' past
history. He took a few steps toward me so as I wouldn't lose none of
his remarks, an' all of a sudden I swung half around an' kicked him in
the jaw with my heel, which was a trick I had learned from a French
sailor. It took me forty-five minutes to come to, after I received my
first an' only lesson, an' I wasted a full year huntin' for that
sailor. Any time durin' the first six months I'd have ventilated him
completely, but after that I wanted to thank him, 'cause I had learned
an' tried the trick by that time, an' it was worth all it cost.

But this cook was no wax figger, an' he only lay quiet a moment before
he began to roll around an' groan. I picked up a neck yoke what was
handy, an' I went for him. I hit him in the butt o' the ear an' on the
back o' the neck an' in the center o' the forehead--I tried him out in
all the most stylish places, until finally he dozed off.

"Bring me a lantern--you man with the whiskers," I called out.

He riz to his feet like a machine. "It ain't filled," he said.

"I don't know much about fillin' LANTERNS," I remarked to him kindly,
"but I have had some experience in fillin' other things. Bring me the
lantern, filled an' lighted--and don't keep me waitin'."

I then noticed two fellers a hoss back. "Do you belong to this outfit?"
sez I.

"Yes, we're the night riders," answered one o' 'em stickin' up his
hands, which plan seemed good to the other one also.

"What are you doin' here this time o' the evenin'?" I asked 'em.

"We heard the racket an' we--we thought something was wrong, an' we--we
came in to see--"

"That's all right," sez I, "I'm the new foreman. You don't need to put
your hands up every time we meet, but I want you to understand right
now that I don't want those cows pestered any more. This outfit is
going to run smoother from this on, an' as soon as the cook feels
better he is going to cook my supper. I'll see that there is plenty o'
coffee for your midnight lunch, an' I want you to enjoy yourselves--but
I don't stand for no nonsense."

I made a motion with my eye an' they rode back to the herd, an' by that
time the lantern had arrived, an' I poked around in the cook's
belongings an' confiscated two shootin' irons an' a wicked Mexican
knife. Then I threw a bucket o' water in his face an' he came out of it.

"How do you feel?" I asked him.

"Oh, hell," he moaned, an' he meant every word of it, an' more.

"Now see here, cook," sez I, in a mild voice, "I hate trouble, an' I
don't intend to be pestered with it. Do you know how to cook?"

"Yes," he muttered.

"Speak out free an' easy," I sez; "no blood at all is better than bad
blood, an' if you don't feel able to forgive me an' go about your work
in a friendly way, why I'll feel compelled to remove you from our
midst. You're not injured none, only bruised a bit, and I'm famished
for my supper. I'm always quick tempered when I'm hungry an' I'm
gettin' hungrier every minute. Are you ready to begin?"

He slowly got up to his feet an' looked at me. "Come over to the fire
an' have a good look," I said, as though we were old friends.

He followed me over to the fire an' he sure gave me a lookover. "You're
bigger'n I thought you was, an' you've been purty well seasoned. I
ain't never yet been licked without a gun an' I didn't think it could
be did. Will you fight me again--without weapons?" "I'll never fight
you again but once," sez I, an' my lips were smiling, but all of a
sudden a hatred of his cruel, evil eyes came over me, an' my lips
curled back over my teeth. "If you had known I was your foreman an' had
mixed with me I'd 'a' killed you a few moments ago. The very next time
you cross me I'll kill you. I sleep light--when I do sleep. Are you
goin' to cook my supper?"

"Yes, you blasted rattler," sez he, with a grin, "you're the killin'
kind an' you're the killin' age, but I know when the jig's up. I know
your name all right, but hanged if I can see through your game. I ain't
goin' to try, either. As long as you choose to play at bein' foreman,
I'll play at bein' cook, an' when you start on again, I'm willin' to
join ya. I'll get your supper in a jiffey, Kid."

I sauntered over to the fair-hair, tryin' to act as if this was an
every day occurrence. He had never changed his position all through it,
although his hands were tremblin'.

I sat down beside him an' he chuckled softly--I liked that chuckle. It
was boyish an' friendly, but most of all it showed a good foundation.
He was new to the game, but he was the kind that learned.

"I suppose I'm purt nigh as old as you," he blurted out.

"In some things, mebbe--not in the cattle business," sez I.

"No," he grinned, "nor in the man-handlin' business, but I want to tell
you right now that I have enjoyed this evenin's performance, no matter
what happens from it. I ain't carryin' much cash with me," he added
after a moment's thought.

"I ain't carryin' any," sez I.

He looked into my face again an' gave his chuckle. A feller couldn't
help but echo when that fair-hair chuckled. "I heard the cook say he
knew you an' he called you Kid--I suppose you are the Pan Handle Kid?"
he asked.

"I didn't know the' was a Pan Handle Kid, but they're pretty common an'
they're all a good bit alike. Forced to begin killin' before they're
able to put the right value on life, an' once they begin, no way to
stop. Now I'll tell you confidential that I'm not the Pan Handle, nor
any other kind of a kid, although I once was the makin' of one. Still,
it will make matters easier if this bunch thinks I am, so we'll just
let it go at that. My name is Happy Hawkins; what might I call you?"

"Happy?"--he opens his eyes like saucers an' then he laughs like a boy.
"Well, I watched you goin' after the cook with the neck yoke an' I
never in the world would have called you Happy."

"Well, you'll see me trail in this bunch o' beef cattle, smooth an'
contented an' with every man jack rollin' fat an' dimpled to the
knuckles. They've had their last fuss. I'll feed 'em an' I'll work 'em
from now on, an' you won't know 'em when we hit the market. Where you
headin' for, K.C.?

"Yes. My name is Mister Jamison--James Jamison."

"This is a warm climate," sez I.

"Yes," he sez sort o' surprised, "it is."

"It has an awful meltin' effect on names," I continued.

He chuckled again. "I'm mighty glad you arrived, Happy," sez he. "What
do you suppose'll happen to my name?"

"Well" I sez, "if you get yours before they learn to like you, it'll
probably be James Jamison on the headboard, but if you make good, it'll
be Jim Jimison on Sundays an' jest plain Jim for every day." "That
suits me," sez he. "I'm entered for the whole race, an' I'm glad to get
off as soon as possible."

"Supper's ready," called the cooks, an' when I gave a whoop an' bolted
for it he giggled like a big fat mammy. I had turned up the side of his
nature 'at would be most useful to our business. I took a sip o' the
coffee while he kept his eyes glued on me. "Come over here, Jim," I
called.

Jim came over lookin' a little anxious. "Taste that stuff," sez I.

He tasted it an' his face changed as though he had caught a vision of
the better world, but I kept my face like the face of an angry bear.
"What do you call this stuff?" I asked the cook, an' his face grew dark
as a thunder cloud.

"That's coffee!" he roared.

"When was the pot cleaned?" I asked, with my brows drawn down to the
bridge of my nose.

"Not more'n ten minutes ago," he yelled; and I got up an' holding my
cup in my hand I danced about twenty different dances, while that cook
like to split his sides laughin'. He was a cook, the' was no gettin'
around it, an' Jim, he turned in an' fed his face while first his
cheeks would dimple with the gladness o' the moment, an' then his eyes
would sadden as he thought of all the good eatin' he had missed by not
knowin' the proper kind o' diplomacy to use in handlin' a cook. An'
me!--say, I mowed away until my skin begun to creak under the strain
an' I couldn't roll my eyes more'n two degrees. Then I got up an' I
shook hands with the cook.

"Cook," I sez, "no matter how devilish wicked you've been in the past,
an' no matter how faithful you live up to your inner nature in the
future, you're sure of a number nine crown an' a spotless robe jest fer
this one meal"; an' the cook, he fairly glistened in the firelight.

Well, this was about all they was to that expedition. We all got to be
so friendly with one another that by the time we had trailed that bunch
into the stock yards, we was like one big family of elder brothers, an'
Jim, he teased me into goin' back to the Pan Handle with him.

Jim was an Englishman--a younger brother. Up to that time I had allus
supposed 'at bein' a younger brother was somewhat in the nature of an
accident, an' not a thing to be hurled in a feller's teeth; but over in
England it's looked upon as a heinius crime, an' the only thing a
younger brother can do to square himself is to get out o' sight. That's
how Tim happened to be in the Texas Pan Handle with a tidy little
fortune his aunt had left him, tucked away in a good-sized,
well-stocked ranch.

I took a good deal o' pains with him, 'cause he didn't have nothin' but
a book education, an' it wasn't altogether easy to get him to see the
true value o' things. He used to talk about Eton an' Oxford purty
solemn, until one night he helped me mill the herd durin' a Norther',
an' after that he took more kindly to the vital things o' life, but he
was a man, Jim was, an' he kept raisin' my wages right along until I
got that opulent feelin'. I never could stand prosperity those days;
just as soon as I had a weight o' money 'at I could notice, I begun to
grow restless, an' nothin' 'at Jim could do or say had much effect.

If things hadn't run in oil, I'd a-stayed right along, I reckon; but it
got so 'at the' wasn't a hitch from week to week, an' I couldn't stand
it. I never had a better friend in the world'n that cook was after he'd
saved my life.

Jim had a kid sort o' chorin' around the place an' keepin' us from
gettin' old an' stupid. One nice bright winter's day the kid went out
for a ride; his pony came lopin' in just at sun down in the face of a
blizzard, an' I went out to look for the kid. I found him trudgin'
toward home an' cussin' his luck somethin' terrible. I put him up
behind me an' by that time the wind was shootin' needles o' sleet into
my face 'till I couldn't see a yard ahead. The kid snuggled up to me
an' went to sleep, an' I gave the pony his head an' trusted to
luck--no, come to think about it, that night I trusted to somethin'
higher than luck, 'cause it was a perfect demon of a night.

The pony dropped from a lope to a walk an' then he put his nose to the
ground an' fairly shuffled along. I was wearin' sheepskin with the wool
on, but after a time the needles began to creep in an' I grew numb as a
stone, while my flesh seemed shook loose from my bones, an' it hurt me
to breathe. Oh, Lord, but it was cold! If it hadn't 'a' been for the
kid I'd have gotten down an' walked alongside the pony, but as it was,
he was out o' the wind an' sleepin' peaceful, so I just sat an' took it.

At last I sort o' drowsed off myself. I didn't sleep, but I wasn't
awake; I seemed to be back at the Diamond Dot an' playin' in a little
sheltered dell with Barbie. She had made up a game called Fairy
Princess; sometimes she was the Fairy Princess an' sometimes I was, an'
it was a mighty amusin' sort of a game, but different from most o' the
games I was familiar with.

Well, that night out in the Texas blizzard I was playin' that game with
little Barbie, an' all of a sudden--smash! Before I knowed what had
happened we had been run into an' knocked down a ravine an' both the
kid an' the pony was lyin' on top o' me. The kid got up an' begun to
cuss as usual, but the pony never moved. I'd a heap sight rather had
the conditions reversed, 'cause the pony was on my right leg an' my
right leg was on a sharp stone.

"Shut up, kid," sez I, "this ain't no time for such talk. Here, you
curl up alongside the pony an' I'll spread part o' my coat over you."

That kid was a home-maker all right; nothin' ever surprised him, an'
wherever he lit he made himself comfortable. In two minutes he was
asleep, while I began to puzzle it out. We were in a sheltered spot an'
the wind swept above us; but it was so dark that you couldn't see ten
inches. The wind was from the no'th, an' I went over every bit o'
landscape in the country until at last I figgered out the' was only one
place in Texas that filled the bill. A path swung around a crag an'
the' was a shelf of stone ten feet below it an' eight feet wide, then
it cut off sheer, fifty feet to the rocky bank of a creek. I reached
out with my hand an' felt the edge of it, an' it give me an awful
chill. I don't like to come quite so close.

After a time the wind veered around a little more to the east an' then
it sucked up through the cut an' I began to freeze. I didn't care a
great deal 'cause it stopped the horrid hurtin' in my leg; but the dead
pony began to cool, an' I knew it was only a question o' minutes.
Finally I awoke the kid. "Where is your gun, kid?" I sez.

"I shot all my catridges tryin' to bring some one out on a pony," sez
the kid, drowsily, an' then he dozes off again.

We were only a mile from the ranch house; it was again the wind an' it
wasn't much use to waste ammunition, but I finally got out my gun an'
begun to shoot at intervals.

"What the deuce you makin' that racket for?" grunted the kid at the
third shot. I boxed his ears and went on shootin' until at last the
cold went through sheepskin an' woolens an' hide an' flesh, an' I grew
warm an' contented; an' the next I knew, the cook was rubbin' my wrists
an' pourin' hot coffee into me. I was purty mad at bein' dragged back
to earth an' grumbled about it free an' hearty, but the cook kept
croonin' to me the same as if I'd been a baby: "Neveh mind, honey,
neveh mind; ol' Monody'll bring ya around all right. Take another sip
o' coffee, chile, that's right, that's right."

It took me quite a spell before I could tell whether I was alive or
not, 'cause while the cook had changed a heap since I'd first met up
with him, I'd never heard any such talk as this; but after a time I
came out of it an' the anguish I underwent gettin' back to life wasn't
nowise worth the experiment.

It had stopped blowin', but it was colder than ever, an' at last I
began to take enough interest in things to want 'em to get settled one
way or another. As soon as I was able to think along a straight line,
the cook would give a heave to the pony an' I would give myself a jerk.
The lantern shed a splash o' light on the shelf, but the jump-off
looked like the mouth o' the pit, an' I jerked purty tol'able careful.
At last I was out, an' if you'll believe it, my leg was only broke in
two places. I thought it was broken clear off. I couldn't get back up
the cliff to the trail any way we could figger, so the cook said I
should roll up in the Navajos he'd brought an' he'd take the kid an' go
back an' bring a couple o' the boys an' pack me in.

The kid had found the blankets all right an' had rolled himself up, an'
we had to shake the stuffin' out of him to rouse him again. He
complained most bitter when he found he had to go back to the ranch
house; but at last they got started an' it wasn't long before they had
me there too, an' next day Phil McLaughlin rode over an' brought out a
doctor who lined up my bones as good as new, while Jim told me about
the cook.

Old Monody was like a salamander for heat, an' you couldn't drag him
away from the fire in the winter time; but when I didn't return he
began to worry: "If the' was a man left in this outfit I reckon he'd go
out an' get him," he'd say scornful. "Riders! you call yourselves
riders? You're loafers an' eaters, that's what you are! I'm a cook, but
if nobody else has the nerve to go an' git him, I'll go myself."

Jim started to go at last, but he wouldn't let him. "You got the grit,
Jim, but you ain't got the night sense yet. You stay where you are or
you'd be on our hands too." Well, he steamed up an' down makin' new hot
coffee an' drinkin' it by the bowl. All of a sudden he give a scream:
"Oh, oh! there he goes over the cliff! Get me a pony--get me a pony,
while I wrap up some coffee an' pick out some blankets!" Well, the cook
was so blame wild by this time 'at they was glad to get shut of him; so
they rigged him out an' he rode a bee line right to me, an' what led
him you can figger out for yourselves. He was a queer cook, but after
that night he was different: he acted as though he had adopted me; he
petted me an' spoiled me an' you can talk all you want to about the
flesh-pots of Egypt--why, that cook could fix beans eleven different
ways, an' each one better'n the other.

But while I was lyin' there waitin' for my leg to knit up, I kept
thinkin' o' the little lass back at the Diamond Dot, an' when I got
about again, I knew I was signed for a trip No'th.

 The cook was mighty good to me while I was backin' it; he used to
deal out fussy little fixin's 'at kept the appetite an' the fever both
down, an' when they wasn't no one around he used to pat out my pillers
an' oncet he smoothed back my hair. He cut out his cussin' too, an' he
used to line up the kid for it.

"You're from the South, ain't ya, Happy?" sez he to me one day.

"Not so you could notice," sez I. "I reckon this is the southest I ever
got before."

"Hu," sez the cook, "Texas ain't south. Texas is just the rubbish heap
o' this whole country. Where did you hook up to that word 'reckon'?"

"I dunno," sez I, thinkin' back. "A feller just catches words like the
mumps, I suppose; but my pap, he used to use it right often."

"Where did your folks come from?" sez the cook.

"Oh, they come from Kentucky, an' before that from Virginia an' No'th
Carolina, an' before that they came from Scotch Irish an' English, an'
go clear back to Adam an' you'll find us Hawkinses was a ramblin' crew,
I reckon; but what on earth you drivin' at, Monody, an' where on earth
did your line hail from?"

He sat there a moment with lights an' shades dartin' over his ugly
face, which somehow wasn't ugly to me any more, an' at last he said: "I
have the blood of an Injun chief an' an African king an' a Spanish
nobleman in my veins, an'--"

"Lord, man, you ought to let some of it out," I interrupted. "You'll
have an eruption in your in'ards some day 'at'll blow you into a
million pieces."

"No, I got 'em all whipped out now, Happy, an' I reckon 'at you did it.
You 're the only man I ever met 'at I ain't once felt like killin'."

"It's pleasant to think o' what a good neighbor you've been all your
life, cook; but I'm glad you've turned over since I met up with you.
Anyhow, you've been a heap o' comfort to me, an' anything I got is on
your list too, don't you never forget it."

But just the same, as soon as I got up an' around again, I had a
terrible tuggin' from the no'th an' I couldn't resist it. I'd be makin'
plans for the summer an' then all of a sudden I'd find myself sayin,
"What in the world do you reckon 'at that child is doin' now. She'll be
eight years old shortly, an' I simply have to see her on her next
birthday, even if she don't see me." At last I couldn't stand it no
longer, so I told the boys I had to cut, an' it fell like a stone on a
lamp chimney; but the cook, he took it harder'n any one else. I liked
the boys an' I liked Jim an' I liked the job; but there was that
tuggin' allus at my heart, an' in the end I set a day. Jim, he made me
all kinds of offers, 'cause things were gettin' easy with him; but when
I made it clear to him, he saw how it was an' he sez: "I know 'at
you'll come back to me some day, Happy, an' if you'll settle down, you
can be a rich man. I've kept back five hundred dollars for you 'at I
haven't mentioned in your wages, an' you can take your pick o' the
colts an' just as soon as you've had your little flier I want you back;
we all want you back."

It's a comfortin' feelin' to know 'at you're goin' to be missed; but I
couldn't savvy that cook. He had one big tearin' time of it an' sluiced
himself out with gin an' dug up his old profanity, an' then he simmered
down an' just cooked himself into a new record. Gee! it was hard to
separate from that mess table; but I had set my day an' the' was no
goin' back.

Jim had a black Arabian stallion an' a couple o' high grade mares an'
he was showin' up something fancy in the hoss line. He raised the colts
just like range ponies, an' while they wasn't quite so tough when it
came to livin' on sage brush an' pleasant memories, they could eat up
the ground like a prairie fire, an' they was gentle. I bought a silver
trimmed bridle an' some Mexican didoes, an' then I said good-bye to all
of 'em except the cook--he wasn't there.

I hunted for him an hour; but he had so many peculiar ways 'at I just
let it go at that an' finally gave him up; so I left him a nifty
present an' pulled out with about a thousand yellow ones in my belt an'
the best mount in the West.

I hadn't gone more than two miles before I turned a corner an' came
face to face with ol' Monody. He was settin' on a big bald-faced roan,
an' he had a serious look on his face. "Well, I wondered if you was
goin' to let me go away without sayin' good-bye," sez I, tryin' to talk
light an' easy.

