He shot his hand across an’ pulled his gun quick as a flash; but Horace didn’t move, he just sat still, with a friendly smile on his face
FRIAR TUCK
BEING THE CHRONICLES OF THE REVEREND
JOHN CARMICHAEL, OF WYOMING, U.S.A.,
AS SET FORTH AND EMBELLISHED BY
HIS FRIEND AND ADMIRER
HAPPY HAWKINS
AND HERE RECORDED BY
ROBERT ALEXANDER WASON
AUTHOR OF
HAPPY HAWKINS,
THE KNIGHT-ERRANT, ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY
STANLEY L. WOOD
NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1912
By Small, Maynard and Company
(Incorporated)
Entered at Stationers’ Hall
Published, September 7, 1912; sixth edition, November, 1912
Many there are who respond to the commonplace, monotonous call of Duty, and year after year uncomplainingly spend their lives on the treadmill of Routine; but who still feel in their hearts the call of the open road, the music of the stars, the wine of the western wind, and the thrilling abandon of a mad gallop out beyond speed limits and grass signs to where life has ceased to be a series of cogs and—a man is still a man.
To the members of this fraternity, whose emblem, hidden behind deep and steadfast eyes, is often missed by man, but always recognized by dogs and horses, I dedicate this book, in the hope that for an hour or two it may lift the pressure a little.
R. A. W.
JUST BETWEEN YOU AND ME
Reviews are not infrequently colored by a temporary elevation of the critic’s mind (or a temporary depression of the critic’s liver), advertisements are not invariably free from bias; so, perhaps, a few words of friendly warning will not be considered impertinent.
Whosoever is squeamishly sensitive as to the formal technique of literary construction will save himself positive irritation by avoiding this book. It is a told, rather than a written story; and this is a compromise which defies Art and frankly turns to the more elastic methods of Nature.
It is supposed to be told by an outdoor man in those delightful moments of relaxation when the restraint of self-consciousness is dropped, and the spirit flows forth with a freedom difficult to find, outside the egoism of childhood. This general suggestion is easily tossed out; but the reader must supply the details—the night camps with the pipes sending up incense about the tiny fires, the winter evenings when the still cold lurks at the threshold or the blizzard howls around the log corners; or those still more elusive moments when the riding man shifts his weight to a single thigh, and tells the inner story which has been rising from his open heart to his closed lips for many a long mile.
Nor will these details suffice to complete the atmosphere in which, bit by bit, the story is told. The greatest charm in the told story comes direct from the teller; and, toil as we will over printed pages, they obstinately refuse to reproduce the twinkle of bright, deep-set eyes, the whimsical twist which gives character to a commonplace word, the subtile modulations of a mellow voice, the discriminating accent which makes a sentence fire when spoken, and only ashes when written; or, hardest of all, those eloquent pauses and illuminating gestures which convey a climax neither tongue nor pen dare attempt.
Happy Hawkins is complex, but the basic foundation of his character is simplicity. His audience is usually a mixed one, men of the range and an Easterner or two, fortunate enough to find the way into his confidence. Occasionally he amuses himself by talking to the one group over the heads of the other; but even then, his own simplicity is but thinly veiled. The phases of life which he holds lightly are exploited with riotous recklessness; but whoever would visit his private shrines must tread with reverent step.
His exaggerations are not to deceive, but to magnify—an adjunct to expression invariably found among primitive people. A brass monkey is really not sensitive to variations of temperature; and yet, even among the civilized, a peculiarly vivid impression is conveyed by stating that a particular cold snap has had a disintegrating effect upon the integrity of a brass monkey. There is a philosophy of exaggeration which is no kin to falsehood.