"I'd be apt to," sez he. "Why, I've been peacefuller since you been
here'n ever I was in my life before, an' it ain't likely I'd let you
scoot out an' leave me. I'm goin' along."

Well, what do you think of that! Me startin' up to where I wasn't sure
of a welcome an' takin' such a tow as ol' Monody along with me. I
argued with him for an hour, an' then I got hot an' told him that
merely savin' my life didn't give him no mortgage on me an' that he
couldn't nowise keep up with me, an' by the time he reached the Diamond
Dot, the chances were 'at I'd be on my way back to the Lion Head. He
didn't waste no time in words, just sat sour an' moody, an' every tine
I'd stop he'd growl out, "I don't care where you go or how fast you go
or nothin' at all about it. I'm goin' along, an' I'll catch up with you
sometime."

I sure gave him a chase; I wanted the black hoss to show up well when I
landed, but I sent him along pretty steady an' took extra care of him.
Ol' Monody had picked out the toughest pony at the Lion Head, an' he
had good hands, but he never sighted me till the night I reached the
ranch and was busy wipin' Starlight's legs. "I got some news for ya,"
sez ol' Monody, gettin' down slow from his leg-weary roan. "I'll tell
it to ya while you 're eatin supper,"--an' I was sure glad to see
him--an' glad to eat food again.




CHAPTER THREE

UNDER FIRE


As soon as I finished takin' care o' Starlight, I give Monody's mount a
look-over. The old bald-face was whipcord an' steel; but he looked
purty near ready to own up.

"Monody, confound you," I sez. "What the deuce did you hammer this old
skin over the road like this for?"

"That's my pony," he growled.

"Since when?"

"Since I bought him, that's since when."

"When did you buy him?"

"It ain't none o' your business when I bought him. I bought him the
mo'nin' you pulled out."

"What did you pay for him?"

"Are you goin' to talk about that ol' cayuse all night?" he snorts,
gettin' wrought up.

"I'm goin' to talk about him until I find out about him," sez I, "an'
you might as well come out of it an' tell what the' is to tell."

"I don't have to tell nothin' about him. He neveh belonged to you. Jim,
he owed me some money on my wages so I just took the pony for the
money. An' now I hope you're through pesterin' me."

"How much did he owe ya?" sez I.

"Now you gone about far enough with this!" yells Monody. "I don't know
how much he owed me, an' I don't care. I reckon he owed me more'n the
pony's worth, 'n if he didn't he can just pertend he raised my wages
last month."

 "Why didn't you let him raise your wages a little more, an' bring
along a bunch o' five-year-olds too?" sez I, grinning. I was mighty
glad to see the old scamp, an' I knew he had drawed the worst end o'
the bargain; but I wanted him to understand that it was embarrassin' to
go again my wishes without my consent. He had the pot o' coffee just
ready to set on the rock where we was goin' to eat, an' all of a sudden
he straightened up an' shot a scowl into me. "Look here, Happy." sez
he, "I don't care a sky blue flap doodle for the whole Jim Jimison
outfit! I told you I was comin' along, an' I come. I tells you again
that I'm goin' wherever you go; but if you don't shet up about that
royally sequestered ol' ball faced camel, I'll dash this scaldin' hot
coffee--right on the ground!"

Well, I fell on my knees an' begged him to spare me, an' I kept it up
until he was gigglin' with laughter--he had a funny way o'
laughin'--an' then we sat on the stone an'--well, the' never was a
human mortal 'at was qualified to carry water for ol' Monody's cookin'.

"What's your news, Monody?" I sez, after I 'd satisfied myself that I
couldn't swaller another crumb.

"You're headin' for the Diamond Dot, ain't ya?" sez he.

"This is a corner o' the Diamond Dot range," sez I, lollin' back an'
puffin' slow an' comfortable at my pipe.

"The pony corral stands at the mouth of a little canon, don't it?"

"Yes," sez I.

"An' the cook house is to the right of it?"

"Yes," sez I.

"An' the ranch house is kind o' sprawly with--"

"Look here, Monody," sez I, interruptin', "this ain't no news. What are
you gettin' at?"

"You got friends there, ain't ya?" sez he.

"I got one friend anyhow," sez I, "but as long as you've insisted on
taggin' along after me, you'll see the place an' you'll see my friend;
though I somehow doubt if you'll be invited in for a meal."

"Is your friend a lady?" sez Monody.

"Oh, no," sez I, sarcastic, "she 's a two-year-old heifer. I wouldn't
think o' goin' this distance just to call on a lady."

"How old is she?" asked Monody.

"Now you look here, you old pest," sez I, "if you're just tryin' to get
even with me about the bald-faced roan, why cut it; but if you've got
anything to tell, why tell it, 'cause I'm gettin' sleepy. She'll be
eight years old to-morrow."

Old Monody shook with silent laughter for a moment. "A lady!" sez he.
Then he sobered an' sez, "Is it your child?"

I heaved a rock at him which he dodged, an' then I sez, "You wicked of
beast you, do I look old enough to have an eight-year-old daughter?"

"Sometimes you do an' sometimes you don't. You're one o' these fellers
'at ain't got no age o' their own, but just age up accordin' to what's
goin' on,"--an' ol' Monody stumbled on a bit o' truth when he said
this, an' it's still true.

"Well, what are you gettin' at?" sez I.

"The Diamond Dot is goin' to be raided to-night," sez he.

I jumped to my feet. "Who by?" I sez.

"You're fifteen years older right now than you was two minutes ago,"
sez Monody. "I stumbled onto Bill Brophy's gang last night. Bill has
seven o' the lowest grade wolves 'at ever wore man-hide--I--I used to
know Bill down in the Territory, an' Bill he thought I was still on the
grab. He put me on. I'm supposed to be at the pony corral at midnight
to turn the ponies loose an' bottle up the house gang in their shack.
Brophy's bad medicine; you'd better pass up your eight-year-old lady
friend an' come on back to the Lion Head with ol' Monody."

I walked up an' down a time or two, thinkin' it over. "We can ride
right into the ravine 'at leads to the pony corral from here," sez I.
"It's a good average four hours' ride. Now I can do it in three on
Starlight; the old bald-face couldn't do it at all to-night--"

"Look at him now," sez Monody. There he was eatin' grass as lively as a
cricket. "Well, you follow as you can, only you'd better lay low unless
I whistle the Lion Head signal. If I get time to break you gentle to
the home gang, it'll be all right; but you ain't apt to be due for a
cordial welcome, not when strangers to you are lookin' for hold-ups."

He had tossed the saddles an' bridles on the hosses by this time, an'
we left our outfit lyin' on the rocks. We hit the saddles in the same
tick an' settled into a swing. Big an' heavy as ol' Monody was, he was
a light rider, an' the bald-face hung at my cinch for the best part of
an hour an' then we slowly oozed away from him. The stars were all full
power that night, an' a feller could see most as plain as if the'd been
a moon.

It smelt good to be back at the old place again, an' my blood was
racin' through my veins till I fair tingled. Finally I reached the
canon an' began to ride careful. It was only about eleven; but I didn't
want any o' Brophy's gang to take a pot shot at me. All of a sudden
something moved on a little grassy shelf on the side of the cliff.
Starlight shied off to the left an' my gun flew up over my head, ready
to drop on whatever it happened to be. My eyes were drillin' into the
gloom when a mite of a creature with her hands clasped rose up an'
said, "Oh, Happy, Happy! is it really you? an' ridin' on the black hoss
with the silver trimmed leather!"

"Barbie, child!" I cried, "what on earth you doin' out here this time
o' night an' all by your lone?"

"I just couldn't sleep, Happy," she said, comin' to the edge o' the
shelf an' sittin' down with her little bare feet swingin' over; "I got
to wonderin' how it would feel just when the birthday was a-comin' on;
so I sneaked out here, an' I was just beginnin' to feel it when you
hove into sight. I been thinkin' o' you lots lately, Happy."

"You little minx, you," sez I, "I doubt if you've thought of me twice
since I been away, while I've been thinkin' of you every minute. But
come, jump down behind me an' we'll hurry on. I want you to go in an'
wake Daddy up an' tell him I've got something mighty important to say
to him, while I scurry over an' wake up the home gang."

"The home gang ain't here," sez Barbie. "The ponies vamoosed this
afternoon--they nearly always do the days I turn Mr. H. Hawkins with
them,--that's what I call the pinto. He's an awful scamp; but the best
pony on the place."

"Then I reckon they'll bring 'em around the twist an' down this canon.
Now you get down here an' sneak into the house while I stake out
Starlight in the big cathedral--see how well I remember everything."

I set the child down, rode Starlight into a big open nook with a narrow
mouth, an' then hustled into the house. Old Cast Steel was standin' in
the dining room in his stockin'-feet with a gun in each hand an' a
question in his eyes. "Get ready for a raid, Jabez," sez I. "Who from?"
sez he.

"From the Brophy gang," sez I.

"How do you know?" sez he. "They are due to arrive here at midnight,
Jabez," sez I. "I don't know why; but I think we'd better get ready for
'em now an' argue about it to-morrow."

"I know why," sez lie. "One of 'em stole one o' my ponies an' started
to run off a bunch o' my own cows with it. I strung him up an' he said
'at Bill Brophy'd get even with me for it. That was two months ago, an'
the' hasn't been a minute since 'at I was so bad prepared for 'em. How
many's in the gang?"

"Bill an' seven others. I found out through the meanest lookin' mortal
you ever set eyes on. He's a giant, nearly black, an' the ugliest
critter you ever set eyes on; but he's white inside. He'll be along as
soon as he can get here--don't shoot him."

"I ain't apt to shoot any help this night," grins Jabez.

"If it wasn't for the little girl, Happy, I'd be right satisfied to
have it out with Bill; but I hate to think of what may happen to her.
How'll we fix for 'em?"

"Get in the dug-out cellar," sez I, for I'd been plannin' it all along.

"I reckon they'll burn the house down," sez Jabez; "but I'd rather they
destroyed the whole blame outfit than to have anything happen to the
little lass."

"Where's Melisse?" sez I. "She left," sez Jabez; an' I hadn't time to
learn particulars.

By this time we had everything barricaded, an' gettin' Barbie we made a
run for the dug-out. It was only two hundred yards; but we hadn't left
the shadow of the house before a rifle sings out followed by two
revolver shots. The' was a big pile o' winter wood in the L of the
ranch house, an' without sayin' a word I swung Jabez with little Barbie
in his arms back of the wood pile.

We didn't shoot much, although the gang kept pepperin' at the wood pile
purty frequent from behind the cook house. "They'll fire the house
purty soon," mutters Jabez, after we'd beat'em off on their second
rush. "We'll have to try for the dug-out sooner or later."

Just at this minute the six notes o' the Lion Head signal floated in.
"There's ol' Monody," sez I. "I wish Barbie was safe an' we'd show'em a
merry time of it." I answered the call an' the' was silence for a long
time. Presently we heard a rattlin' volley, an' the cook rolled around
the corner o' the house an' joined us.

"The next time they rush," sez Jabez, "we'll charge out after 'em an'
try for the dug-out. They won't monkey much longer."

They didn't monkey at all. Two of 'em had broke into the house from in
front, an' the next we knew a window had been flung open at our back
an' we would a-got it right then, but Monody heard 'em, an' as soon as
the window shutter flew back he emptied his gun inside. At the same
time the remainin' six charged in a body, an' for the next few minutes
we was some busy. But we beat'em off, an' as they scurried for shelter
to load, we made for the dug-out; me in front, ol' Jabez in the center,
an' Monody closin' up the rear.

Just before we reached it, a revolver cracked in the doorway o' the
dug-out, I felt a sting in the left shoulder, spun around and fell, but
jumped up just as Jabez changed directions for the cook shack. It was
only a step from the dug-out an' we rushed in, slammed the door,
dropped in the bar, an' turned to face a man with two guns on us.
Monody dropped on him, an' I was about to shoot from the hip when of
Jabez sez, "By George, Jim, I'd forgot all about you--we can sure
fix'em now. These is friends, Jim." Jim was a savage lookin' brute an'
I eyed him purty close. "This feller is cookin' while Flapjack is on
his bender, Happy," sez Jabez.

The cook shack was built out o' pine logs at the bottom, an' fixed so
the upper sides'd swing out like awnings in hot weather. We felt purty
comfortable. The' was a square window at each end an' one on the side
facin' the house; the stove was on the other side. We made little
Barbie sit in the corner behind the stove. Jabez took the window facin'
the house, me the one facin' the dug-out, an' the sub-cook facin' the
corral. I could shoot cleaner'n Monody, so he stood by to do my
loadin', an' we proceeded to waste ammunition. It's enough to make the
oldest man the' is reckless, when you think of the weight o' lead good
aimers can throw without spillin' any blood.

After a bit things grew quiet, an' then we saw a small freight-wagon
backin' down to the door with a lot o' wood across the back of it.
Jabez came over to my window an' we shot into an' under the wagon; but
it still backed up. The' was a little grade down to the cook shack, an'
after they got it started the' wasn't much to do but guide. They had
fixed a stick o' wood pointin' straight back from the rear axle, an'
when it hit the door the bar broke an' the door flew off its hinges an'
clear across the room.

But gettin' the wagon away for their rush was a different matter, an'
we all shot at one another purty regardless. Once I reached back my
hand for a fresh gun an' failed to get any. I turned around, an' there
was Monody holdin' the sub-cook's right wrist with his left hand an'
grippin' at his throat with his right. The' was a horrid look on the
sub-cook's face, an' just as I turned to interfere, Monody gave a
wrench which tore out the cook's wind-pipe, gave him a sling which
landed him under the table, an' handed me a fresh gun. I was some
bothered about this; but that wa'n't no time to hold an investigation,
so I begun shootin' at flashes again.

"How's your catridges holdin' out?" sez Jabez.

"Ain't many left," sez Monody.

"I'm about cleaned myself," sez Jabez. "Where's Jim?"

"I think he's about once through," sez I, an' we proceeded to shoot
more economical.

Purty soon they quit firin' again an' then the freight wagon started up
the hill. They had put their ropes on the tongue an' were draggin' it
out with ponies. We knew what that meant an' took a brace.

The lull what followed was the hardest part o' the whole business.
Ther' wasn't a blasted thing we could do, an' it seemed hours before
the neat volley came from the corner o' the dug-out. We didn't reply to
it, which was most uncommon lucky for us; 'cause first thing we knew,
they came rompin' around each corner an' poured in on top of us. They
was used to fightin' against odds, an' it irritated 'em consid'able to
take so long at a job with the odds in their favor. Outside, the
starlight give us a purty fair aim, while they couldn't do more than
guess at us--so we beat 'em off once more.

"The's only three shots in this gun," sez Monody, cheerfully, as he
handed my iron back to me.

"What's that?" sez Jabez.

"We're about out o' fuel, Jabez," sez I.

I heard him grit his teeth in the darkness. "Where is she, Happy?" sez
he.

"She's still in her corner back of the stove with the shack door in
front of her. They won't hurt her, Jabez--no matter what happens, an'
the' 's a good fight in us yet. Ol' Monody here don't begin to fight
till the ammunition has give out; so keep your mind easy for the next
rush," sez I.

Next moment they surged down on us, shootin' as fast as they could fan.
We didn't explode a catridge until they was bunched in the door an'
then we emptied out. They cussed an' groaned consid'able; but they
surged on into the cabin, just the same. The smoke was like a cloud
inside, an' a newcomer couldn't see an inch; so I backed into my corner
with my left arm danglin' at my side an' holdin' my gun by the barrel.

The shootin' stopped in a flash an' the silence hurt a feller's ears.
The' was a sloppy, floppin' sound over under the table an' now an'
again a low groan. "Fetch the lantern out o' the freight wagon, an'
let's chalk up." said a deep, heavy voice. In about a minute a light
ripped its way into darkness an' I never saw a worse sight. Jabez was
lyin' face down with a hairy viper on top of him face up. The feller'd
been pinked in the bridge o' the nose an' it was most horrid ghastly.
Two others lay still with their bodies inside the shack an' their legs
outside; while another was lyin' just at my feet. Some one had swatted
him in the temple with a revolver butt; but the sight that just about
made me homesick was Jim, the deputy cook.

Monody hadn't broken the windpipe, an' he wasn't dead yet. It was him
'at made the floppin' sound. Oh, it was sickening! Brophy was a fine
lookin' man--I recognized him from his description right at once--an'
he hadn't been even grazed. He looked around cool but quick, an' just
about took it all in, in the snap of a finger. Then he loaded both his
guns before us an' made the feller with the lantern do the same. After
which he looked into Monody's eyes--looked into 'em until Monody's ugly
black face turned ashy; but Brophy hadn't even a scowl, an' when he
spoke, his deep voice was steady an' calm. "How did that happen,
Monody?" sez he, pointin' to the sub-cook.

"I--I reckon one o' the boys mistook him in the dark," sez Monody.

"I reckon you lie," sez Brophy. "The' ain't no white man would be beast
enough. It's one o' your own heathen tricks."

I was surprised at the way Brophy talked. I'd allus heard 'at he was a
rip-snortin' screamer, an' here he was talkin' low an' level like, as
if he was conversin' about the weather; but when I looked into Monody's
face an' saw it gray an' quivery, I knew 'at Brophy wasn't no bluffer,
whether he yelled or whether he whispered.

I moved about an inch 'cause my leg was strainin', an' three guns
dropped on me. "Don't try nothin'," sez Brophy. I didn't--I stood
mighty still.

The man under the table give a gaspy squawk, Brophy dropped on one knee
to look at him, an' I could see him shudder as he looked at the torn
throat. "My God!" he muttered, an' then he started to git up, his voice
fairly snarlin' with rage. "Monody, you beast!" he yelled, snap-pin'
back the hammer of his gun, "I'll--"

He never finished it. With a queer, guttural cry Monody took a step
forward with his left foot an' kicked him under the chin, lifted him
clear from the ground, an' rolled him over, a crumpled an' broken
thing, on top o' the sub-cook The man with the lantern began to
fan-shoot into Monody, an' I jumped for him an' hit him in the temple
with the butt, o' my gun. He went down with a crash an' the lantern
went out.

"Monody!" I called. "Monody, are you hurt?" The' wasn't no answer; the'
wasn't a sound. I felt like the last man on earth. Then I thought of
the girl. I waited a moment to quiet my voice, an' then I sez, "Are you
all right, little Barbie?" Still the' wasn't no answer, an' I fairly
yelled to her.

"Yes, I'm all right, Happy, but I want to get out. Are you all right?"
Her voice was steady, but it sounded a long ways off.

"Yes, Honey Bird, I'm all right," I sez.

"And is my Daddy all right?" she asked.

My! but it was a world o' comfort to hear the child's voice again, an'
some way I felt unreasonable tickled to think 'at she had asked about
me first. "Your Daddy ain't here just now, Barbie," I sez. "You'd
better just stay where you are until we make sure 'at they're all gone."

"Well, all right," she said in the same muffled voice; "but I'd like to
get out."

I hunted through my pockets for a match, but I couldn't find one, an'
what I wanted just then was light--Lord, how I did want a light!

And then I heard a tramplin' an' a poundin' as the herd swept down the
ravine an' into the corral, an' next minute I heard George Hendricks
give the yell he allus give when a job was done, an' I yelled
back--yelled till my voice cracked; an' it was the biggest relief I
ever had.




CHAPTER FOUR

PROFESSIONAL DUTY


I kept on yellin' until they got to the cook shack. "What the bloomin'
blue blasted blazes is the matter?" sez Spider Kelley. "An' who the
fiber fingered flub-dub are ya?"

"Get a light, get a light an' see!" I yells, hatin' to move.

"It's Happy Hawkins!" yells the whole bunch, an' the tone they used was
all-fired welcome.

Purty soon they come in with a lantern, an' then they stopped askin'
questions. For a moment we all just looked at that floor, an' it was
sure a hideous sight. I put my finger on my lips an' pointed to the
corner back of the stove where I'd put the shack door in front o'
little Barbie, an' then I motioned for 'em to drag the bodies out.
Monody was alive an' he had a satisfied grin on his face when I helped
to carry him out in the air. Jabez never moved, an' the boys lifted him
mighty tender--he'd been a good man to work for, spite of his queer
ways. The two men in the doorway were still gaspin', but the rest of
Brophy's gang had passed on as they had a right to expect, wearin'
their boots an' their guns hot in their hands. Brophy himself had his
neck broken, but his face didn't look bad. It was peaceful under the
lantern light.

As soon as they was all lined up on the side porch I took the shack
door down, but Barbie wasn't there. "Barbie!" I called. "Barbie, child!
where are you?"

"Here I am, Happy," answered a muted voice. "I'm in the oven. Can't I
come out now?" I opened the door to the big oven an' there she was,
wrapped in a coat an' all rumpled up as if she'd been sleepin'. "Who
put you in there, child?" I asked.

"A woman," she answered. "A woman with a soft, kind voice. She put me
in here an' she told me to go to sleep, an' I did sleep most o' the
time. When you'd all shoot together it would wake me up; but then after
a minute I'd doze off again, an' now it's gettin' daylight an' I'm
eight years old, an' I didn't get to see how it felt comin' on. Where's
my Daddy, an' are all the robbers gone?"

"A woman!" sez I.

"Yes, an' she had the kindest voice," sez Barbie. "Ain't she here now?
I want to talk to her. I've missed ol' Melisse something fierce--but I
never let on to Daddy. Where is Daddy, Happy?"

"You ask more questions'n an almanac, Barbie," sez I, tryin' to speak
easy. "I'm goin' to carry you in an' put you to bed, an' you can go on
dreamin' about your beautiful lady, an' then in the mornin' I'll tell
you all about what's happened."

My heart weighed about a ton in my breast as I carried the child into
the house with the gray dawn light drippin' over her an' the still form
of her father lyin' around on the side porch. I thought o' the mother
she hadn't never seen, an' I hoped that things was fixed so 'at that
mother could keep on comin' back now an' again to put a dream into her
lonely little heart like she'd already done that night; but I carried
her into her little white bedroom hummin' a dance-tune, took off her
shoes an' stockin's, covered her up warm, an' told her she could sleep
late, as we wasn't goin' to have an early breakfast. The big lids
closed down over her bright little eyes, an' purty soon she was
breathin' soft an' quiet, an' then I left her. I stopped in the doorway
an' looked back, an' my heart ached when I thought of her havin' to
wake up an' face it all. It ain't just killin' a man that's so bad,
it's the awful hole most of 'em makes in some innocent woman's heart.

When I got back to the side porch my breath liked to 'a' stopped, for
there was Jabez sittin' up an' complainin' most bitter because he had
an achin' in the back of his neck. I stopped in my tracks gappin' at
him, an' purty soon he noticed me an' sez, "Well, what are YOU starin'
at? Remember 'at I ain't no chicken heart, an' remember 'at what I hate
worse'n anything else is a liar. Now where is my child?"

"She's in bed and asleep, an' if you're sure you 're alive you've
lifted a ton off my heart. I thought you was dead," sez I.

"This whole pack of idiots thinks so yet," he yells, "an' they won't
let me get up. I got to see her, Happy, I got to touch her an' make
sure for myself that she's all right."

"Where was you hit, Jabez?" I sez.

"I was creased--I was creased the same as they crease a mustang" he
sez. "I was just touched in the back o' the neck an' it paralyzed me.
These blame pin-heads are crazy to strip me an' see if I ain't shot all
to pieces, but I won't stand for it." He tried to get up, but his legs
wouldn't work, an' he sank back again.

"You just set an' rest a bit, Jabez," I sez. "I want to see how old
Monody is."

The boys hadn't paid much attention to him, thinkin' him one o'
Brophy's gang, an' not carin' much whether or not he was comfortable,
'cause he was the most bloodthirsty lookin' of the whole bunch. "Are
you hurt bad, Monody" I said. His face lit up with a smile. "I don't
hurt at all, Happy, but I reckon I 'm done for--the' ain't no feelin'
in me from the waist down."

I got three o' the boys to help me, an' we put him on the shack door
an' packed him into the house an' put him into one o' the spare beds.
He was shot three times in the left shoulder, an' it wasn't till I
noticed it that I recalled my own fix. Monody's shoulder was all
shattered to smash, but still, it wasn't no reason for him to die, so I
begun to kid him about it. He grinned an' said he didn't intend to die
on purpose, but he reckoned it was his turn, an' he didn't intend to
side step. He was most unreasonable an' wouldn't let us bandage him nor
nothin', said he had a salve 'at beat anything a doctor had, an' we got
it for him out of his coat which was the one wrapped around Barbie. He
examined my shoulder with his right hand, an' his fingers worked around
inside my bones clear and true, but some way without hurtin' me much.
"It ain't broke," sez he, "just grooved a bit. You got bones like a
grizzly."

When his salve came he rubbed it on me an' then he rubbed it on
himself, an' then he told us to clear out so he could sleep. We all
left him after a little, an' I sent Spider Kelley after the doctor.
The' was only one member of Brophy's gang alive when I got back to the
side porch, an' he was sinkin' fast. He had told Jabez 'at then
intended to clean him out completely, an' that Jim, the sub-cook, was
one o' the gang an' had let the ridin' ponies loose so 'at the' was no
choice but to walk after the herd when they stampeded. He said that if
he hadn't 'a' had that chance he would 'a' put knock-out drops in the
coffee that night, which made all the men madder'n ever. Knock-out
drops ain't no fair way o' fightin'.

Well, this feller had been with Brophy a long time, an' he gave us a
purty complete list of his doin's an' his ways. As a rule a man only
lasted about a year with the gang, an' when it was possible Brophy
tried to get boys to fill up the vacancies,--boys likin' the game an'
not carin' much for the consequences. He tried to tell us where Brophy
had a lot o' gold salted down in Nevada, but it was hard to understand
him, an' before he made it clear he tuckered out.

We sent out word to the neighbors, an' that evening about forty of 'em
rode over to the buryin', and they made a good bit of a fuss over us,
'cause the gang had been worse'n a plague an' a famine. You can judge
o' their nerve when they made war on the Diamond Dot, we havin' one o'
the biggest outfits in the territory, an' all patriotic toward the old
man. Jabez give me more credit'n was due me, but he sure tried to do
the fair thing by of Monody too. Monody had saved us all, an' that was
the simple truth. It seemed odd to think of how that kick I had in the
jaw won me a friend in Monody, an' then, when it was passed on, saved
the Diamond Dot. I 'd like to know what it did for the French sailor
an' the feller what handed it to him. Funny thing, life.

We tried to get Monody to take his clothes off an' be comfortable; the
boys fairly pestered the life out of him tryin' to do somethin' for
him, but he was obstinate, said 'at his clothes was clean, an' he
didn't intend to take 'em off till they got dirty. They bothered him so
that finally he made me bring him one of his guns, an' he swore he'd
use it before they got his clothes off. "I want to be buried in 'em,
Happy," he said to me, most earnest. "If I die with 'em on you won't
let 'em take 'em off, will ya?" He had a lot o' fever, so I humored
him; but I wished, myself, he wasn't so set in his ways. His salve was
the bulliest stuff I ever used on a bullet hole, an' my arm begun to
mend right from the start. His shoulder was splintered purty bad, but
still, it didn't seem as if it ought to have bothered his legs none.
The next day he was a little wobbly in his head, an' it seemed to rest
him to hold my hand. He didn't want no one else in the room, so I just
sat an' talked nonsense to him, an' twice Barbie came in to see him.

In spite of his ugly face the child wasn't a mite afraid of him, an'
she would smooth back his black, coarse hair; but she didn't talk to
him much--just looked into his eyes an' smiled.

"I wish Melisse was here," she said to me once when Monody was dozin',
"she'd cook somethin' nice an' tasty, an' she's such a good nurse."

"Melisse?" sez Monody comein' to, "who's Melisse?"

"She's my old nurse," sez Barbie. "I told her a story--just a little
one--an' she wouldn't whip me for it, so Daddy told her to clear out
until she was willin' to do her duty. He thinks she's gone for good,
but I know where she is."

"Melisse, Melisse," muttered Monody. "Well, after all, it might be.
The' ain't nothin' too strange to happen."

I see 'at he was a bit out of his head, so I didn't question him none.
"Where is she, Barbie?" I asked in a low tone.

"I don't know just exactly where she is or I'd go bring her back, of
course," she sez; "but I know 'at she's somewhere hereabouts, 'cause
the day before my birthday--why, it was only day before yesterday,
wasn't it? It seems years ago. Well, day before yesterday I found a big
pan o' cakes in my playhouse, an' no one can't bake 'em but Melisse."

Monody didn't say anything more until after Barbie'd gone from the
room, and then he made me tell him all I knew of Jabez, which was
mighty little. He lay there a long time without speakin', an' then he
sez: "O' course the' may not be anything in it, but if ever you an'
this Jabez lock horns, you just ask him about the Creole Belle, an' if
he's the man I mean--an' he sure favors him--it'll most likely unnerve
him. Now I want to sleep."

Spider Kelley an' the doctor got back about ten that night, an' ol'
Monody was in a ragin' fever an' some out of his head, but he kept his
gun handy an' wouldn't stand for any one startin' to undress him.

"The''s somethin' worse'n that shoulder," sez the doctor, "though
that's bad enough, goodness knows. He's hurt somewhere in the spine,
an' I'll have to examine him. Take that fool gun away from him."

I put my hand on Monody's an' he loosened his hold on the gun an' took
hold of my hand, his face lightin' up contented. Then I handed the gun
to one o' the boys an' took tight hold of his right arm while the
doctor started to unbutton his shirt. Ol' Monody's eyes opened with a
jerk, an' the fever had left 'em. "Happy, Happy!" he pleaded. "You know
'at I'd give my life for ya! You won't let 'em bother me, will ya? I'm
done for, I know it; an' the' ain't nothin' to do. Happy, Happy, let me
go in peace, won't ya? Let me die like a man!"

The' wa'n't no fever in his eyes, an' he was sure earnest about it. I
knew 'at if things was changed an' I was in his place he'd give me my
way, so I sez to the doctor, "Dock, ol' Monody here is a cure-all
himself; he give me the best salve ever I see for my own shoulder, an'
when he sez it's all up with him, he ain't bluffin'. I reckon you'd
better just let him alone." I hadn't never seen this doctor before; he
was a youngish buck with sharp features an' an obstinate chin. "No,"
sez he, "it wouldn't be professional. I got to make an examination. Now
some o' you boys hold his feet an' some o' you hold his good hands
an'--"

"Some o' you go to hell!" sez I. "If ol' Monody here wants to die with
his clothes on he's sure goin' to do it or else the' 's goin' to be
consid'able more funerals on this place than we've already had. Now you
git!"

The Dock, he was the first to go, an' then the rest o' the boys filed
out.

"You're square, Happy," sez Monody, after they'd gone. "You're square,
an' I knew it the first time I looked into your eyes. If I'd fell in
with square ones at the start it would 'a' been a heap easier--a heap
easier."

Cast Steel hadn't hardly taken his eyes off Barbie since lie 'd got up
an' around again, but right after the Dock had left, in he popped.
"What's this I hear, Happy?" he sez, excited.

"I don't know, Jabez," I replied.

"Dock Wilson sez 'at you chased hire out o' the room with a gun an'
wouldn't let him examine this man."

"Well," sez I, "as far as that goes, this man has a right to judge for
himself. He saved your life an' your outfit an' your daughter, an' I
don't reckon you're goin' to tie him into a knot so as a doctor can go
pokin' around in him when he don't want it."

"You're as obstinate as ever!" shouts Jabez. "He 's probably out of his
head."

"No, he ain't out of his head," sez Monody, in a low, soft voice, but
without openin' his eyes more'n a crack.

"He ain't out of his head an' he ain't forgot nothin' he ever knew, an'
it'll be better all around if he's allowed to go in peace."

Jabez looked at him in surprise, and Monody scowled up his face till he
looked like a wounded Silver Tip, but the' came a queer hunted look
into Jabez' eyes for a moment, an' then he muttered, "Well, this is a
free country an' I reckon lie has the right to decide. He has sure
saved us, an' if the' 's anything on earth I can give him, all lie has
to do is to ask for it, an' I hope he pulls through in his own way."

Jabez fidgeted around a minute or two longer an' then he oozed out o'
the room. When he'd gone of Monody chuckled a wicked, contented
chuckle, an' after a bit he sez, "It's him all right, it's him, but he
never did me any harm, an' I wouldn't worry the child, not for worlds.
She ought to have a woman around her though. You get old Melisse back,
Happy, an' remember--if it ever comes to a question of you or him--just
call him George Jordan an' say 'at Jack Whitman wasn't killed "--Monody
chuckled again, an' then sobered--"but don't spring it except as a last
resort, 'cause the little girl couldn't help nothin' about the Creole
Belle, an' she ain't no call to be worried by it. Jim Jimison, he's
white, Happy, but he 'd 'a' been killed that trip if you hadn't taken
bolt when you did. He's learned the game purty well now, though, an' I
reckon he'll make good."

Poor old Monody kept on talkin' disconnected until about midnight,
first tellin' some devilish deed he'd seen or took part in, an' then
tellin' o' some joke or some act o' kindness. Just at midnight he took
my hand, an' the' came a look into his eyes like as if he was about
overcome by some beautiful vision; but in a moment he cohered down an'
he gripped my hand till it hurt. "Happy," he gasped, "I allus loved ya,
Happy. You won't let--you won't let 'em--" an' it was all over with ol'
Monody.

I sat by the bed a long time thinkin' it over, an' then I went out into
the settin' room. Jabez an' a couple o' the boys was there an' I told
'em it was over. I went out into the night to have a look at the stars.
Whenever somethin' has happened in my little wobbly life down here I
like to get out an' see the same old stars in their same old places,
calm an' steady an' true. That was one thing which allus drew me to the
child Barbie,--she was a star-worshiper too, same as me.

When I got back I see the little doctor explainin' somethin' to Jabez.
I thought he had gone long ago, but the hooked-nosed buzzard couldn't
leave without satisfyin' his curiosity. "What do you reckon was the
reason your friend wouldn't let himself be examined?" sez he, with a
leer.

"It wasn't nowise my business," sez I, "so I didn't think about it at
all."

"Well, it was because he wasn't a man at all--he was a woman."

For a moment I stood an' looked at him, while a lot o' things became
clear as day to me. A woman--ol' Monody was a woman! When I thought of
what a girl is, an' what it must have took to make one want to really
be a man, I felt plumb ashamed o' my sex; but here was another creature
in man's clothes standin' an' grinnin' into my face as though he had
done somethin' smart.

"How do you know?" I sez soft an' steady.

"I went in an' examined--it was my professional duty. She had been shot
in the abdomen and the bullet had lodged in the spine. She had stuffed
a rag into the hole an' all the bleedin' was internal. I found that--"

"Who was with you?" I asked him.

"Nobody," he said with pride; "I went in alone an' I found--"

"I'm obliged to ya, Boys," sez I, "an' I'll be obliged to you still
more if you'll just stand to one side an' watch me make an examination.
I only got one arm, so it's perfectly fair. It seems to be the fashion
now days to examine human beings who wear men's clothes--but who ain't
men--so I feel it my PROFESSIONAL DUTY to examine this here speciment
before us."

The grin kind o' left his face when I started for him. He wasn't near
my size, but me only havin' one workin' arm made it fair. He looked to
the boys to help him, but they was unusual placid. I reached out an'
grabbed him by the collar an' put my knee in his stomach as a brace; he
struck me in the face an' in my wounded shoulder, but in about one
minute I had his clothes off him, an' there he stood the shamedest
thing I ever see. "Now you get out o' here an' ride home," sez I, "an'
I believe if I was you I'd pick myself out a new home--one 'at would
take about six weeks to ride to. You won't be popular around here from
this on."

"Can't I put my clothes on," he sez.

"Not these," sez I. "If you have any more where you've been livin' you
can put them on; but I hope in my heart the sun peels your back before
you arrive, an' I hope when you do arrive the' 'll be enough women
awake to give you a raw-hidin' for bein' indecent. Now git."

He looked into the boys' faces again, but they wasn't friendly--they
wasn't even smilin', an' then he went outside, got his pony, an' rode
away. He rode clear out o' the West I reckon, 'cause while I heard of
the story purty much everywhere I went after that, I ain't never heard
o' the buzzard himself since that day long, long ago.

It was dawn by the time he'd rode out o' sight with his white skin
shinin' on his hunched up form, an' then I went in to set with ol'
Monody a while.




CHAPTER FIVE

JUST MONODY--A MAN


He looked mighty peaceful, did ol' Monody. Curious thing about death,
is the way it seems to beautify a person. In life Monody was the
homeliest human I ever see, an' yet the' was something so kindly, an'
gentle, an'--an' satisfied in his face there under the lamplight, that
I reached out an' patted his hand, almost envious--even though my fool
eyes was a-winkin' mighty fast.

We all of us would give the first ten years of our life to know what
it's like out yonder; when he was here, ol' Monody would 'a' done
anything he could for me,--well, he lay down his life an' I reckon
that's about skinnin' the deck,--but here I was achin' to know how it
was with him, an' there he was with all his guesses answered, an' him
not able to pass back a single tip to me.

It wasn't him that I was lookin' down at, it was just the shell of him,
scarred and battered and bruised, but all his life--or at least most of
it--he had twisted up his face to make it as ugly as possible, so 'at
no one wouldn't take him for a woman. Now it could relax an' give a
sort of a hint as to what it might have been if he'd had a chance to
live. Oh, it's sure a crime the way we torture some o' the white souls
'at drift to this Sorrowful Star, as I once heard a feller call it.

Injun, Nigger, an' Greaser--why, such a combination as that ain't
entitled to trial in a civilized nation--it's guilty on sight. Any one
would know 'at such a bein' would be cruel an' treacherous an' thievin'
an' everything else 'at was bad--but yet the' come a good streak into
Monody some way or other. All in the world I had ever done for him was
to beat him over the head when he acted like a beast, an' then to treat
hint like a human when he acted like one. The' wasn't nothin'
especially kind nor thoughtful in it, just simple justice as you might
say, an' yet in spite of his treacherous mixture he wasn't askin' no
favors; all he wanted was a square deal, an' when he got it he was
square clear to the finish. It's a funny thing, life.

In spite of all he'd done to kill it the' was a mother streak in him
which made him fair hungry for somethin' to pet an' fondle. He was
allus good to any kind of an animal, an' though I didn't notice it at
the time, he was allus motherin' me; an' look at the way he had soothed
little Barbie with a touch that night in the cook shack! O' course I
ain't questioning the judgment o' the Almighty, but for the life o' me
the I can't see why it was necessary to make a woman as big an' as tall
as ol' Monody was, an' yet perhaps if I just knew the story from the
beginnin', I 'd see it was a mercy, after all.