Happy has an eager, hungry, active mind, a mind worthy of careful cultivation; but forced by circumstances to gather its nourishment along lines similar to those adopted by the meek and lowly sponge. A sponge is earnest, patient, and industrious; but, fixed to a submerged stone as it is, it is hampered by limitations which no amount of personal ambition is quite able to overcome. As Happy himself was fond of saying: “The thing ’at sets most strangers again each other, is the fact that each insists on judgin’ everything from his own standpoint. A cow-puncher gets the idee that because an Eastener can’t sit comfortable on a bronco when it’s sunfishin’ or twistin’ ends, he jes nachely ain’t fit to clutter up the surface o’ the earth; while the Eastener is inclined to estimate the puncher an’ his pony as bein’ on the same intellectual level. If they’d just open up an’ examine each other impartial, they’d mighty soon see ’at the difference in ’em came from what they did, instead o’ the choice o’ their lines o’ business dependin’ on their natural make-up. I once had a no-account pinto which refused to squat back on the rope, and I rejoiced exceeding when I got seventy-five bucks for him; but the feller I took advantage of clipped his mane, docked his tail, introduced him into swell-society, and got three hundred for him as a polo pony; which all goes to show—” (The finish of this is an expansive wave of the hand, a tilt of the head to the right, and an indescribably droll expression.)
The above is a fair sample of the leisurely way in which Happy Hawkins tells a story. This is not the proper way to tell a story. A story should travel an air-line and not stop at the smaller stations, while Happy prefers to take his bed along on a spare horse and camp out wherever the mood strikes him. The reader who delights in a story which speeds along like a limited, will probably be disappointed in this book; while, on the other hand, the reader who enjoys the intimate association which is lighted with the evening camp fire, runs a risk of finding some relaxation in taking another little trip with Happy Hawkins.
R. A. W.
CONTENTS
[CHAPTER ONE—THE MEETING]
[CHAPTER TWO—THE BETTIN’ BARBER O’ BOGGS]
[CHAPTER THREE—ABOVE THE DUST]
[CHAPTER FOUR—TY JONES]
[CHAPTER FIVE—THE HOLD-UP]
[CHAPTER SIX—A REMINISCENCE]
[CHAPTER SEVEN—HORACE WALPOLE BRADFORD]
[CHAPTER EIGHT—A CASE OF NERVES]
[CHAPTER NINE—TREATING THE CASE]
[CHAPTER TEN—INJUNS!]
[CHAPTER ELEVEN—BENEFITS OF FASTING]
[CHAPTER TWELVE—A COMPLETE CURE]
[CHAPTER THIRTEEN—AN UNEXPECTED CACHE]
[CHAPTER FOURTEEN—HAPPY’S NEW AMBITION]
[CHAPTER FIFTEEN—TENDER FEELINGS]
[CHAPTER SIXTEEN—THEMIS IN THE ROCKIES]
[CHAPTER SEVENTEEN—KIT MURRAY]
[CHAPTER EIGHTEEN—TESTING THE FRIAR’S NERVE]
[CHAPTER NINETEEN—OTHER PEOPLE’S BUSINESS]
[CHAPTER TWENTY—QUARRELING FOR PEACE]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE—PEACE TO START A QUARREL]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO—A PROGRESSIVE HUNT]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE—A LITTLE GUN-PLAY]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR—NIGHT-PROWLERS]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE—THE TRADE-RAT’S CHRISTMAS-GIFT]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX—A CONTESTED LIFE-TITLE]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN—A STRANGE ALLIANCE]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT—THE HEART OF HAPPY HAWKINS]
[CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE—THE LITTLE TOWN OF BOSCO]
[CHAPTER THIRTY—TY JONES GETS A WOMAN]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE—JUSTICE UNDELAYED]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO—THE FRIAR GOES ALONE]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE—THE FRIAR GIVEN TWO WEEKS]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR—A CROSS FOR EVERY MAN]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE—THE FRIAR A COMPLICATION]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX—A SIDE-TRIP TO SKELTY’S]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN—PROMOTHEUS IN THE TOILS]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT—OLAF RUNS THE BLOCKADE]
[CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE—SKIRMISHES]
[CHAPTER FORTY—AN IRRITATING GRIN]
[CHAPTER FORTY-ONE—THE NIGHT-ATTACK]
[CHAPTER FORTY-TWO—HAND TO HAND]
[CHAPTER FORTY-THREE—THE GIFT OF THE DAWN]
[CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR—TY JONES NODS HIS HEAD]
[CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE—THE LITTLE GUST O’ WIND]
[CHAPTER FORTY-SIX—THE FINAL MOVES]
ILLUSTRATIONS
He shot his hand across an’ pulled his gun quick as a flash; but Horace didn’t move, he just sat still, with a friendly smile on his face
We found the singer on foot with a noose about his neck an’ nine rather tough-lookin’ citizens holdin’ a parley with him
The cow had forgot all about havin’ had her hoofs pared, an’ she took after him like a hungry coyote
“I intend to kill you,” said Olaf, as calm as though talkin’ about a sick sheep.