Anyhow, it made it easy enough for him to work out his scheme.

The' ain't no rules for women anyhow, 'cause their hearts won't never
surrender to their heads; when they do, they ain't all woman. Well,
yes, there is one rule 'at 's safe for a man to foller In dealin with
woman, an' that is that when a woman's in love, she 's in love all
over. Sometimes a man's in love up to his pocket-book, sometimes up to
his appetite, an' sometimes up to his heart, but he's mighty seldom in
love all over. If nothin' else stays dry he's generally able to take
care of his head, but with a woman everything goes; so I'm purty
tol'able sure that away back at the beginnin' it was love 'at drove ol'
Monody out of her own sex down into ours.

When the news spread abroad 'at the man who had killed Bill Brophy
without a weapon had cashed in, the neighbors gathered from ninety
miles around, and we sure gave Monody the rip-snortin'est funeral ever
seen in those parts. We didn't say nothin' about him not really bein' a
man, an' though I reckon 'at every feller there knew of it, the' wasn't
a single one of 'em spoke of it--so we didn't have no trouble at all.

He lies on a little knoll about a mile to the north of the ranch house.
Up back of him ol' Mount Savage stands guard an' fights off the
roughest of the storms; while the soft winds from the south steal
gently up a little cut in the rocks an' seem to circle about him,
whisperin' secrets of countries far away. If the' 's a single bird in
Wyoming, you can find it hoppin' about his narrow bed or singin' in the
oak tree 'at stands above him, spreadin' out its branches like a priest
givin' the blessin'. Winter or summer, Monody's grave is the quietest,
peacefullest, purtiest spot 'at lies outdoors, as if the old Earth had
repented of the way it had treated him, and was tryin' to make it up to
him now.

Take it in winter when the' 's a clean sheet o' soft, white snow over
everything, an' I like to go out an' stand on another little knoll
about a half mile this side. The last speck of light in the valley
comes through a narrow cleft an' falls on Monody's grave. As the sun
sinks lower an' lower the crimson glory on the soft fleecy snow seems
to come up out of the grave an' climb the black shadow of the mountain,
like--but pshaw, I reckon it'd be a mighty tame sight to ol' Monody
himself.

I never speak of him, an' I never think of him, as anything but a man.
He lived like a man, God knows he died like a man; and on the little
stone at his head the' ain't nothin' carved except just--Monody, a Man.




CHAPTER SIX

THE RACE


It was mighty pleasant back at the Diamond Dot after things got settled
again. Barbie had become a curious little trick with a way of doin'
strange things in a sober old-fashioned manner like as if she was a
hundred years of age, but was tryin' to hide it.

She was more like Jabez too, which give me a heap of amusement, seein'
which one was goin' to win when they straddled a question. Barbie
wasn't sassy, not at all; she just didn't seem able to savvy that a few
small matters, like age an' parentage an' ownin' the ranch, gave Jabez
a sort of a majority vote, as you might say, on all questions. No,
Barbie couldn't seem to get callous to this, an' she fought out all
differences of opinion from the mere facts o' the case, an' I got to do
Jabez the justice of admittin' that he never retreated behind his
authority until after he'd been well licked in the open; an' unless it
was a mighty important question he took his lickin' like a man. Barbie
was game about it too, an' when she got the worst of a fair fight she
never put up a howl; but when she had won in the open it used to grind
her something fierce to be told point blank that she had to do such an'
so, "'Cause she was a girl."

"If tobacco stunts your growth, how's it come 'at old Tank Williams an'
George Hendricks an' Happy an' a lot more o' the boys is all over six
feet tall," she sez one day durin' a try-out, "while Flap Jack is the
smallest man on the place an' he don't never use it at all--'cept when
he cuts his finger."

"Things don't allus work alike," sez Jabez, slow an' cautious. "The
tall ones would all 'av' been taller if they hadn't used it, an'
Flappy, he wouldn't 'a' been able to see out of his boots if he had."

"Well, I don't see as it makes much difference, anyhow," sez she. "I
don't want to be so everlastin' tall, so I reckon I'll just smoke four
a day an' that'll--"

"I reckon you won't smoke any a day," sez Jabez, gettin' riled.
"Smokin' cigarettes is a nasty, filthy habit, an'--"

"Then I'll smoke a pipe," sez Barbie.

"No you won't smoke a pipe! I don't intend to have a gal child of mine
smokin' anything. It's disgustin', an--"

"It ain't as disgustin' as chewin', an' you chew," sez Barbie.

"Now you look here!" yells Jabez, hot as a hornet, "I'm a man an' you
ain't, an' that makes a heap o' difference. I had to give up cussin' on
your account, but I don't intend to go to wearin' dresses complete,
just to keep you halfway respectable."

"Yes, an' I got three cusses comin' to me too," sez Barbie. "I heard
you over at the hay-barn yesterday."

"That don't count--the agreement was, 'about the house'; an' besides,
you didn't have no call to be there."

"Yes I did. I couldn't light my cigarette out in the wind so I got
behind the barn. You are the one 'at didn't have no call to cuss. The'
wasn't anything wrong at the hay-barn an' you was all alone. I just
know 'at you went there to cuss 'cause I made you own up at breakfast
that it wasn't no worse for me to fling the oatmeal out the window when
it didn't suit me than it was for you to fling the coffee."

The old man just stood an' stared at her so I knew 'at the little witch
had rooted out his devisement. "When you are older, Barbara," ol' Cast
Steel sez in his coldest tone, "you will understand these things an' be
glad of the care I took of you; but now I am compelled to lay down a
law. You are never to smoke again until you're of legal age."

"What's legal age?" sez she.

"Twenty-one years," sez Jabez.

"That'll be thirteen years," sez Barbie. "All right; but I'm goin' to
roll three cigarettes a day for thirteen years an' the very day I'm
twenty-one I'm goin' to smoke 'em all."

"You go to your room an' stay there," sez Jabez, white-hot.

"I will," she answers as cool as an icicle, "an' I'm goin' to figure up
how many it will be, so I'll have some sort of fun to look forward
to--when I get of legal age."

After she'd gone Jabez set down on a stone an' wiped his forehead. "She
ain't a child, Happy. She ain't nothin' like a child," sez Jabez to me.
"Here she is only eight year old an' she's got me out beyond my depth
already. I don't know what I ought to do with her. She went to the
spring round-up this year an' slept in a Navajo right outdoors. She
wants to go bear huntin' or anything else 'at's wild an' dis-accordin'
to her nature. What on earth am I goin' to do with her?"

"You ought to have children to play with her. She wants to play all
right, she tries to play; but the only kind of play she knows is
grown-up play. Get some children an' dolls an' pet kittens an' such
things for her; that'll give her a chance," sez I.

"I tried it," sez Jabez. "I tried it last summer, but she about killed
'em. The only children I could get was two little Injuns, but she about
ruined 'em. The only game she would play was war, an' when they
wouldn't stand for her way o' playin' it she got on her pinto--the one
you broke for her--an' roped 'em both an' like to dragged the hide off
'em. I don't know what to do."

"You ought to send her to school," sez I. "They'll be white children
there an' they won't be slow an' gentle like the little Injuns; they'll
be just as full o' devil as what she is, an' she'll get the sharp
corners wore off her."

"Hang it I tried that too. I sent her when she was six year old--I'd
been lookin' forward to it a good long time too, but it didn't do no
good.

"She put in the first day all right, but things went too slow for her
after that, an' she brought home her books an' made me pester over 'em
with her, an' she went into it like a game, an' now she's gone through
about four years' work in two. It's a blame shame, 'cause the school is
only ten miles away an' she could go as well as not, but she's so
terrible impatient. She reads all kinds o' books already, an' sez she's
goin' to read 'em all before she quits. She ain't a bit like a child
an' I don't think it's natural. I wish she'd pester me for dolls an'
pink dresses an' things like that instead of wantin' all kinds of
firearms, an' playin' poker with the boys."

Ol' Cast Steel was all worked up over it, an' I thought a long time
before I answered him, then I sez, "Jabez, you're hard enough on the
child an' you're strict enough with her, but you ain't strict enough
with yourself. When it comes to a show down,--when you actually say yes
and now,--why, she gives in; but when you argue with her she's just as
sharp as you are, an' the' 's a heap o' things all children has to do
'at I reckon the' ain't no real sense in, so when you try to dig up a
reason for 'em you give 'em the whip hand. Just like religion: lots of
it is better just stated an' not mussed up tryin' to be explained. When
a parson tries to tell me why God created this universe, it don't sound
reasonable; but when I go out an' look at the stars an' the mountains
an' the big sweep o' the plains an' then try to round up all that
astronomer feller said about things, why, I just know 'at nobody but
God could 'a' done it--an' I reckon it's that way with a child. She
trusts you until you get down to her level an' then she sees that the'
ain't much difference between you, an' she naturally expects you to
play the same game by the same rules. You send her to school an' tell
her it's for her own good, an' let her'n the teacher fight it out.
That's a teacher's business an' they know how."

Well, they was a heap o' sense in what I said, an' I'd been thinkin'
over it a long spell; so when school opened up again in the fall Barbie
had her orders an' the' wasn't much in the way of trouble.

I didn't have any regular duties at the Diamond Dot--the worst trouble
about the Diamond Dot was that nobody had any regular duties. Jabez was
notionable to a degree, an' we all just floated along, doin' what we
did do right, but not havin' much of a plan for it. I could have
handled the place with ten less men an' got through on a tighter
schedule, but it was a fine place to work at an' we all got what was
comin' to us. Through the winter I used to ride over with Barbie when
the days was anyways rough, an' it took her a long time to find out
that Starlight really could beat her pinto. I reckon that child was the
best rider 'at ever backed a pony. As you might say she grew up with a
pony between her knees, an' the way she could play a bit in a hoss's
mouth was the finest sight I ever see. I ain't much of a fool when it
comes to pickin' out a ridin' critter, an' the pinto was able--most
uncommon able.

One Saturday morning she told me that she was tired o' seein' Starlight
beat Hawkins on ten-mile dashes, an' she was goin' to have a real race
that day. She allus called the pinto "Hawkins" after I got back; she
had said it wouldn't be polite to call us both "Happy" an' as long as I
had owned both names the longest, she was willin' to give me my
choice--an' then she said 'at that wouldn't be quite fair to the
pinto--she was mighty rigid on bein' square--so she said 'at we'd have
to draw for 'em. She wrote "Happy" on one piece of paper an' "Hawkins"
on the other, put her hat in the pony's mouth,--she had taught him a
lot o' tricks,--an' I had to turn my back while she dropped in the
names. My luck was good, so I drawed "Happy," an' the pony was called
"Hawkins." I was feared I might have to go back to John, an' John's a
sort of a heavy baggage for a careless cuss to be luggin' around.

It was spring, an' the range was smooth an' tough. All through the snow
Starlight's long legs had given him a big advantage, but now her weight
made it a purty good bet either way. "Let 'em go grassin', Barbie," sez
I. "This fine young grass--"

"I knew you were afraid to make a fair test of it," she sez scornful.

"I ain't neither afraid," I sez, "but what's the use of a race just to
satisfy our curiosity?"

"What's the use of curiosity except to satisfy it?" sez Barbie, an' she
had me sure enough. A feller was a fool to argue with that little
witch. She allus had a come-back, an' the only way to get ahead of her
was either to boss or beg. I hadn't no authority to boss, an' I was too
blame young to beg, so she just about had me roped an' tied. "How far
are you goin' to race?" sez I.

"A hundred miles," sez she.

"Pshaw," sez I, "the country's wider'n that. Why don't you give'em a
decent work out."

"That'll be enough for this time," sez she, "an' if you hustle you can
have'em ready by five o'clock."

"Does the boss know?" sez I.

"He will sometime," sez she. "Now hustle."

It was a glorious day, an' I own up I was amused at the prospect. Both
hosses was hard as flint an' nervy. If I'd 'a' stayed at the ranch I'd
have collected up brandin' irons an' other truck for the round-up, an'
a hundred miles through spring sweetness was a heap sight more temptin'
to me; so I give in an' soon we was under way. "Where is the course
laid out, Barbie?" I sez. "You know I won't see much of you back there
in the ruck an' I want to know the path."

"All you need to do is to foller Hawkins's trail," sez she, "but in
case you can't find it just circle Mount Savage an' that'll be the
distance, so the boys say."

We started out at a comfortable gait, an' I watched her pretty close.
Once I tried her out by sendin' Starlight along for a mile, but she
just kept the pinto pluggin' away, an' I sensed I was up against some
head ridin'. Oh, it was gratifyin' to watch the little rascal ridin'
with her brain, like I'd taught her. She didn't throw the reins down on
her pony's neck, an' she didn't pull in on the bit; she just played it
in his mouth to keep remindin' him that this was his busy day, an' that
he'd better tend to his knittin'. Old Starlight knew every move I made,
an' he was resigned to a good long pump of it.

I nonsensed a while, tryin' to get her to laugh an' cut up, but not
her. "Now don't talk unless you have somethin' to say, Happy," sez she.
"I don't want Hawkins to imagine 'at we're out ridin' for an appetite.
I want him to believe 'at we're on mighty important business."

"Oh, he'll sure enough think it," sez I, "when we swing around Mount
Savage an' he gets to see home through Starlight's dust."

"When it comes to that, I'll bet he won't be complainin' o' the
dullness of the business he's been on. Now just practice thinkin' a
while."

We watered about noon at a little snow stream on the opposite side of
old Savage; but we et our vittles on hoss back an' we didn't waste any
time on the waterin'. I figured we'd scaled up about fifty miles, an'
the pinto was still tonguin' his bit an' waitin' for somethin'
interestin' to turn up. Starlight was gettin' some disgusted with the
monotony.

We rode on for another hour an' then Barbie began to ride a little. The
pinto let out a couple of links as cheerful as a rainbow, an' I rode at
his cinch. I knew I could beat her in the brush, an' she was easin' the
pinto too much to make it a question of grit unless she began to herd
him mighty shortly. Well she did begin ridin' purty soon, an' brother
Hawkins responded like an echo. He was a hog for distance, was that
pinto. He was short on top with plenty of depth to him, and his belly
cut up quick, showin' he had lots o' room for his heart an' his lungs
an' his forage. Starlight's nostrils worked a shade more than his did,
but we were gettin' purty close to the pinto's speed, an' Starlight had
a load of it left, and he'd pay out the last ounce of it when I said
the word. I knew I could beat her this time, but I was feared she might
call for a repeat the next day--an' I intended to remind Jabez it was
the Sabbath.

Starlight was pretty wet with sweat, while the pinto was bone dry when
we struck Trouble Creek which was boilin' full. In we went, an' the
water hissed and sucked around our waists; but we crossed at about the
same time, an' then it was only ten miles to the ranch house an' Barbie
shook her quirt. Away shot the pinto, but Starlight had his fussy
streak warm by this time, an' I let him edge ahead as fast as he wanted
to. He knew the distance now, an' he knew I wanted to cover it in the
least possible time, an' he knew just how much the' was left in him, so
I drew a tight rein, eased it off again, an' we dropped a gap between
us an' the shorter legs of Barbie's mount. We only gained an inch at a
time an' I wasn't sure I'd be the one to do the braggin' even yet, when
all of a sudden we swept around a point of rock an' there was Melisse
hot-footin' it to the ranch house. She heard us the minute we saw her,
an' when we drew up to her she gasped: "Pluto has about killed ol' Cast
Steel, an' Spider Kelley has gone for the doctor."

Barbie caught the words, but she never made a reply or asked a single
question; she just laid the quirt without a sting over Hawkins's
foreshoulder an' raced on. I stopped long enough to tell Melisse that I
would send the buckboard after her, an' then I took after Barbie. It
looked like a race, sure enough. I was worried. Pluto was a high grade
stallion Jabez had got after I lined up Starlight alongside the range
ponies, an' he had the meanest temper I ever see put into a hoss. I had
been tendin' him 'cause I'd got wise to the ways o' these thin-skinned
fellers down at the Lion Head, but I never quite trusted him, an' I
feared 'at maybe Barbie's goin' off without notice had riled the old
man an' he had tried to take it out on Pluto.

We only had five miles to go, an' we sure went it. I beat her to the
ranch house, but Starlight hadn't got his breath back when she rode in,
an' the pinto only took one long breath an' shook his head. I turned
the hosses over to one o' the boys 'at were hangin' around the door
lookin' troubled, an' hustled inside. Jabez lay on the lounge with a
face like soured vinegar. He had a bandage round his head an' another
around his arm, while his leg was propped up on pillows.

"What's the damage, Jabez?" I asked.

"Where's Barbie?" he demanded, not payin' any heed to my question. She
had flung herself from the pinto an' came running into the room. "Oh,
Daddy," she said, throwin' her arms around him.

"Where have you been?" sez he.

"I been racin' with Happy," she said. "Are you bad hurt, Daddy?"

"Who beat?" sez he.

"Happy did, about a hundred yards."

"It wasn't more'n fifty," sez I.

"How far did you race?" asked Jabez, grittin' his teeth.

"A hundred miles," sez Barbie.

"A hundred miles?" sez Jabez, grinnin' painful. "A hundred miles, an'
the black hoss beat your pinto carryin' a hundred'n fifty pounds more
weight. Hendricks--tell those blame fools not to kill Pluto. Happy, you
go an' see that they don't even hurt him. It was my fault. Now, Barbie,
tell me about the race."

I went out to the big open stall where Pluto was kept all by himself,
but first I sent one o' the boys with the buckboard after Melisse. I
found Pluto in the middle of his stall with three ropes around his neck
an' the boys snubbin' him to posts. They wasn't minded to let him go,
even on Hendricks's say-so, but I went into the stall an' told 'em to
ease off. "He's whipped one man in a fair fight," sez I, "an' if
another man don't whip him in a fair fight the' won't be any handlin'
of him from this on. Ease off these ropes."

Well, I whipped that hoss in a fair fight, an' then I went in to see
how Jabez was gettin' along. I said a fair fight an' I meant a fair
fight. Yes, the' is a way to fight a hoss fair--that is, as fair as any
fight is. If you look at it one way, the' can't never be a fair fight,
'cause one is bound to have an advantage--skill, luck, experience, or
courage; but what I mean is, that I fought that hoss with nothing but
just my own hands an' I whipped him.

Why the way I did it was this: as soon as they slacked off the ropes I
slipped up beside him an' jerked 'em over his head, an' we two stood
alone in the big box stall with size in his favor an' brains in mine. I
had some consid'able size in those days, an' he was almost too brainy
for a hoss; but I own up 'at I 'd had the most experience.

First I stood off an' insulted him: I cussed him an' I called him all
manner of names an' then I laughed at him--you think a hoss, a hoss
like Pluto, can't be insulted? Why, pshaw! they're as high feelin' as
children. He was out o' humor to begin with, an' purty soon his ears
went back an' his eyes got red. I've heard tell about an animal not
bein' able to look a man in the eyes, an' I never saw the wild animal
'at could; but I've seen three man-eatin' stallions in my time 'at
could look clear to your liver, an' a bulldog can do it too.

First off he tried to bite, but I got him a shoulder-blow right on the
nose. It made him wink, an' he reared an' struck at me with his front
hoofs. I ducked to the left an' the minute his hoofs came down I
slipped thumb an' forefinger into his nostrils, an' tried to jerk his
head around to the right; but I'd thrown him once before that way an'
he was too quick. He threw up his head before I could grip his mane
with my left, an' a reachin' kick with his right hind foot tore my vest
away.

He floundered me around consid'able for a spell, but at last in tryin'
to jam me against the wall I got hold of his mane. I braced my feet
against the wall an' liftin' myself, I got his ear in my mouth an' I
bit it. It was a trick I'd learned from ol' Monody, an' I sure bit hard
an' close to the head. For mighty nigh a minute he stood it fightin',
an' then he give a groan. He hadn't had a sniff of air through his nose
since I'd grabbed it, an' he wasn't no bulldog, he was a satin-skinned
thoroughbred, an' he couldn't stand the anguish in his ear.

He groaned an' then he shivered an' then of a sudden I let go his ear,
jerked his head around to the right, pulled up his left front foot with
my left hand an' heaved with my shoulder. Down he went an' as he fell I
leaped across him, an' put my weight on his head. Then I took my
fingers out of his nose an' patted him.

I hate to whip a hoss, I hate to break the pride of any livin'
creature; but when I start in to do it I don't just pester him. I wait
until I have good reason an' then I convince him--whether he's able to
live through it or not. I stroked old Pluto's ears an' nose, all the
time murmurin' to him, an' durin' the murmurin' I told the boys to file
out. I never shame nobody in front of anybody if the' 's any other way
round.

Well, Pluto was drippin' with sweat an' havin' his bit ear rubbed was
mighty soothin' to him. We all like a lot of babyin' after we've been
hurt, whether we own up to it or not, an' Pluto wasn't any exception to
the rule. After a while I explained everything to him an' told him that
if he'd just act like a human bein', he'd be treated like a king; but
if he wanted to carry on like some savage varmint we'd have to remove
his hide an inch at a time; an' when I finally let him up he was mortal
shamed of himself.

It was plumb dark by the time I let him up, an' I watered him an' fed
him an' rubbed him until he began to eat, an' that was the last bother
any man ever had with Pluto; but I was the only one he'd mind without
bein' chainbitted. He counted me his best friend, an' after a while he
got so he'd play with me--nip my ear with his lips an' such things,
which I count as bein' a game way of takin' punishment. Still, it ain't
just gettin' beat, it's havin' it rubbed in that makes a feller bitter.

I walked around to where Starlight an' Hawkins was enjoyin' their
evenin' meal, an' I was mortal proud of the condition they was in. I
reckon the' wasn't another pair in the territory 'at could 'a' covered
their ante that day, an' it was a feather in Uncle Happy's cap all
right.

But all the time I was thinkin' o' these things I was dreadin' havin'
it out with Jabez. He was contrairy enough at the best; but all bunged
up, I could see my self-control gettin' strained twice a minute. I knew
enough about us both to know 'at whenever it came to a show down, it
meant a breakin' of home ties, an' I hated to cut loose from Barbie.
After a while, I washed up, fed up, an' went in to have it over with.




CHAPTER SEVEN

MENTAL TREATMENT FOR A BROKEN LEG


Barbie an' three of the boys were in the room when I went in. Barbie
was tellin' the old man of our ride, an' the three punchers sat with
the rims of their lids between thumb an' finger, lookin' at the floor
as solemn as if they was on trial for their life. Barbie had just
finished about our meetin' up with Melisse when I stepped in.

"Who's boss o' this place?" sez Jabez to me.

"If the' is any boss," sez I, "I reckon you're it."

"Who told you you could be gone all day?" sez he.

"Nobody told me. Nobody told me what was to be done if I stayed. Nobody
hasn't told me what to do on a ranch for some several years. Why?"

"Looks to me as if you 'd have sense enough not to risk this child's
life with your fool nonsense," sez he. I looked at him calm an' steady,
an' I didn't grin--much.

He knew all 'at I was thinkin' of,--about my leavin' the last time an'
also about my comin' back,--but he also knew 'at I knew he was thinkin'
of the same thing, an' that we'd neither of us mention it, an' that it
wouldn't ever weigh an ounce in whatever happened to come between us. I
didn't say anything.

"What makes you humor her in everything for?" sez he.

"As far as I know, she ain't my child," sez I.

He give a start an' it made him groan. "What's the matter with your
leg?" sez I. "It's broke!" he yells. "Do you think I got it stuck up on
pillers 'cause my foot's asleep?"

"Is it easy that way?" sez I.

"No it ain't," he snaps.

"Perhaps if you'd get it fixed easy you might be able to talk easy," I
sez. "Do you want me to fix it easy?"

"For heaven's sake, yes, if you know how," he sez; so I examined it. It
was a nasty break. It seems 'at Jabez had hunted over the place to find
something to fuss about as soon as he discovered 'at Barbie an' me had
flown the coop. Luck was in his favor when Slinky Bill left Pluto's
door open an' he got out. It took 'em some time to get him back, an'
they finally roped him. None o' the boys seemed anxious to go into his
stall an' take the rope off unless he'd let them ride him a while to
get the ginger out of him. Jabez took a short club an' went in an' took
off the rope, an' if the boys hadn't been handy he'd 'a' been took off
himself. As it was the hoss had smashed his leg something fierce.

"Get a board," sez I. The three boys left in a body to get the board. I
lined up the bones as well as I could, 'cause the leg was some swelled.
Then I bandaged it purty tight, next took an old boot-leg an' bandaged
that in, an' finally split a joint of stovepipe an' packed cotton to
fit the leg, tyin' the whole business to the board when it arrived, an'
proppin' the board up on pillers with one at each side of the foot.
Then I wet the bandage on his head an' arm, puttin' in plenty of
turpentine on the arm to prevent poisonin'. The turpentine made him
twist an' grunt, but when it stopped burnin' his face cleared up.

"My leg's a heap easier," he sez. I only nodded. I knew he had a lot
more steam on his mind. Presently he said, "But we might as well settle
things now as any time. Who are you workin' for?"

"I settled that a long time ago," sez I. "I'm workin' for myself."

"Then what the deuce do you mean takin' my wages?" sez he.

"I ain't takin' your wages, I'm takin' my own," sez I; "but if I was
you I'd keep calm. You'll raise your fever."

"It's my fever!" he yells, an' even the three punchers had to grin.

"Look here, Jabez," sez I, "the' ain't any sense in your gettin' riled.
You ain't dangerous when you rant around, an' I know it; but you're
most uncommon irritatin'. We didn't run any risk in our ride to-day,
an' it proved 'at my way o' feedin' is the right way. You don't own a
pair o' hosses 'at can go out to-morrow an' keep in sight o' Starlight
an' the pinto. An' my way o' handlin' Pluto is the right way too, but
if you don't like my way o' workin' for myself on your ranch--why, the'
's plenty of other ranches. The' ain't no use o' your makin' us both
miserable, quarrellin' like a pair o' children."

"That's what I say," sez Barbie.

"You wait till you're spoke to," sez Jabez; but at that moment the
buckboard came in with old Melisse, an' the very first thing she did
was to chase the three punchers out o' the house, fix up a mess of her
own to put on Jabez's head an' arm, an' then she picks up Barbie in her
arms an' I saw the little chap's lip begin to quiver; I saw Jabez wink
his eyes too fast for comfort; I saw the tears rollin' down the cheeks
of old Melisse, an' I went out into the starlight to look up toward
Mount Savage where Monody was sleepin'. It's a funny thing, life. After
a while I went back inside an' they were purty cozy again. "You been
away purt nigh a year," sez Jabez, "where you been?"

Melisse grinned; she was a Mexican an' had been good lookin' a century
or so before. She was the silent sort, but she could do a heap sight
keener thinkin' 'an lots of 'em 'at kicks up more dust at it.

"Part o' the time I been right here at the ranch," she sez, "but when
the snow was heavy I stayed in a little cave right up the ravine from
the pony corral. You don't reckon 'at I'd leave this child just on your
account, do ya?"

It was some comical to see Jabez's face. "Lord, no!" sez he. "I'm in
the habit o' payin' wages to people 'at work for themselves, an' I
don't reckon I got the authority to make anybody get off my ranch. If
you've been foolin' around here, how come the dogs never barked at ya?"

"Dogs ain't apt to forget the hand that feeds 'em. After a dog has
thought well of ya for a while, he don't turn on ya just because you've
become out o' favor for a spell; the friendship of a dog works both
ways--dogs ain't like human beings, Jabez Judson."

Melisse had a low, musical voice; but I kind o' felt my hair raisin' in
pity for the man on the sofey. It seemed like she had stuck a knife
into him, an' was twistin' it around slow without losin' her temper. He
squirmed, he bit his lip, his thumbs kept runnin' over the inside of
his fingers. It was some time before he spoke, an' then he said, "How
much longer you goin' to keep that child awake?"

"She's been asleep in my arms for some time," sez Melisse, lookin' down
at Barbie's face, which was nestled up close to hers. "I reckon I'll
put her to bed now." She got up an' carried Barbie to the door an' then
she turned an' sez in a low tone: "You're mighty proud o' being called
Cast Steel, you love to trample over people; but I want to tell you
somethin' to remember; I sha'n't never be separated from this child
again except by her own will. Next time I can't live around you I'll
take her with me. You've known me a long time"--an' she shut the door
without slammin' it.

"Oh, I don't reckon it's allus some one else's fault," I sez, after he
had got through cussin' about his luck.

"Am I a hard man to work for?" sez he.

"You ain't," sez I.

"When am I ever unjust?" sez he.

"When you go off halfcock," sez I.

"What is it allus about?" sez he.

I thought over everything before I answered. "Why, it's allus about the
child Barbie."

"I ain't Cast Steel about her; I'm spring steel where she's concerned,
an' you fellers ought to know the way spring steel works if any one
does."

"That's all right," sez I,--I was still smartin' a little,--"but the
deuce of the thing is that you go off at halfcock, an' then you allus
expect the other feller to pay the damage. It's goin' hard with you
some day, Jabez, if you don't watch closer."

"Oh, you can't understand it. If you only knew what lyin' an'
disobedience sometimes does, you wouldn't talk so calm about it,
neither. The' ain't nothin' I wouldn't do for Barbara--except see her
get started wrong. You're different from the rest, some way, an' she
thinks more of you than the others. That's one reason why I give you a
wider circle to range in, an' why I give you foreman's pay for odd-job
work--"

"Now if you think 'at I don't earn all you're payin' me," sez I--but he
broke in: "If I didn't think I wouldn't pay it," sez he.

"I can go down to the Lion Head any time I want an' get more'n you're
payin' me," sez I.

"I can pay you as much as any man in the West," sez he.

"You couldn't hire me at all if it wasn't for Barbie," sez I.

"An' I wouldn't hire you at all if it wasn't for her," he snaps. "You
can do the right thing at the right time better'n any other man I ever
had; but you're the contrariest man to work with on the job. You're
allus flyin' up, an' you'd talk back if your throat was cut."

"I'm free," sez I, "an' what's more, I know it. The' ain't no law ever
been framed up yet 'at can herd me in with the cows, an' I don't never
intend to act like a cow. I'm man to man wherever I am, an' a lot o'
you fellers with big outfits are beginnin' to forget that proposition;
but I don't forget it, an'--"

"Well, for heaven's sake," he yells, "I ain't tryin' to put a bit in
your mouth; though I must confess if I had my way about it, I'd like to
put a quart o' bran there sometimes. What I'm tryin' to do is to come
to an understandin' about the child."

"Hasn't she gone to school every day this term?" sez I.

"There's another thing," sez he. "When I told you to give that
schoolmaster a rawhidin', you wouldn't do it."

"Course I wouldn't do it," sez I. "He may have been in the right as far
as I know, an' anyway, she gave him the worst of it."

"I don't want her to give 'em the worst of it. I want her to act like a
gal child. Ridin' her pony into the schoolroom an' ropin' the master
ain't no way for a gal child to act. What I want is for the teachers to
play fair. It ain't reasonable to suppose 'at these mountains was ever
under water."

 "You stood for it when the astronomer said so," sez I; "an' the
Bible sez so, an'--"

"Well, that's all right when it comes to grown-ups; but the' ain't no
use makin' a child say somethin' it don't nowise believe. The truth is
more important than a lot of water 'at dried up millions of years
ago--if it ever was here."

"Well, the truth is a heap o' bother to Barbie's teachers at the best,"
sez I. "Look at her spellin'--she comes upon a cross-bred word in a
book an' the teacher sez it's pronounced one way, an' you another, an'
me another, until she thinks we're all liars; and she knows it the next
day when she comes across another word spelled almost alike an'
pronounced just the opposite. How you goin' to teach a child to spell
an' be honest both?"

"It's a damned outrage!" sez Jabez, his eyes flashin'. "Take 'thought'
an' through,' an' 'though'--why, it's enough to ruin the morals of the
best child the' is. Hang it, I--"

"Well, you had your own way about it," sez I. "You've had three
different teachers here this term."

"Who built the school?" sez Jabez. "Didn't I build it with my own
money, just so I'd have it handy, an' didn't I offer to pay the teacher
if they'd put it right here at the ranch?"

"You ain't got money enough to bring the world here to her feet,
Jabez," sez I, "an' it wouldn't be the best thing for her if you could."

Well, I sat there the whole blessed night, cheerin' him up. Every time
he'd get to thinkin' about his arm or his leg, I'd say somethin' to
rile him an' take his mind off his afflictions, an' along about dawn he
fell asleep. Spider Kelley had found the doctor almost in our
neighborhood, an' he arrived with him by ten in the mornin'. He paid me
a high compliment on the leg, an' after he'd rounded up a few splinters
it wasn't no trouble at all to set it; but Jabez was in for a good long
spell of it, an' the Spring round-up in sight. You might think that
this would rile him up too; but he took it like a hero, an' I kept him
in touch with everything.

We didn't have a regular foreman at the Diamond Dot. George Hendricks
took charge around the house, an' Omaha was a sort of ridin'
over-see-er; but Jabez himself tended to even little details when he
felt like it. When he didn't feel that way, any one else who thought of
it did. After the round-up Flap Jack decided to go on a bender. I tried
to talk him out of it, but he insisted, an' finally I sent him into
Jabez.

Flappy came away just tearin' mad. "He's the hardest-hearted old tyrant
ever breathed," sez Flappy to me.

"What now?" sez I.

"Last time I came back I was a day late," sez Flappy. "He fair frothed
at the mouth at it, an' made me promise to give him a month's notice
next time. How's a man to know a month ahead when he's goin' to be in
the notion for a bender. I'm fair ravin' for it now; but like's not
I'll be all out o' the notion in a month."

"Then you'll be a sight o' money ahead," sez I.

"Money? What's money for? Can you buy a thirst like mine with money?
Why, I could take this thirst o' mine to a city an' get independent
rich, just rentin' it out by the night. I've watched fellers drinkin'
when they didn't crave it, an' it hurt 'em somethin' dreadful. If you
don't want it, you can't enjoy it until you're under the influence of
it, an' after you're under the influence of it half the fun o' drinkin'
it is gone."

Flappy had studied this question more'n airy other man I ever see, an'
it was edicatin' to hear him lecture on it.

"The's only one way to get around ol' Cast Steel," sez I, winkin'; so
he got Barbie to beg for him when she went in that evenin', an' she got
Jabez to let him go next day; but after Jabez'd had time to think it
over, he sez to me, "Now see what I've done--I've let that child
wheedle me into changin' my mind an' lettin' a man break his word."

"Well, he needed it mighty bad," sez I.

"An' another thing; it ain't no fit thing for a gal child to be beggin'
for a man to go get drunk," sez Jabez. "Maybe not," sez I, "but he sure
needed it."




CHAPTER EIGHT

THE LETTER


It all came about through me bein' edicated. Most any one can read
print words, if they're of a reasonable size,--the words I mean,--but I
could read handwritin' too. I never was no great mathematician when you
got above fractions, an' I was some particular in what I read; but if I
'd been minded that way, I reckon I could have waded through purty much
any kind of a book ever was written. At that time, however, I was still
middlin' young in some things, an' I sure was suspicious of any kind of
book 'at looked like a school book.

If you'd have school books did up in paper with the right kind of
pictures on the covers you could easy get children to peruse 'em. Did
you ever notice bear cubs gettin' an edication? They ain't beat into
it, they has to be helt back. Same with the Injun kids; they was up on
edge to learn until they got to schoolin' 'em, then they fought again
it just like the white kids. The reason is that we make children learn
things they ain't curious about. I bet if you was to try an' keep it a
secret about George Washington bein' made President because he wouldn't
lie about choppin' down that cherry tree, the kids would stay awake
nights to pry into it. Kids is only human, any way you take 'em.

But this business was sure a fetcher to me, an' Barbie, she just
stumbled on it too. One afternoon me an' her went for a little ride up
into the foothills, an' after we'd built our fire, like we allus did,
no matter how hot it was, she lay there rollin' cigarettes for me to
smoke, like she allus did--the little scamp used to get on the lee side
o' me so the smoke would blow in her face; but we never mentioned it.

Well, after a while she begun to talk of romances, an' to ask me
questions about 'em. I told her as many as I could remember, an' the
one what suited her best was "Claud, the Boy Hero of Gore Gulch." It
allus used to fret her to think 'at the' wasn't nothing she could do to
make her a boy, an' she tried to even up by plannin' to herself what
she'd have done if so be she had been a boy. We talked along about as
usual; but I see the' was somethin' on her mind. She wasn't the one to
flare up an' shout for information. She allus talked in a circle like
an Injun when she really needed news.

After a while she fished out a funny old letter. It wasn't put into an
envelope, it was just wrapped inside itself an' stuck fast with a gob
o' some kind o' wax which had been broke before it was opened. The' had
been a name on the outside, but it had been rubbed out. Inside at the
beginning was the name "Rose Cottage, San Francisco," and a date; but
I've forgotten the date. The letter began, "Dearest George." I read
that much an' then I looked at Barbie. "Where'd you get this?" sez I.

She reddened a little, an' then she looked me straight in the face, and
sez "I found it in the attic. I wanted a new box to put my cigarettes
in, an' one day Daddy left the attic door open an' I went in. The' was
just a dandy chest there an' he had left the key in it. I opened it an'
this letter was on top. He goes to the attic alone every now an'
again,--mostly at night,--an' he won't never let me go with him."

"I suppose that was the reason you thought he wanted you to go alone to
the attic, too," sez I. She flushed again. "If a person don't trust me
he ain't got no call to be surprised when I don't suit him."

I shook my head. Now in talkin' to her you forgot she was a child,
'cause she didn't talk broken like most of 'em do--nor she didn't think
broken neither; but when you looked at her, little and slim an' purty
as a picture, you couldn't help but wonder if she hadn't got her soul
changed off with some one else, like what they say the Chinese believe.
She had the same rules that I did for so many things that it floored me
to understand how she got 'em that young, me havin' had to figger 'em
out with a heap o' sweat.

"Was the letter to you?" I sez, gettin' around to facts.

"No, it wasn't; but I read it, an' I wisht I knew what it means."

"I ain't a-goin' to read it," sez I.

"You 're a coward," sez she.

"That's nothing," sez I; "if it wasn't for the cowards the' would be a
heap o' vacant land in this country," sez I.

"I thought you was my friend," sez she, takin' back the letter an'
holdin' it open in her hand. "If Spider Kelley could read he would read
it for me."

"So would Hawkins, your pinto," sez I, grinnin'. "What you ought to do
is to tell your Dad that you have the letter. If you don't tell him, I
reckon I'll have to."