“It would be a foolish waste of time,” replied the Friar, as if he was advisin’ a ten-year-old boy not to fish when the Blue Bull was high and muddy. “It wouldn’t do any good, and I shall not allow it.”
[CHAPTER ONE—THE MEETING]
It’s a curious thing—life. Ya might just as well ask a kitten to chase her own tail or a dog to bay at the evenin’ star, or a periodical spring to run constant, as to ask a feller right out to tell a story. Some things can only be done spontaneous.
Friar Tuck used to say ’at whenever he could cut it, he allus got on the lee side o’ human nature and let it blow down on him natural; and my way o’ gettin’ to the lee side o’ human nature in story-tellin’ is not to ask for a story, but to start tellin’ one myself. And it’s a good plan not to put over too good a one either; ’cause if it seems as though a feller is short run on stories, some listener is likely to take pity on him and fit him out with a new assortment so as he won’t be such bad company for himself when he’s alone again. This is the way I’ve picked up most o’ my stories.
Then again, it’s allus hard for me to tell what is the true beginnin’ of a story. It’s easy enough to tell cream from milk—after the milk has stood long enough for the cream to rise to the top; but the great trouble is, that a man’s own recollections haven’t stood long enough for him to skim out just what part he might be in need of.
Without meanin’ the least mite o’ disrespect to any one, it does seem to me that if I was able to plan out any sort of a memory at all, I could have made a few improvements on the ones we now have.
My own memory is as stubborn as a mule and as grippy as a bulldog. What it does remember, it calls up in the shape o’ pictures; and I see old things just as plain as livin’, breathin’ beings; but try as I would, I never could keep my memory from loadin’ herself down with so many trifles that sometimes I’ve had to spade it over as many as six times to turn up some important item which I was actually in need of. When my memory’s in a good humor, I like to start a pipe and lean back and just watch old scenes over again, the same as if I was in a the-ater; and I can see every twinkle in a pair o’ well-known eyes, which have been lookin’ up through six feet of earth for this many a long year, and I can hear—actually hear—the half tones ripplin’ through voices which have no more part in my to-day than the perfume o’ last year’s flowers; and then, like as not, my memory’ll lay her ears back and refuse to confide what I did with my shavin’ soap.
When I look back at my own life and compare it with others, it seems like a curious, patch-worky sort of affair, and not much more my own than the lives o’ those others with which I compare it. I allus liked my work, and yet it never attracted my attention much. Side-trips and such-like stand out plain as figures in a hand-painted picture, such as I’ve seen in hotels down at Frisco; but the work part is just a blotchy, colorless sort of smudge, the same as the background o’ one o’ these pictures.
When I first took on with Jabez—every one called him ol’ Cast Steel Judson at this time—they wanted to know if I could ride. I was nothin’ but a regular kid then, so I handed in a purty high average as to my ridin’ ability; though, truth to tell, I wasn’t no bronco buster those days. They gave me a genuwine mean one as a starter, and told me to ride him clean or step off and walk.