At first she was mad as hops, an' then she looked into my eyes an'
laughed. "I'll dare you to," sez she. The' was some woman in her even
then.

The' wasn't no way to bluff her, so I said serious, "Well, what do you
intend to do about it?"

"I don't know," said she. "Dad has lost so many other things beside his
temper, stumpin' around with that cane, that he thinks he has lost the
key to the chest. He goes around grumblin' an' lookin' for it; but he
don't ask if any one has found it. Why do you suppose that is?"

"It ain't any of my supposin'," sez I. "What are you goin' to do about
it?"

"As soon as I get through with this letter--an' make up my mind not to
hunt through the chest--I'm goin' to slip the key into his pocket--an'
then watch his face when he finds it."

"You oughtn't to treat your own father so, Barbara," sez I.

She laughed. "Barbara! that's a good soundin' name on your tongue,
Happy," sez she. Then she sobered. "I don't care nothing for what you
say or what he says; the' 's things I'm goin' to find out; an' I have a
right to. I never told him why it was that I whopped those two girls
over at school last winter, an' I never told even you. I whopped 'em
'cause they said I never had a mother. Everything has to have a mother,
even a snake, an' I had one too. Why don't he tell me about her? Why
does he allus turn me off when I ask about her? I don't intend to just
let him tell me that she was the most beautiful woman in the world an'
too good to stay here, an' such things. I am going to find out who she
was, an' if you wasn't a coward you'd help me. Now."

It was true what she said, an' I might have known she was studyin'
about it. I might, if I'd had the sense of a hoss, have known that this
was what made her old-like--studyin' about things she never ought to
have been forced to study about.

"Does that letter tell about her, Barbie?" I asked.

"That's what I want to know; but you ain't got the sand to read it, an'
I can't make it out. Here, read it."

I took it an' read it. The writin' was fine an' like what was in
Barbie's writin' book along the top. It sounded like as if a young girl
had written it partly against her will, although it was purty lovesome
too. It told about how lonely she was, an' that she hadn't never been
able to tell whether it was Jack or him she was most in love with until
Jack had asked her, an' then after Jack had deceived her an' he had
been so kind, she found out 'at he was the one she had loved the most
all the time. She reminded him 'at she had written to him before
acceptin' Jack, an' that now if he was still sure he wanted her, she
would accept him; but she could never live near the Creole Belle. She
closed with love, an' signed herself Barbara.

I kept on lookin' at the page a long time after I had read it. I
remembered what Monody had said when I thought he was out of his
head--about George Jordan an' Jack Whitman, an' the Creole Belle. I
knew 'at Barbie was studyin' my face, an' I pertended to spell out the
words a letter at a time until I could get full control o' myself.

"What kind of a bell is a Creole Bell?" sez I. "She ain't got it
spelled right neither."

"A Creole Belle is a beautiful woman of French an' Spanish blood who
lives in New Orleans," sez Barbie. "What do you make out about it?"

I was thinkin' fast as I could, but I still pertended to read the
letter. So Jabez had been in a scrape with some cross-breed woman, an'
he an' this Jack Whitman had loved the same girl, an' the' was a bad
mix-up somewhere.

"Little girl," I sez, "the' 's a lot o' wickedness in this world you
don't know about--"

"An' the' a lot o' wickedness I do know about 'at I ain't supposed to,"
she snaps in. "Do you reckon I could knock around this ranch the way I
have an' not know nothin' except about flowers an' moonlight? You cut
out the little girl part an' play square."

"Well, you look here," I sez. "I don't know what you do know an' I
don't know what you don't know; but I do know 'at lots of the things
you think you know ain't so, if you picked it up from the fool stories
some o' these damn cow punchers tell; an' you ought to be ashamed to
listen to 'em."

"Oh, yes, of course!" she fires up. "I am the one what ought to be
ashamed of the stories the cow punchers tell! That's the way from one
end to the other; somebody else says somethin' an' I ought to be
ashamed 'cause I ain't too deaf to hear it. Now the' 's a lot of
questions I'm goin' to ask you as soon as I get time. I want to know
why--"

"No, you don't!" I yells, jumpin' to my feet an' blushin' clear to my
ears. "I ain't neither one o' your parents an' I ain't your teacher. If
you want to know things you ask Melisse. If you don't put a curb on
yourself I'm goin' to flop myself on Starlight an' streak for the Lion
Head this very minute, an' I won't stop before reachin' the Pan Handle."

She knew enough to stop bettin' up a pair o' tens when she see the
other feller wasn't to be bluffed; so she sez, "Well, I'm goin' to find
it out some way or other--I'm going to find out everything I want to
know before I'm done. I love my Daddy, but he don't always play fair;
an' I'm goin' to find out what I want to find out--whether he wants me
to or not."

I was in a sweat. "Barbie," I sez at last, "supposin' he is playin'
fair? Supposin' he has sacrificed his own happiness to keep sorrow out
of your life, an' supposin' you nose around an' discover it--who'd be
the one 'at played un-fair then? You're powerful young yet; you're a
heap younger'n you realize, an' you can't know it all in a day. He'll
tell you when he can, an' you ought to trust him. He loves you more'n
anything else in this wide world. You ought to trust him, Barbie."

She trembled tryin' to steady herself, an' I looked off into the valley
for a moment. "I know he loves me, an' I wouldn't hurt him for the
world; but I think I'm old enough to know, an' I'm goin' to ask him. If
he won't tell me now he has to set a date to tell me. I ain't goin' to
have no dirty-faced school kids askin' me questions I can't answer."

"I reckon all you want to know is in that chest in the garret," sez I;
"an' I reckon it's kept for you to read after--well some day; but if I
was you, I'd put back the letter an' I'd not think about it any more'n
I could help. Supposin' your Dad had had to kill a man to save your
mother, an' didn't want you to know 'at he had ever killed a man--"

"Humph!" she snaps in. "Didn't Claud kill fourteen men in Gore Gulch,
an' didn't I think it was fine? If he's killed a man I'd be proud of
it."

"It's different in real life," sez I. "I like to read about Claud
myself, but I wouldn't want to slaughter men in the quantities he does."

"You killed a man oncet yourself," sez she.

"When?" sez I.

"You killed at least one o' the Brophy gang with the butt of your gun,"
sez she.

"It couldn't be proved," sez I.

"It couldn't be denied," sez she. "If that's all you think it is I'm
goin' to ask him."

"Supposin' your mother had made him promise not to tell you until you
came of age,--you know what store he sets on keepin' his word,--would
you be glad to know 'at you had made him break it? This Barbara might
have been his sister, an' some one else might have been your mother."

"Oh, I see it now--my mother was the Creole Belle, the beautiful lady.
He allus said she was beautiful, the most beautiful woman in the
world--" She sat there with her eyes flashin', but I didn't want to let
her make up things 'at wasn't so an' then be disappointed. "Who do you
suppose George was, an' Jack?" sez I quiet.

She drew her brows together an' sat diggin' her spur into the dirt.
"That's so, too," she said, thinkin' aloud. "But Barbara certainly did
have something to do with me, an' I wisht I knew! Oh, I wish I could
grow as big as I feel--I hate this bein' a child. I hate it!"

"Will you put the letter back an' try to forget it?" I said at last.

"I'll put it back at once, I'll give him the key at once; that is, I'll
slip it into his pocket, an' I won't pester him about it--now; but you
got to promise to tell me if you ever find it out. Will ya?"

"Yes," sez I. "If I ever find it all out I'll tell you, honest across
my heart."

"An' you won't say nothin' about this letter to Daddy, until I let
you?" she said, fixin' her eyes on me.

"No, I won't say a word about that until you tell me to," sez I.

"Now, then, let's play tag goin' back to the house," she said, with her
lip stiff again. Oh, she had a heart in her, that child had.

"You know the pinto has Starlight beat on turns an' twists," sez I.

"Yes," she sez, "an' on a two-hundred mile race, too." She played away
through the summer an' never spoke a word on the subject again; but she
hid it most too careful, and Jabez saw the' was somethin' on her mind.
"Have you any idea what the child's thinkin' about?" he asked me one
day when we was figurin' some on the beef round-up.

I didn't answer straight off, an' he noticed it. "What is she studyin'
about?" sez he, mighty shrewd.

"How can a body tell what that child is studyin' about?" sez I.

"You're with her most of the time--fact is, about all you do is to play
with her these days."

"Any time my work here don't suit you," I began; but he snaps in, "It
ain't a question o' work. If you amuse her you're worth more to me'n
any other ten men; but I have some rights. I want to know what you
think."

"Have you asked her?" sez I.

"I'm askin' you," sez he.

"Well, I want you to understand 'at I ain't no spy," sez I, glad of a
way out. "I don't know all 'at 's on her mind, an' I don't propose to
guess; and if I did know, I wouldn't tell unless she told me to. If you
know any way to make me tell, why go ahead and I'll stand by and watch
the proceedin's."

Well, he ranted up an' down a while, an' finally he pulls himself down
an' sez, "Now look here, Happy, the' 's a difference between a parent
an' anybody else."

"I own too to that," sez I; "but what have I got to do with it?"

"Well, you can sort of hint around until you find out what's on her
mind, an' if it ain't somethin' fit, you can tell her so; because if it
comes to a show down, she thinks I ought to tell her anything she wants
to know."

"Well, hadn't you?" sez I.

"Yes, sometime, I suppose--but hang it, it's mighty hard to answer some
of her questions, or to give reasons why I can't answer 'em."

"Have you asked her what's on her mind this time?" sez I.

He fidgeted around a while, an' then he sez, "Yes, I asked her."

"What did she say?" sez I.

"She looked me plumb in the eyes, an' said, 'Do you want me to ask you
what I want to find out?'"

"What did you say?" sez I.

"Why, I said, 'Yes, Barbara, if it is something you ought to know.'"

"Well?" I sez, after waitin' a bit.

"Why, she flared up," sez Jabez, "an' went on sarcastic about it bein'
strange to her why girls was so much different from other folks, an'
there bein' so many things 'at they wasn't fit to know; an' finally she
said to me point blank, 'Do you want me to ask you what I want to know,
an' if I do ask you will you answer?'"

"What did you say?" I sez.

"I didn't know what to say," sez Jabez. "She looked different from any
way she had ever looked before, and after a minute I sez, 'No, Barbara,
I don't think you had better ask me, an' I don't think you had better
think of it any more.' Don't you think I did right?"

"No," sez I, "you did not. You simply side-stepped; you wilted under
fire, an' she hates a coward as much as you do. Why didn't you face it
right then?"

"Happy," he sez, an' his voice wrung my heart, "the' 's things she'll
have to know sometime, but she ain't old enough to know 'em yet." He
stopped, an' his face grew hard as stone when he went on. "But the' 's
some things that she never can know, an' I don't want her to even learn
that there are such things. That's why you have to find out what's on
her mind."

"Now you know, Jabez, that I have my own ideas on what I have to do;
but you tell me what kind o' things there are that she mustn't ever
learn, an' maybe I'll see your way of it."

Jabez looked down at the ground, an' the sweat broke out on his
forehead before he answered me. When he did the' wasn't a trace of
friendliness in his tone. "You have done a heap for me, Happy, and if
there's anything in the money line that you think I owe you, why, name
it an' it's yours; but you can see for yourself that we can't go on
this way. I haven't asked you to do anything unreasonable and you have
refused point blank. I don't intend to explain myself to one of my own
men, and I don't intend to have an argument with him every time I want
anything done my way. This is my ranch and as long 's my own way suits
me, that's the only man it has to suit."

"Yes, you own this ranch," sez I; "but you don't own the earth, so I'll
move on."

"I haven't fired you," sez Jabez. "You're welcome to work here as long
as you want to; but you'll have to be like the other men from this on.
You've been like one of the family so long 'at we don't pull together
any more, and so if you stay I'll have to send you out with the riding
gangs."

I looked into his face and laughed, though even then I was sorry for
him. He led a lonely life, an' I knew 'at he'd miss me; but we was both
as we was, so I rolled up my stuff, loaded up Starlight, an' said
good-bye to little Barbie. That was the hard part of it. She didn't cry
when I told her I was goin'--that would 'a' been too girlish-like for
her; she just breathed hard an' jerky for a couple o' minutes while we
looked in opposite directions, an' then she said, "How'll you come back
next time, Happy? It's over three years ago since you left that other
time, an' you came back just as you said, ridin' on a black hoss with
silver trimmed leather. How'll you come back next time?"

"I don't know, Barbie," I said, "but I'll sure come back, true to you."

"Yes," she said, "an' I'll sure be true to you, all the time you're
away and when you come back."

"Barbie," I said, "you haven't treated your father right. You've let
him see that you're worryin' about somethin', an' it bothers him."

"I ain't made out o' wood," she snaps out fierce. "I try to be
contented, but I get tired o' bein' a girl. I've half a mind to go with
you, Happy."

"Yes, but the other half of your mind is the best half, Barbie," I
said. "Now I'm goin' to tell you a secret; your daddy is twice as
lonesome as you are, and he's been through a heap of trouble sometime.
You miss the mother that you never did see, but he misses the mother
that he knew and loved; and I want you to promise to do all you can to
cheer him up and make him happy."

"I never thought o' that before," said she, "I'll do the best I
can--but you'll come back to me sometime, won't you, Happy?"

"I sure will," I said, an' we shook hands on it. Then I decided that
I'd leave Starlight with her. He wasn't as good for knockin' around as
a range pony, and I didn't know what I'd be doin', so I took my stuff
off him, picked out a tough little mustang from the home herd, shook
hands with her again, an' started. I glanced up toward old Savage, and
she read my thoughts. "I'll take flowers to him now and again," sez
she, "and I'll go up there and talk to him about you; and Happy, Happy,
we'll both be lonesome until you come back!" And so I kissed her on the
lips, and rode away the second time.




CHAPTER NINE

ADRIFT AGAIN


Well, I rode purty tol'able slow. Some way I didn't want to go back to
the Lion Head Ranch. I knew 'at Jim would be glad to see me, but I knew
I'd be lonesomer there than among total strangers; so I just floated,
punchin' cows most o' the time, but not runnin' very long over the same
range.

It was just about this period that I begun to lose my serious view o'
life and get more man-like. The usual idea is that a boy is a careless,
happy, easy-goin' sort of a creature, and a man is a steady, serious
minded, thoughtful kind of an outfit; but just the reverse. A boy
starts out believin' most o' what's told him an' thinkin' that it's his
duty to reform the world; an' about the only thing he is careless of is
human life--his own or any one else's. Fact o' the matter is that if
you watch him close enough you'll find out that even in his games a boy
is about the solemnest thing on earth, an' you have to know the game
purty thorough to tell when it drifts into a real fight. That's why all
wars have been fought by boys. They believe in any cause 'at looks big
enough to lay down their lives for, an' that's their chief ambition. A
man, though; gets to see after a time that the' 's most generally
somebody up behind who's working the wires, an' he gets so 'at he don't
want to lay down ANYBODY's life, except as a last resort. He looks
favorable upon amusement, an' after a while he kind o' sort o' gets
hardened to the fact that the whole thing's a joke and he'd rather
laugh than shoot. Why, I'd be more afraid of a boy with a popgun than I
'd be of a man with a standin' army.

So as I said, it was just about this time in my life that I begun to
hunt up pleasant places to eat and sleep; an' if I heard of trouble in
the next county I turned out an' went around. I did a little of
everything; even lugged a chain in a surveyor outfit, but the' wasn't
enough chance in that. I got to have a trace of gamblin' in anything I
do; so the first thing I knew I was down in Nevada lookin' for the
treasure 'at Bill Brophy had buried there. The last of his gang had
tried to describe the place, but his description would have done for
'most any place in Nevada--she not bein' what you might call
free-handed in the way of variety.

Well, I ragged around in the mountains between Nevada and California,
lookin' for a flat-shaped rock with a mountain-peak on each side of it,
an' a cold wind sweepin' up the canon--I don't know just how the cold
wind got included, but the dyin' outlaw dwelt upon that cold wind
something particular. I stayed out puny late in the season, an' if cold
winds was identifyin', Brophy had his treasure buried purty unpartially
all over the West.

I reckon I'd have died if I had it fallen in with Slocum. Slocum was a
queer lookin' speciment when you first came upon him. His skin didn't
fit him very well, bein' a trifle too big, an' wrankled an' baggy in
consequence; his eyes was kind of a washy blue, an' they stuck out from
his face, givin' him the most sorrowful expression I ever see. You just
couldn't be suspicious of a man with such eyes as that; he seemed to
have throwed himself wide open an' invited the whole world to come an'
look inside. Why, a perfect stranger would have trusted Slocum with his
last plug of tobacoo, and like as not he'd have gotten part of it back.
Well, as I said, I was headin' for warmer weather, but I got overtook
an' had about given up all hope when I noticed the smell of smoke in
the air. I was walkin' on foot an' pullin' a burro with a pack behind
me, an' after a time I located that smoke comin' right up through the
snow.

I yelled and shouted around for a while without gettin' any response.
Night and the snow was both fallin' fast, an' that smoke was exceeding
temptin'. Finally I took a piece of burlap off the pack, put it over
the hole where the smoke was comin' up through, an' piled snow on top
of it. I was curious to see what would happen. I waited--perhaps it was
only five minutes, but it seemed that many hours--an' then a low, calm
voice, down somewhere beneath me, sez, "Get off that chimney!"

"I will," sez I, "when you tell me how to get to the fire."

I waited again, an' then a man with a lantern emerged into the cut
about forty feet below me, an' told me how I could wind around and come
down to him. Well, me an' the burro finally worked it out, an' there
was a man with long whiskers standin' in his shirt-sleeves in front of
a hole in the snow.

"You like to 'a' smothered me," he grumbled. "Don't you know better'n
to stop up a chimney that's workin'?"

"I wanted the chimney to work double," sez I, "an' that was the only
way I could think up to attract your attention."

"Do you live around here?" sez he. "Not very much," sez I, "but I 'm
minded to try it a while, if there 's room in your burrow for two."

"Got any tobacco?" sez he.

"Plenty," sez I.

"You're welcome," sez he.

We took the burro over to a clump of pine woods an' turned him loose,
an' then I crawled in through the tunnel to Slocum's fire. It was in a
cave which had a natural chimney runnin' up the hill, an' it looked
considerable much like Paradise to me. We ate an' smoked together for a
week, an' then one day our fire went out an' a flood of water poured
down through the chimney. We worked like beavers for a while, gettin'
our stuff outdoors, an' it was as hot as summer outside.

"That's the only drawback to this cave," said Slocum. "It will be all
to the good when the winter settles in earnest, but it will be some
bother while it's still snowin' an' thawin'."

I told him that I agreed with him to such an extent that if I could
locate the burro I'd rather risk gettin' back to humanity than to dyin'
there of rheumatiz. I was wringin' wet through.

"Nobody can't die of rheumatiz around me," sez Slocum, an' he went to
one of his packs an' got out a piece of root.

"Chew this," sez he, "an' it will drive the rheumatiz out of your
system."

Anybody would have trusted those eyes, so I chewed the root for about a
minute, an' then I chewed snow an' mud an' tobacco an' red pepper for
an hour, tryin' to get rid of the taste. Drive the rheumatiz out of
your system? Why, the blame stuff would drive out your system too if
you chewed it long enough. It was the tarnationest stuff 'at ever a
human man met up with.

"It's most too strong to take pure," sez Slocum, "but if you grind it
an' put a shall pinch in a quart of alcohol it makes a fine remedy.
Don't throw the rest o' that root away. There is enough there to do you
a lifetime."

"Yes," sez I, "there is, an' more."

A feller once told me that man was a slave to his
envirament--envirament is anything around you, scenery, books, evil
companions, an' sech; well, a burro ain't no slave to his envirament
'cause he generally eats it. My burro was fat, an' the clump of pine
trees had mostly disappeared. I loaded up my stuff, shook hands with
Slocum, and started down the mountain. Just as I got fully started
Slocum sez to me, "I 'm sure sorry to see you go. I don't generally get
much friendly with folks any more, but I took to you from the first,
an' any time I can do you a favor, all you got to do is to wink."

"What's your general plan of occupation, Slocum?" sez I.

"All that I ever expect to do for the remainder of my days," sez he,
"is to search for my Rheumatiz Remedy."

"Well," sez I, "any time you get to do me a favor in that line, it'll
be when I'm too weak to wink." So we parted the best o' friends, an' I
went on to a lumber camp where I put in the winter bossin' a gang. I
didn't know much about lumber, but the men there was just the same as
anywhere else, an' we got along fine.

I was bossin' a little ranch up in Idaho next June when I heard tell of
a big strike in the Esmeralda range--not such a great distance from
where I had spent the week with Slocum. The report had it that a feller
named Slocum had located the big ace of gold mines, an' I was some et
up with curiosity to see if it was the same Slocum; but I was needed at
the ranch that winter, an' as I took a likin' for the young feller who
was tryin' to make it go, I stuck to him, an' it wasn't until the
followin' July that I pulled out an' floated down that way.

Well, it was the same old Slocum sure enough. He was the most onlucky
cuss 'at ever breathed, I reckon. Every time he had made up his mind to
do something, Fate had stepped up an' voted again it. He had wasted the
best part of his life locatin' gold mines 'at wouldn't hang out, until
at last even he got disgusted an' went to huntin' for his Injun root to
cure rheumatiz with. First thing he knew, he had stumbled on a bonanza
lode in the Esmeralda range. This here lode was a peach. Ten-foot face
on top, just soggy with gold an' silver, an' copper an' tin enough to
pay expenses. It just looked as if they's said, "Now then, there's
Slocum; he been hammered so long he's got callous to it. Let's jus' see
how he'd act if we switched his luck on him." An' they sure done it.

Slocum, he scratched around until he see that it wasn't no joke, an'
then he set bait for a couple o' capitalists. He trapped two beauties,
an' they put up the assets an' went in, equal partners. They sunk
shafts an' built stamp mills an' smelters an' retorts; oh, they sure
made plans to get the metal wholesale. As soon as it began to flow in
they built stores an' shacks an' a big hotel--they wasn't timorous
about puttin' their coin into circulation, you bet your life, an' it
looked as if they was going to flood the market.

Well, Slocum, he owned a third of everything, mind, an' his expression
flopped square over like a dry moon, an' stayed points up. He forgot
all those years 'at he'd been havin' the muddy end of it, an' after a
time he got 'em to call the mine "Slocum's Luck." The' wasn't no call
to hurl such an insult as that into the mouth of an honest,
hard-workin' mine, an' naturally, as soon as it was done, the mine laid
down in its tracts an' refused to give up another ounce.

They came to a break in the lode an' couldn't find the beginnin' again.
The same twist that had hove one edge out of the ground had unjointed
the other. But they had got out a tidy sum already, an' they knew the'
must be a loose end somewhere, so they was anxious to keep their outfit
in good order.

Slocum hadn't swelled clear out of shape with his new fortune, an' when
I made myself known to him he had give me a purty tol'able decent sort
of a job, where there was more bossin' an' responsibility than brute
labor; an' I felt kindly toward him. Winter lasted full four months out
there. It was a good ninety miles to the railroad, an' so when the
mornin's begun to get frosty every one else scooted for humanity, an'
I, bein' more or less weak-minded, took the job o' watchman, at forty a
month an' my needin's. I always was a hog for litachure, so I got a
bushel o' libraries an' started in to play it alone.

The' wasn't a blessed thing to do, so I read 'em through by New Years,
an' got out of tobacco by the first of February. From that on I begun
to think in a circle, an' my intellect creaked like a dry axle before
the bluebirds began to sing. Quiet? I could hear the shadows crawlin'
along the side of the house. The snow was seventy-five feet deep in the
canyons, so you might say I was duty bound to stay there. As a general
rule, I don't shirk breakin' a path, but when the snow is more than
fifty feet higher than my head, I'd rather walk fourth or fifth.

When the outfit came back in the spring I was the entire reception
committee; but I bet the' never was one more able to do its part.




CHAPTER TEN

A WINTER AT SLOCUM'S LUCK


They only brought out about half a gang that summer, an' they kept them
probin' around all over the neighborhood; but though they found enough
stuff to about pay expenses, they couldn't get back on the main track.
Both the Eastern capitalists showed up along toward fall to see what
was doin', an' when it came time to knock off work, they tried to get
me to repeat my little performance as watchman.

I thanked 'em for their trustfulness, but I politely declined the
honor. I told 'em 'at I was purty tol'able quick-witted, an' it didn't
take me four months to study out what I was goin' to say next. But I
compromised by sayin' that if they would give me two other fellers for
company I'd stay; otherwise they'd have to rustle up some poor devil
'at needed the money. They knew 'at I was reliable, so they agreed; an'
I selected out my two companions in affliction. What I mostly wanted
was a heap of variety, an' when the number is limited to two, a feller
has to be some choicy; but I reckon I got the best the' was.

There'd been a little light-haired feller there all season, kind o'
gettin' familiar with labor, like. He was no account to work, he
couldn't even learn to tie a knot; but he talked kin' o' blotchy, an'
it was divertin' to listen to him. One day we was kiddin' him about
bein' so thumby, an' he sez, "That's right, boys, laugh while you can;
but I'll have you all between the covers of a book some day, an' then
it will be my grin. I ain't swore no everlastin' felicity to the holy
cause o' labor; I'm just gettin' local color now."

Next day he fell into a barrel of red paint he was swobbin' on the
hotel to keep her from warpin', an' every blessed man in camp passed
out about six jokes apiece relatin' to local color. He never saddened
up none, though, just smiled sorrowful, as though he pitied us, an'
went on tanglin' up everything he touched.

An' then there was another curious speciment there; a tall thin feller,
with one o' them lean, chinny faces. He claimed 'at he had been a show
actor, but his lungs had given out--claimed he was a tragudian, but
Great Scott! he couldn't even turn a handspring.

He said he was recuperatin', an' he sure did hit his liquor purty hard;
but I never could make out what he expected to get out of a minin'
camp, 'cause he was full as useless as Local Color. About half the
fellers you meet strayin' around out here are a bit one-sided, but we
don't care so long as they're peaceable. When you'd guy this one a
little stout, he'd fold his arms, throw back his head, an' say, "Laugh,
varlets, laugh! Like the cracklin' o' thorns under a pot, is the
laughter of fools." This was the brand of langwidge 'at flowed from
this one, an' he wasn't no ways stingy with it.

Well, they had kept these two at boys' jobs an' boys' wages, an' when I
offered 'em the position of deputy watchmen, they fair jumped at it.
Said Local Color, "It will be a golden opportunity to perpetuate the
seething thoughts which crowd upon my brain." Said Hamlet, "I thank
thee, sir, for this, thy proposition fair. In sooth I'll try the
cold-air cure, and in the majesty of prime-evil silence, I shall make
the snow-capped mountains echo to the wonderful rhapsodies of
Shakespeare." Well, the' was a super-abundance of cold air an'
prime-evil silence an' snow-capped mountains, an' I didn't care a hang
what he did to 'em, so long as it kept me from gettin' everlastin' sick
o' my own company.

I never see any company yet 'at wasn't a shade better'n just my own. I
knew I could stand these two innocents for four months, an' if they got
violent I could rope an' tie 'em. When everybody begun to get ready to
pull out, I took the twenty-mule team down to town to get our needin's.
I took the children along with me, an' I sez to 'em, "Now, boys, no
drinkin' goes up above through the winter. We simply have to go out an'
get disgusted with it before we start back."

Well, we sure had a work-out. On the sixth day Hamlet, he throws his
arm around my neck an' busts out cryin' an' sez, "Happy, it is the
inflexible destiny o' the human race to weary of all things mortal, an'
I'm dog-tired o' bein' drunk--an' 'sides, I'm busted."

It turned out that he didn't have any advantage over me an' Locals in
this respect, so we went to the company store an' got three bushels o'
nickle libraries, enough grub to do six men six months, enough tobacco
to do twelve men a car, an' a little yeller pup 'at we give six bits
for. I didn't 'low to run any risks this deal.

When we got back 'most everybody had pulled out, an' the roads was
beginnin' to choke up. Slocum an' the two capitalists was there waitin'
for us, but when all their stuff was loaded on the wagon the' wasn't
room for the men; so Miller, the youngest capitalist, who was a bit of
a highroller, an' had been shakin' up the coast off an' on, he took off
four trunks, an' sez to me, "Happy, if you run out of clothes, here's
four trunks-full." Then they hopped on the wagon an' left us alone in
our glory.

I reckon, take it all in all, that was about the most florid winter I
ever put in, an' it purt' nigh spoilt me for hard work. I did the
cookin', the innocents did the chores, an' we got along as bully as a
fat bear for a while, livin' in the hotel. The' was a hundred rooms,
but we didn't use 'em all. Locals, he wrote most of the time, when he
wasn't lookin' at the ceiling an' tryin' to think. Hammy, he walked
barefoot in the snow, on' hollered at the snow-capped mountains. I read
nickle libraries, an' we didn't care a dang for the Czar of Russia,
until along toward Christmas a spark lit in my pile of litachure, an'
doggone near burned the hotel down. Then we began to feel snowed-in.
Locals had writ himself dry, Hammy was tired of listenin' to himself,
besides havin' chilblains up to his knees, an' I was half crazy, 'count
of havin' nothing to read. We didn't have a nickle between us, so we
couldn't gamble, an' I resigned my mind that when spring climbed up the
trail the 'd be two corpses an' one maniac in that cussed hotel.

One day Hammy came stalkin' in to where me an' Locals was playin'
guess. Guess ain't never apt to be a popular pastime 'cause it has to
be played without any kind o' cheatin' whatever. The one who is it,
guesses what the other one is thinkin' of, an' if he guesses before he
falls asleep, he wins. Well, Hammy, he breaks in on our game just the
same as if we hadn't been doin' anything at all, an' I knew by his
action that the' was somethin' afoot. Whenever Hammy was ready to speak
something, he always walked like a hoss 'at was string-haltered in all
four legs. Well, he paraded up to us that day, hip action, knee action,
and instep action all workin', stopped in front of us, folded his arms,
an' sez, "Good sirs, I have conceived a fitting fete."

"The only fate I expect is to go mad an' cut my own throat," sez
Locals; but Hammy frowned an' went on in a scoldy, indignant voice.
"When Wisdom speaks, Folly replies with jest; yet, having little choice
of company, I needs must make the best of what I have."

Well, those two had what they called a war of wits until finally Locals
hit Hammy with a chair, which was the way most o' their discussions
ended; but it turned out that what Hammy was tryin' to say was that we
should open the trunks, dress ourselves in the clothes, an' give a
show. He said he knew parts to fit any make-ups we'd find; an' after
Locals found out what it was 'at Hammy had schemed out, he joined in
enthusiastic, an' said that if the' had never been a part writ to fit
'em yet, he could do it on the spot, an' he wasn't swamped with
business right then anyway. "Yes," I sez, "it's a great idee, an' we'll
sure draw a mammoth crowd. We'll charge 'em a library apiece an' get
enough litachure to last us a hundred years."

"At best, sarcasm is out of season; at worst, the season 's out of it,"
sez Hammy to me: "and furthermore, good friend, in life, as on the
stage, your part must be a role of actions, not of words." I used to
say over the things 'at this pair made up, until I had 'em by heart,
an' since then I've had a lot o' fun springin' 'em on strangers. They
used to speak to me as though I was a horse, and of me as though I was
part of the furniture. Hammy sez to me one day, "Me good man, you do
very well with your hands, but kindly Nature designed your head merely
for a hatrack."

They could say these little things right off the roll, an' it allus
made me feel like a fish out o' water, somehow, but I stored 'em up in
my memory, an' I've got my worth out of 'em all right.

We did open the trunks a week or so after this--and clothes! Well, say,
Miller sure was the dresser. The' was fifteen hats in a little trunk
built a-purpose for 'em, an' the' was all kinds of vests an' pants an'
neckties 'at a feller could imagine. But best of all was a book 'at we
found at the bottom of one o' the trunks. It was a hard-shelled book,
an' I never took much stock in that kind. When it's my turn to read a
book, a little old paper-back fits me out all right. I've been fooled
on them hard-shells too often; but this here one was a hummer.

I ain't no tenderfoot when it comes to a book, but this one was sure
the corkin'est I ever met up with. I had allus thought 'at "Seventeen
Buckets o' Blood; or the Mormon Widder's Revenge" was about the extreme
limit in books, but this here one lays over even that. It was called
"Monte Cristo," an' had the darndest set o' Dago names in it ever a
mortal human bein' laid eyes on. I tried to mine it out by myself at
first, but pshaw, every cuss in the book had a name like an Injun town,
an' the' was about as many characters in the book as the' is on the
earth; so I delegated Hammy to read her out loud. This suited Hammy to
the limit, an' he didn't only read her--he acted her. He'd roar an'
screech an' whisper an' glare into your eyes so blame natural that a
feller never used the back of his chair from start to finish, an' twice
I was on the point of shootin' him, thinkin' it was real.

If you ain't never read the book it'll pay you to fling up your job an'
wrastle through it. It starts out with a nice, decent young feller
sailin' home to marry his steady, but all his friends turn in an' stack
the cards on him, an' get him chucked into the rottenest dungeon in
France. He knowed how they soak it to a feller citizen in that country,
an' at first he was all for killin' himself; but after he'd studied it
over ten or twelve years, he suddenly heard a queer scratchin' noise.

In that same prison was another prisoner, an Abbey. An Abbey is a kind
of foreman priest. Well, this Abbey wasn't one to throw out a prayer
an' then set down to wait for results, not him. He was one o' these
nervous, fretty fellers what like to do their own drivin', an' he makes
him a set o' minin' tools out of a tin saucepan an' a bed-castor, an'
runs a level from his own cell into Eddie's--an' that was the queer,
scratchin' sound that made Eddie decide not to kill himself.

By George, if I could find a prison what had an Abbey shut up in it,
the' wouldn't be any way in the world to keep me out. This Abbey, he
cottoned to Eddie right from the start, an' durin' the next few years
they mine around in the prison till she's as holey as a Switzer cheeze;
an' durin' their leisure he edicates Eddie till he knows more'n a
college professor.

Then the Abbey begins to have fits, an' when all the medicine 'at he
could make out of old soot an' sulphur matches an' such stuff is gone,
he gives up an' tells Eddie where he has a little holler island, chuck
full o' diamonds an' money an' such like plunder. Then he dies, an'
Eddie gets in the sack. They chain a round shot to Eddie's feet an'
hurl him off a cliff into the angry sea, an' when it comes to that part
you can't hardly breathe; but Eddie kicks off the chain, rips open the
sack, an' when he strikes the water he's a free man.

He swims along for a couple of days until he overtakes a smuggler, an'
he climbs on board an' shows 'ern how to run their business accordin'
to Hoyle. He only stays with 'em long enough to learn all their
secrets, an' then he gives 'em the slip an' goes to his little holler
island. He pulls off the top, an' it's all so, what the Abbey told him.
Then he lifts up his hand an' he sez, sez he, "I'll be avenged!" And he
sure done it.

He didn't believe in none o' your cheap little killin's. He gives 'em
all the range they wanted while he was fixin' up the cards; but when he
was ready to call their hands, the' was somethin' doin' every minute,
an' don't you never forget it. Oh, he was a deep one. It is creepy to
think of any one like him bein' turned loose on the earth, 'cause a
feller might do somethin' 'at didn't suit him, an' the' wasn't no place
you could hide in afterward. He kept watchin' all the while, an' nobody
couldn't commit a crime nowheres on earth but what he knew of it, an'
he'd go an' call the feller over to one side an' say, "Young man, you
are doomed to die; but if you'll promise to do anything I want you to,
I'll give the Pope, or the Emp'rer of Chinee, or whoever the main stem
happened to be, a scuttle o' diamonds an' get you free--what's the
word?"

Well, in a few years the' wasn't half a dozen criminals in the whole
world who wasn't bound to carry out his orders, an' you can see what an
outfit he had to back him up. Some of 'em he'd make his body-servants;
but that wasn't no snap, you can bet, 'cause he was notionable to a
degree. He'd make plans for a little party, an' he'd send one man to
Siberia for a fish, an' another to Asia for a fowl, an' another to
Chinee for a bird's nest--to make soup of--an' so on. He never give his
guests nothin' to eat 'at growed in the same country the feast was to
be give in. Then he'd say to his steward, who had the hardest job of
all, "Bill"--Bill wasn't his name, but it'll do--"Bill, where did I see
that six-foot vase, made out of a single ruby?"

An' Bill would turn pale an' say, "It was in the secret vault of the
Em'prer of Chince, your Excellency." Then Monte Cristo, he'd say, "Ah,
yes, so it was. 'Tell, go an' get it an' have it here by the
twenty-fifth day of next month."

Well, Bill, he'd just about flicker out, an' begin to tell how it
couldn't be did; but Xlonte, he'd only look at him cold, an' say,
"Never mind the details, Bill--get the vase. If you think you need the
British Navy, why, buy it, but don't bother me. It seems to me, Bill,
'at you ought to begin gittin' on to my curves purty soon. Good-bye."

This was the way he carried on. He'd go to a prison an' he'd say,
"Young man, you was buried to death when you was a baby, but I figgered
I could use you later on, so I had you transplanted. You come out o'
this prison, get an edication, an' on the ninth o' next June you show
up at number forty-nine, Rue de Champaign, Paris, at two fifteen P.
M.--sharp. Here's a million francs to pay expenses. Don't be a
tight-wad--the's plenty more." A franc is worth five dollars, but he
didn't give a durn for 'em. That was HIS style.

He'd come to town an' buy a tenement house 'at wouldn't rent, because
it was haunted; an' he'd tear it all down except the rooms 'at had been
most popular to commit murder in. Then next day he'd run up a swell
mansion around these rooms--big an' gorgeous, like the Capitol at
Cheyenne, with full-grown trees from all over the world, standin' in
the front yard. Then he 'd give a party to all the substantial citizens
who had once used those rooms to commit murders in, an' he'd bring 'em
face to face with the ones they thought they had murdered--an' it was
comical to see 'em fallin' around in faints; but Monte, he'd pretend
'at he hadn't noticed anything unusual, an' he'd get 'em a glass of
wine an' make 'em face the torture, till it gives a feller a cold
sweat, just to read about it.

You might think that a man runnin' for congress in this country has a
hard time sinkin' his reputation; but the way 'at Monte Cristo mined
around in a feller's past was enough to scare a cat out of a cellar.
They don't run things over in France like they do here; they make
Counts an' Markusses an' Bankers out of the bad men, an' slap the
innocent ones into dungeons to keep 'em from gettin' spoilt. But this
didn't suit Monte for a minute; so when he gets the gang all settin' up
in front of him like a herd o' tenpins he sez, "Let her go!" an' you
ought to have seen 'em drop.