At that time I didn’t even know how to discard a hoss when I couldn’t stand the poundin’ any longer; so when I felt my backbone gettin’ wedged too far into my skull, I made a grab for the horn. My luck was on the job that day and I got the quirt, instead. At his next pitch, my hand went up as natural as ever, and I slammed down the quirt as hard as I could. It landed on a ticklish spot and before he had time to make up his mind, the cayuse had started to run, me whalin’ him at every jump and givin’ thanks between ’em. I rode him good and out as soon as he started to stampede, and they all thought I was a real rider. Well, this gave me a lot o’ trouble—tryin’ to live up to my reputation—but that’s a good sort o’ trouble for a kid to have.
Now I can feel all the sensations o’ this ride as plain as though it was this mornin’; but the’s a thousand rides since then which have all melted an’ run together. The same with most o’ the rest o’ my work: I allus aimed to do my bit a little quicker and cleaner ’n the rest; but as soon as I learned all the tricks of it, it fell into a rut, like breathin’ and seein’. Easteners seem to have an idee that our life must be as carefree and joyous as goin’ to a different circus every day in the year; but it ain’t: it’s work, just like all other work. We’re a good bit like our ridin’ ponies: when we’re in the thick of it we’re too busy to take notice; and when we’re through, we’re hungry—and that’s about the whole story.
Jabez Judson was a high peak, and once a feller knew him, he never ran any risk o’ gettin’ him mixed up with any one else. He was the settest in his ways of any man I ever had much doin’s with; but he didn’t change about any—if he faced north on a question one day, he faced north on it always; so a feller could tell just how any action would strike him, and this made livin’ with him as accurate as workin’ out a problem in multiplication, which I claim to hold qualities o’ comfort.
His daughter, Barbie, was a little tot when I first took on; and she was the apple of ol’ Cast Steel’s eye; an’ his curb bit, and his spurs as well. Barbie and I were pals from one end o’ the trail to the other, and this explains a lot o’ my life which otherwise wouldn’t have any answer. My ordinary work at the Diamond Dot wasn’t out-standin’ enough to give me any special privileges; but I happened to come back one time when the Brophy gang was about to clean things out, and Jabez gave me credit for savin’ Barbie’s life; so ’at he didn’t check up my time any and I did purty much as I pleased, only quittin’ him when I couldn’t put up with his set ways any longer. I aimed to play fair with Jabez, and he with me; but once in a while we locked horns, though not often, takin’ everything into account.
It was shortly after ol’ Cast Steel had bought in the D lazy L brand, an’ we was still pickin’ up strays here an’ there. Whenever he bought up a brand he allus put the Diamond Dot on the stuff as soon as he could, his mark commandin’ more respect than some o’ the little fellers’.
When I’d get tired o’ loafing about the home place, I’d take one o’ the boys an’ we’d start out to look for stray hosses. Spider Kelley was with me this time, an’ we had meandered here an’ there until we had picked up a big enough string to stand as an excuse for our trip, and were about minded to start back.
We had just forded a little crick when we heard a man’s voice singin’ off to the right. The’ was a mess o’ cottonwoods between us, an’ we stopped to listen. Now I had never heard that voice before, an’ I had never seen the man who was running it; but right then I was ready to believe anything he had a mind to tell me. It was a deep, rich voice; but mellow an’ tender, an’ a feller could tell that he was singin’ simply because he couldn’t help it.
Spider looked at me with his face shinin’, an’ I could feel a sort o’ pleasant heat in my own face. The’ was a lift an’ a swing, and a sort of rally-around-the-flag to this voice which got right into ya, an’ made you want to do something.
“’T is thine to save from perils of perdition
The souls for whom the Lord His life laid down;
Beware, lest, slothful to fulfill thy mission,
Thou lose one jewel that should deck His crown.
Publish glad tidings; tidings of peace;
Tidings of Jesus, redemption and release.”
“That feller can sing some,” sez Spider Kelley; but just then the ponies turned back on us an’ by the time we had started ’em on again, the singer had passed on up the trail, so I didn’t make any reply.