He don't do none o' the dirty work himself--no more prisons for him. He
just goes around like a Sunday-school director at Christmas time, while
his enemies turn to an' poison an' stab an' mutilate each other in a
way to turn a butcher pale; but his favorite plan is to make 'em go
insane an' have their hair turn white in a single night. That got to be
his private brand.

Well, Hammy read the book to us so natural that we all slept in one bed
for company; but it cheered us a heap, an' we begun to feel rich,
ourselves, an' talked about millions as easy an' natural as though we
each had little holler islands of our own. Miller was about my size, so
'at all his clothes fit me like the skin on a potato. Hammy was a
leetle too tall an' thin, and Locals, a foot or so short; but they
fished out a couple of swell outfits too.

We found a lot of empty check-books, an' used to play draw, settlin' at
night by check. It was purty good fun for a while--until we woke up.
Hammy owed me ten million francs an' Locals was into me for fifteen. I
offered to give 'em a receipt in full if they'd give me their interest
in the yeller pup. As long as the pup had three bosses he wouldn't mind
no one, an' I wanted to teach him somethin' besides eatin' an' sleepin;
but them two cusses wouldn't sell out at the price. When I saw that a
hundred an' twenty-five million dollars wouldn't buy two-thirds of a
seventy-five cent pup, I understood what the spell-binders mean by a
debased currency, an' I felt hurt an' lonesome again.

One day Hammy stacked himself in front of a window an' began to talk
about the gloomy ghastliness of solitude, until me an' Locals couldn't
stand it no longer, an' we heaved him out into a drift. Under ordinary
circumstances he would have rolled his eyes, pulled his hair, an'
ranted around about the base ungratitude of man; but this time he
looked up to the sky an' hollered, "Come out here quick! Hurry up! COME
ON!"

We went out, an' the' was somethin' a-floatin' away up yonder, lookin'
like a flyspeck on a new tablecloth. "What is it?" asked Hammy. "Is it
a bird?" asked Locals. Under such conditions I never say nothin' until
I have somethin' to say, so we stood an' gazed. In about ten minutes we
all shouted together, "It's a balloon!"

An' by jinks, that's what it was. We hollered an' fired off guns, an'
after a while it settled down an' lodged in a tree. The' was only one
man in it, but he was dyked out in Sunday clothes, an' purt' nigh froze
to death. We fed an' warmed him, an' he was about as much surprised at
us as we was at him. I was wearin' a Prince Albert coat an' a high plug
hat, Locals had on a white flannel yachtin' rig, an' Hammy was sportin'
a velvet suit with yeller leggin's an' a belt around the waist. After
we had fitted him out with a pipe he sez, "Gentlemen, I may possibly be
able to repay you at some future time. I am Lord Arthur Cleighton,
second son of the Earl o' Clarenden."

When he registered himself thus, I see Locals an' Hammy open their
eyes, an' I knew 'at we had landed somethin' purty stately.

"I am pleased to meet you, me lord," sez Hammy, in his most gorgeous
manner. "I am Gene De Arcy. You may have heard of my father, the
multimillionaire."

Locals, he looked at Lord Arthur, an' see that Hammy's bluff had stuck,
so he girded up his loins an' sez, "Sir, it gives me great pleasure to
make your acquaintance. My uncle, Silas Martin, the late copper king,
has just died, leavin' me as his sole heir; an' I have been seein' a
bit of my own country, preparatory to a prolonged trip around the
world."

Lord Arthur, he jumps to his feet an' shakes hands with 'em, tellin'
'em to just cut out his title, as he was a simple Democrat while in the
United States.

I hardly knew what to do. I didn't hold openers, an' yet if I didn't
draw some cards an' see it out I stood to lose entirely. I had been
corralin' a heap o' city langwidge since I had been cooped up with
Locals an' Hammy, but my heart failed me. I knew I was still some shy
on society manners; but I also knew 'at the' was a heap o' bluffin'
goin' on, so I stuck up my bet an' called.

"Artie," I sez, holdin' out my hand, "you 're the first lord my eyes
has ever feasted on; but I like you--you're game. It ain't many 'at
will own up to bein' a Democrat these days, not even in the secrecy of
the ballot box, but here in Nevada you're safe. Pa has just retired
from business, leavin' me this little mine; but it only pays about ten
million a year now, so I've made up my mind not to bother with it, but
to shut it down an' go on a tour of the world with my two friends here.
I never cared much for school, so this will be a good way to finish my
edication. We was up here last fall seein' that things was closed in
proper order, an' waited for the watchman to come up from below, when
we expected to drive down to our special train an' start for Paris. But
the snow came unexpected, and the expected watchman failed to come; and
here we are, with no food fit for a human, an' all our servants in the
special train, ninety miles away."

When I begun my oration Locals and Hammy leaned forward, holdin' their
breath; but when they see 'at I wasn't turnin' out no schoolboy article
of a lie, they settled back with a long sigh, an' I could tell by their
faces 'at they were takin' pride in my work. They was about the best
qualified judges o' that kind o' work I ever met up with, an' I'll own
'at I never felt prouder in my life 'an I did when Hammy slapped me on
the back as soon as I finished an' sez to Artie, "Me Lord, this is a
typical American. He plans his life on larger things than rules; but
you can depend on him--yea, though the heavens fall, you can depend on
Jack here."

I was glad we didn't have any liquor there, or like as not we'd 'a'
burned the hotel down just for a lark. We was so full of that doggone
Monte Cristo book that we believed our own lies as easy as Artie did,
an' begun to talk to each other like we was society folks at a banquet.

But Artie was a good, decent sort of a chap, as common as we were, when
we got to know him. He never kicked none on the grub, an' his appetite
was a thing to make preparations for; but, as Locals said, his high
descent came out the minute he was brought face to face with work--he
didn't recognize it. Now he didn't try to dodge it, nor he didn't
apologize for not doing it; he just didn't seem to know the' was such a
thing. It never occurred to him that the only way to have clean dishes
was to wash dirty ones. Hammy and Locals, those freeborn sons of
Independence, was glad an' proud to have the chance to wait on him; but
I must confess that the day he sat by the fire with a pile of wood
within reachin' distance, an' let the fire go out, I grew a trifle
loquacious about it.

Hammy overheard me mutterin' to myself in a voice 'at could be heard
anywhere in the hotel, an' he drew me to one side an' sez, "Hush,
presumptuous peasant; for all you know the blood of Alfred flows within
his veins."

"That ain't my fault," sez I; "but some of it will flow down this
mountain side if he don't begin stayin' awake daytimes."

Still, all in all, he was a likeable young feller an' the' ain't no
doubt but what he saved us from bein' lonesome any more. He said 'at
this balloon had been exhibited in Los Angeles, an' he had got into it
just for fun; but the rope had parted an' he had been fifteen hours on
the way. It was only by luck 'at he had happened to have his overcoat
along.

He had four or five newspapers, which he had tied around his feet to
keep 'em warm, but nare a library; so after we had lied our
imaginations sore for a week or so, we fell back on draw, settlin' by
checks at night. By a dazzling piece of luck Artie had his money in the
same New York bank 'at Miller had, so he could use our checks, an'
things began to brighten. Three of us were playin' for real money, an'
the other feller thought he was--it was genuine poker, an' the stiffest
game I ever sat in.

Time didn't drag none now. Artie knew the game, an' it kept me in a
sweat to beat him. White chips was a hundred dollars apiece; but we bet
colored ones mostly, to keep from litterin' up the table. Spring began
to loosen up about the first of March, an' by that time Artie owed me
two million real dollars. Locals an' Hammy was into me for close to a
billion, but I didn't treasure their humble offerings much, 'ceptin' as
pipe-lighters. We was keyed up to a high pitch by this time, an' was
beginnin' to get thin and ringey about the eyes. Artie from losin', me
from longin' for the time to come when I should start out to be a
little Monte Cristo on my own hook, an' Locals an' Hammy, from pityin'
Artie an' envyin' me.

On the twenty-fifth of March a wagon-load of grub an' four men came out
to get things started. I see 'em comin' up the grade, an' I piked down
an' told'em 'at I had landed a good thing, an' to just treat me as the
boss for a few days an' I'd make it all right with 'em.

When Artie saw the new men he turned pale about the gills. He owed me
close to three millions, an' blame if I didn't feel a little sorry for
him. Still, I'd played fair all the while, an' I 'lowed 'at the Earl o'
Clarenden could stand it, and I needed the money a heap more'n some who
might 'a' won it.

When old Bill Sykes came in to report to me I was wearin' a plug hat on
the back o' my head an' sportin' a white vest an' a red necktie, so I
looked enough like the real thing to make it easy for him to act his
part. He came in an' blurted out, right while we was boostin' up a
jack-pot. "That'll do, me good man," sez I, "wait until this hand is
played." Bill, he took off his hat an' stood humble until Artie had
scooped in a hundred thousand dollars, an' then I told Bill he might
talk.

"The watchman was found froze to death, Mr. Hawkins," sez Bill to me
mighty respectful, "an' your train waited until two relief parties had
been drove back by storms, an' then it pulled out for 'Frisco. We are
all ready to take charge here, an' as soon as you wish you can drive
down in the wagon an' telegraph for the train."

Bill backed out bowin', an' we made plans to emigrate a little. I
promised Locals an' Hammy a generous rake-off, an' we fixed to have a
tol'able fair time as soon as I cashed in.

Next mornin' I found a letter addressed to Mr. John Hawkins, Esq. Artie
wasn't around, but Locals an' Hammy was, so I opened the letter an'
read it. This here is the letter. It's one o' my greatest treasures.


"GENTLEMEN,--You have all treated me fine an' I hate to skin out
without saying good-bye but I have not the nerve. I have lied to you
all the time. I am not a real lord at all. My father was gardener at
Clarenden Castle an' I was under groom at St. James Court. When the
younger son came to this country, I came with him but left him an'
became a waiter in New York City. I went to an excursion to Long Branch
an' got to flirting with a widow just for pastime. She dogged my life
after that and my wife is something terrible so I took her and came to
Los Angeles. We was as happy as any one could be with a wife like mine
until the widow showed up. Then I stood between two fires and either
one of them was hell so I got into the balloon and cut the rope
expecting to drift over into Mexico. You are all rich and will not need
the money but I always play fair and I hate to skin out this way;

  "yours truly
    "L. A. C.

"P.S. It was all I could do to keep from helping with the work 'cause
some of your cooking was rotten and you did not wash the dishes clean
but I knew if I worked you would not think me a real lord. I hope some
day I may be able to repay you for all your kindness."


I didn't say a word after I finished readin' the letter. I had fallen
too far to have any breath left for talkin'; but Hammy an' Locals
unbosomed their hearts something terrible.

"A murrian on the filthy swine!" sez Hammy, after he began to quiet
down a little. "I would I had his treacherous throat within my grasp,
that I might squeeze his inky soul back to the lower depths from whence
he sprung."

"Hush, you punkin headed peasant," sez I. "The' 's just as much of
Alfred's blood flowin' through his veins now as the' ever was."

"'T is not the money I have lost that makes me mad," sez Locals. "It's
finding out that a man can become so degenerate that he will impose
upon the very ones who save his life--deceive them, lie to them!"

"Oh, he ain't the only liar 'at was ever in this hotel," sez I; "an'
when it comes to the money YOU'VE lost, that'd be a small matter to get
mad over. He risked just as much money as we did, an' if he'd 'a' won,
he wouldn't 'a' won a cent more."

After a while they grew more resigned in their langwidge; but after we
had driven down to town without finding him, Hammy sez, "In sooth 't is
bitter truth that all the world's a stage; yet Fate, however cruel,
never decreed that I should play the second season, as servile server
to a worn out mine--my health is all right again, an' I'm goin' back
where a feller gets paid decent wages for makin' a fool of himself."

Suddenly Locals gave a yell of joy and shouted, "My fortune's made! I
can take this thing and have a runaway boy and a lost orphan and a rich
uncle and a villanous cousin, and write the novel of the age about it."

"No, no!" sez Hammy, catchin' the excitement, "tragedy--make it a
tragedy. It is for the stage! Think of them lost without food and the
balloon coming into sight! Think of the scenic effects, the low music
as the orphan kneels in the middle of the stage and prays that the
balloon may bring them food; and then have the villanous cousin in the
balloon--"

Well, they purt' nigh fought about it, and they were still at it when I
left them. The tingle of spring in the air made me wild to get back to
the range again. I thought of little Barbie and what a great girl she
must be by this time. I thought of the big-eyed winter calves huggin'
up to their mothers and wonderin' what it all meant. I thought of old
Mount Savage, and all of a sudden somethin' seemed pullin' at my breast
like a rope, an' I drew down my winter wages, an' set out for the
no'th, eager as a hound pup on his first hunt.




CHAPTER ELEVEN

DRESS REFORM AT THE DIAMOND DOT


I've heard it called Christian fortitude, an' I've heard it called
Injun stoickcism, an' I've heard it called bulldog grit; but it's a
handy thing to have, no matter what it is. I mean the thing that keeps
a feller good company when the' 's a hurtin' in his heart that he never
quite forgets. A little child away from home an' just sick to go back,
a man who has to grit his teeth an'--but no, the first expresses the
feelin' better--a child, homesick, but keepin' a stiff upper lip; and
it don't make much difference what the age, that's a condition 'at
nobody ever outgrows.

Well, all the years I'd been away the' was a little empty sore spot in
my heart that I couldn't quite forget; but I never aired it none, an' I
don't believe I knew myself how big it was, until I left Slocum's Luck
behind me an' headed for the Diamond Dot. Then I spread a grin on my
face that nothin' wouldn't wipe off, an' I stepped so high an' light
that I was like a nervous man goin' barefoot through a thistle patch. I
was headed for home; an' even a mule that gets dressed down regular
with the neck-yoke gives a little simmer of joy when he's headed toward
home, while a dog,--well, a dog will just naturally joyful himself all
over when the trail doubles back on itself, an' a dog ain't no parlor
loafer, neither, if I'm any judge.

Why, for two years I hadn't polished a saddle, an' I whistled like a
boy when I pictured to myself the feel of a hoss under me. The' 's
somethin' about feelin' a hoss's strength slide into your legs an' up
through your body that must be a good deal like the sensation a saint
enjoys the first fly he takes with his new wings. A little pop-eyed
drug merchant was out here on a tour oncet, an' he asked me the usual
list of blame-fool questions, about what we et an' where we washed an'
if it didn't make us ache to sleep on the hard ground, an so on. When I
had made answers to his queries accordin' to the amount of information
I thought it wise to load him with, he shakes his head solemn like an'
sez, "I do not see where you get any compensation for such a life as
this."

"We don't get any compensation," sez I, "but look at all the hoss-back
ridin' we get to make up for it."

An' there I was with the spring drippin' all about me, the plains
standin' beckonin' to me on every side, just coaxin' to be rode over,
an' me walkin' on foot with flat-heeled boots on!

I had rode out on Sam Cutler's freighter to within' twenty miles o' the
ranch house, an' I built a little fire an' unrolled my blankets; but I
couldn't sleep. I just lay lookin' up at the stars an' tryin' to
imagine what Barbie looked like an' whether Starlight was still at the
ranch, an' every now an' again I tried to decide as to whether I'd grin
or he haughty when I first spied Jabez. I was some anxious to come upon
Barbie first. I knew she'd be glad to see me, but I was rather leery
about Jabez. He would 'a' welcomed a projical son of his own as often
as occasion offered, but he wasn't just the sort of a man to be a
public welcomer. I couldn't picture him puttin' up a sign sayin',
"Projical sons turn to the left. If chicken is proferred to veal, shoot
in the air twice when you get within a mile of the house."

But I was too much elated to worry much, an' along about one o'clock I
rolled up my blankets, kicked out my fire, an' started to drill. When
the sun rose I was in sight of the ranch house, an' the sun seemed to
throw an arm around my shoulder an' go skippin' along by my side--an' I
did skip now an' again.

When I got about a mile from the house I came upon Jabez, walkin' slow
an' lookin' down-hearted. He hadn't changed a mite in the five
years--in fact from what I could see he hadn't even changed his
clothes; so for a moment I thought his sour look was the same ill humor
I'd left him in; an' then I saw it was more serious, an' my heart
stopped with a thump.

He looked up just then an' we stared at each other without speakin'.
"Ain't you dead?" sez he.

"No I ain't," sez I.

"We heard you was," sez he; "killed in a muss over at Danders."

"I don't believe it," sez I, "an' besides, I ain't been in Danders for
over seven years."

"Well, then, what made you stay away so long for?" sez he, sort o'
snappy.

"I don't remember you sheddin' any tears when I left, an' I don't
recall you beggin' me to hurry back," sez I. I was pleased at the way I
was bein' received an' I meant to make him show his hand.

"You know as well as I do that things allus go better on this ranch
when you're here."

"Yes," sez I.

"An' you know 'at I don't like to beg no man to do anything; but you
ought to see that I know that you're the usefullest man I ever had, an'
you oughtn't to be so fly-uppity," sez he.

"Now see here, Jabez," sez I, "you're one o' the kind o' men who never
own up 'at a man was fit to live until after he's dead. You're like
some o' these Easterners--they get so everlastin' entranced with the
beautiful scenery that they forget to water their ridin' hosses. I
don't ask no special favors, but I ain't so mortal thick-skinned
myself, an' you ought to learn sometime that there is hosses 'at work
better when they're not beat up an' yelled at."

"Are you goin' to stay this time?" sez he.

"As long as it's agreeable--all around," sez I. "Is everything goin'
smooth?"

The down-hearted look came into his eyes again. "She won't speak to
me," sez he.

"You don't mean to say 'at you've gone an' got married," sez I, "or
that you are tryin' to?"

"I ain't such a fool," he snaps. "It's Barbie, I mean."

"How long has this been goin' on?" sez I.

"This is the fourth meal," sez he; an' he was so solemn about it that I
was some inclined to snicker, but then it flashed upon me that when I
left, the child was all het up over the letter she'd found in the
attic, and I sobered an' sez, "Is it something 'at's goin' to be hard
to smooth over?"

"I don't see how the deuce it's ever goin' to be smoothed over," sez
Jabez, desperately.

"Would you feel like sort o' hintin' what it was about?" sez I.

"Well, it's about the way she acts," sez Jabez. "Confound it, Happy,
she's the best gal child ever was on this earth, I reckon, but she
don't want to be one, an' she won't act like it, an' she--she won't
dress like it. Every time I argue with her she beats me to it, an' I'm
plumb stumped. Yesterday I told her she had to take 'em off an' wear
dresses, an' she did; but now she won't speak to me."

"You mean that you said that she was never to argue with you again?"
sez I, indignant.

"No, I mean that I sez she must take those confounded buckskin pants
off! She's big enough now to begin to train to become a woman--not a
man."

I had to grin a little, but even though it didn't seem as skeptical to
me as it did to him, I saw he might be right about it. Still, I wasn't
goin' to take sides without hearin' all the evidence, so I sez, "Is she
healthy, Jabez?"

"Healthy?" he sez. "Why, that child could winter through without
shelter an' come out in the spring kickin' up her heels an' snortin'."

"Well, that much is in her favor," sez I. "Is she good at her studies?"

"Where you been that you haven't heard about it?" sez he. "Last winter
she out-ciphered an' out-spelt the schoolmarm, an' she fuddled up one
o' these missionary preachers till he didn't know where he was at. She
has been studyin' about all kinds o' thin

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