I was tryin’ to figure out whether it was the words or the tune or the voice, or what it was that had made my whole body vibrate like a fiddle string. As I said before, I see things in pictures an’ I also remember ’em in pictures: a sound generally calls up a picture to me an’ it ain’t allus a picture anyways connected with the sound itself. This song, for instance, had called to my mind a long procession of marchin’ men with banners wavin’ an’ set faces, shinin’ with a glad sort o’ recklessness. There ain’t no accountin’ for the human mind: I had never seen such a procession in real life, nor even in a picture; but that was what this song out there on the open range suggested to me, an’ I hurried out o’ the cottonwoods eager to measure the singer with my open eyes.
When we climbed up out of the woods, we saw him goin’ up the pass ahead of us with our ponies followin’ behind as though they was part of his outfit. We could just catch glimpses of him; enough to show that he was a big man on a big roan hoss, an’ that he was a ridin’ man in spite o’ the fact that he was wearin’ black clothes made up Eastern style. He was still singin’ his song, an’ I straightened up in my saddle, an’ beat time with my hand as though I held a genuwine sword in it; which is a tool I’ve never had much doin’s with.
We scrambled on up the trail, an’ when we reached the top we found a little park with the grass knee high an’ a fringe o’ spruce trees about it. The song had come to a sudden end, an’ we found the singer on foot with a noose about his neck an’ nine rather tough-lookin’ citizens holdin’ a parley with him. We came to the same sort of a stop the song had, an’ Spider Kelley sez in a low tone, “What do ya suppose this is?”
“I don’t know,” sez I, touchin’ my pony, “but I’m with the singer”; so me an’ Spider rode on down to ’em.
I purty well sensed what it was: the’ was a heap o’ rebrandin’ bein’ done at that time, an’ stringin’ a man up was supposed to be the only cure; but I was willin’ to bet my roll that this singer wasn’t a rustler. The feller in charge o’ the posse was an evil-lookin’ cuss, an’ if he’d ’a’ had the rope around his neck, it wouldn’t have looked so misplaced. He was ridin’ a Cross brand hoss; so I guessed him to belong to the Tyrrel Jones outfit. Most o’ the others in the posse was ridin’ the same brand o’ hosses an’ wearin’ the same brand of expressions. It was a tough-lookin’ bunch.
We came up to ’em an’ they looked our ponies an’ us over an’ nodded. We nodded back an’ I asked ’em what seemed to be the trouble.
“We’ve finally got the feller who has been doin’ the rustlin’ out this way,” sez the leader, whose name was Flannigan, Badger-face Flannigan.
“That’s good,” sez I; “but he don’t look the part.”
“He acts it all right,” growls Badger-face, showin’ his fangs in what was meant for a grin. “He’s ridin’ one of our hosses, an’ leadin’ a string o’ D lazy Ls.”
“Leadin’ ’em?” sez I.
“Yes, he’s got some sort of a charm in his voice. Whiskers, here, saw him go up on foot an’ rope this colt an’ lead him off the same as a plow hoss.”
“Did Whiskers, here, see him charm the loose string, too?” I asked.
“No, he came in an’ collected the posse, an’ we decided that this would be a good place to try him; so we cut up the other pass an’ waited for him. When he came up, this bunch o’ ponies was taggin’ after him.”
I looked at the man with the noose about his neck, an’ he was grinnin’ as easy an’ comfortable as I ever saw a man grin in my life. He was wearin’ a vest without buttons an’ a gray flannel shirt. He had a rifle on his saddle an’ a sixshooter on his right hip. He had big gray eyes set wide apart under heavy brows, an’ they were dancin’ with laughter. I grinned into ’em without intendin’ to, an’ sez: “Well, I don’t really think he charmed these loose ponies intentional. Me an’ Spider was takin’ ’em in to the Diamond Dot an’ we had a hard time makin’ ’em ford the crick. I’m some thankful to him for tollin’ ’em up the pass.”
Badger-face scowled. “Well, anyhow, he charmed the beast he’s ridin, all right; an’ he has to swing for it.”
“Are you all done with tryin’ him,” sez I.
“What’s the use of a trial?” snarled Badger-face. “Ain’t he ridin’ a Cross brand hoss, ain’t the brand unvented, don’t every one know that we never sell a hoss without ventin’ the brand, an’ can’t any one see ’at this hoss was never rode before?”
“Got anything to say for yourself, stranger?” I asked.
“Not much,” sez the prisoner. “I have an appointment to keep at Laramie; my hoss gave out; so I just caught a fresh one an’ started on.”
“What more do you want?” asked Badger-face of me.
“Well, now, the’ ain’t any particular hurry; an’ I’m kind o’ curious to learn a little more of his methods,” sez I impartial. “Don’t ya know ’at this is what they call hoss-stealin’ out this way?” I asked of the stranger.
“No, this is not stealin’,” he replied. “I turned another hoss loose that I had picked up a hundred miles or so farther back; and I should have turned this one adrift as soon as he had tired. They allus wander back to their own range.”
This wasn’t no unheard-of custom to practice out our way; but it was a new sort o’ defence for a man with a noose about his neck to put up, an’ I see that some o’ the others was gettin’ interested. The big man had a smile like a boy, an’ steady eyes, an’ a clear skin; an’ he didn’t look at all the kind of a man to really need stretchin’.
“What’s your plan for earnin’ a livin’?” I asked.
“I am a kind of apostle,” sez he, “an’ I live on the bounty of others.”
“Do you mean ’at you’re a preacher?” asked Badger-face.
“Yes,” the stranger replied with a smile.
We found the singer on foot with a noose about his neck an’ nine rather tough-lookin’ citizens holdin’ a parley with him
“Well, I never see a preacher with as short hair as yours, nor one who carried so much artillery, nor one who made a practice o’ pickin’ up a fresh hoss whenever he felt like it. Where’d you learn to ride, an’ where’d you learn to rope?”
“Eastern Colorado. I lived there four years, an’ travelled on hossback,” sez the stranger.
“I’ll bet you left there mighty sudden,” sez Badger-face with an evil leer.
“Yes,” replied the stranger, with a grin, “an’ I also left on hossback.”
“Well, ya satisfied now?” grunted Badger-face to me.
Livin’ out doors the way I had, I naturally had a big respect for brands. It’s mighty comfortin’ to feel that ya can turn your stuff loose an’ know that it’s not likely to be bothered; so I was up something of a stump about this new doctrine. “Where’d you get your commission from to pick up a hoss whenever you feel like it?” sez I to the stranger.
He had a little leather sack hangin’ from his saddle horn, an’ he reached into it an’ fished out a small book with a soft leather cover. The feller ’at was holdin’ his hoss eyed him mighty close for fear it was some sort of a gun; but the stranger ran over the leaves with his fingers as ready as a man would step into the home corral an’ rope his favorite ridin’ pony.
“Here’s my commission,” sez he, as self-satisfied as though he was holdin’ a government document; an’ then he read aloud with that deep, mellow voice o’ his, the story of the time the Lord was minded to let himself out a little an’ came into Jerusalem in state. He read it all, an’ then he paused, looked about, holdin’ each man’s eyes with his own for a second, an’ then he read once more the part where the Lord had sent in a couple of his hands after the colt that no man had ever backed before—an’ then he closed the book, patted it gentle an’ shoved it back into the leather bag. I looked around on the posse, an’ most of ’em was rubbin’ their chins, an’ studyin’. I’ve noticed that while the earth is purty well cluttered up with pale-blooded an’ partially ossified Christians, the’s mighty few out an’ out atheists among ’em.
“That don’t go,” sez Badger-face, after he’d taken time to pump up his nerve a little.
No one said anything for a space, an’ then the stranger put a little edge on his voice, but spoke in a lower tone than before: “That does go,” he said. “No matter what else in life may be questioned, no matter how hard and fast a title may stick, it must crumble to dust when one comes and says, ‘The Lord hath need of this.’ It may be your life or it may be your property or it may be the one being you love most in all the world; but when the Lord hath need, your own needs must fall away.
“Now, boys, I love the West, I glory in the fact that I can lay something down and go on about my business an’ come back a month later and find it just where I left it; and if I was takin’ these hosses to sell or trade or use for my own selfish ends, why, I wouldn’t have a word to say again’ your stringin’ me up. I brought my own hoss into this country and when it gave out I didn’t have time to barter an’ trade for another one; so I just caught one, and when it grew weary, I turned it adrift. I don’t claim the hosses I ride; I don’t want to own them; I simply borrow them for a while because my Lord hath need of them. I treat them well, and when they weary, send ’em back to their own range with a pat, and pick up another. The next fellow who rides that hoss will find it a little less trouble than if I hadn’t used it, and there’s no harm done at all. I’m working with you, I’m going to make your own work easier out here by raisin’ the respect for brands, not by makin’ property rights any looser; and you are goin’ to work with me—whether you want to or not. Now then, how much longer are you goin’ to keep this fool noose about my neck?”
That posse wasn’t easy minded, not by a jugful. This stranger was speakin’ as though he had power an’ authority an’ public opinion all on his side, and they felt consid’able like the tenderfoot who’d roped the buffalo—they was willin’ to quit any time he was.
The Cross brand boys were purty sullen an’ moody; but four o’ the posse belonged to another outfit, an’ they couldn’t stand the strain. One of ’em, a grizzled old codger with one lamp missin’, lifted the noose from the prisoner’s neck, an’ sez most respectful: “Parson, I’m an old man. I ain’t heard a sermon for forty years, an’ I’d be right obliged to ya if you’d make us one.”
Badger-face, he snorted scornful; but the rest of the posse was scattered all the way from repentance to sheepishness, an’ the stranger he stepped to a little rise an’ he certainly did speak us a sermon. First off, he sang us St. Andrew’s hymn—I got to learn a good many of his songs after this, but o’ course at that time I was as shy on hymns as the rest o’ the crowd.
I tell you it was wonderful up in that little park, with the lush grass for a carpet, the spruce trees for panelin’, the bare peaks stickin’ out for rafter-beams, the blue sky above for ceiling, and that soft, deep voice fillin’ the whole place an’ yet stealin’ into a feller’s heart as easy an’ gentle as a woman’s whisper. He sort o’ beat time as though playin’ on an instrument, until before he was through we were all hummin’ in time with him—an’ then he preached.
He told us about the fisher folks an’ how they lived out doors under the stars the same as we did; and that this was probably why the Lord had chose ’em first to follow him. He said that city folks got to relyin’ on themselves so much ’at they was likely to forget that the whole earth was still held in the hollow of the hand which had created it; but that men who lived with nature, out under the sun and the stars, through the heat and the cold, the wind and the rain, the chinook and the blizzard, felt the forces and the mysteries all about them and this kept ’em in touch, even when they didn’t know it themselves, with the great central Intelligence back o’ these forces and mysteries. Then he told ’em how grand their lives might be if they would only give up their nasty little habits of thought, and learn to think broad and free and deep, the same as they breathed.
He told ’em ’at their minds could breathe the inspiration of God as easy as their lungs could breathe the pure air o’ the mountains, if they’d only form the habit. Then he talked to ’em friendly an’ confidential about their natural devilment. He didn’t talk like a saint speakin’ out through a crack in the gates o’ Paradise, like most preachers do. He called the turn on the actual way they cut up when they went to town, and just how it hurt ’em body an’ soul; and his face grew set and earnest, and his eyes blazed; and then he said a few words about mothers an’ children and such, and wound up with a short prayer.
Well two o’ those fellers owned up right out in public and said that from that on they was goin’ to lead a decent sort of life; and one other said ’at he didn’t have any faith in himself any longer; but he insisted on signin’ the pledge, and said if that worked, why, he’d go on an’ try the rest of it.
The preacher shook hands with ’em all around—he had a grip ’at wouldn’t be no disgrace for a silver-tip—an’ then he sez that if any of ’em has the notion that bein’ a Christian makes a weakling of a man, why, he’s willin’ to wrastle or box or run a race or shoot at a mark or do any other sort of a stunt to show ’at he’s in good order; but they size him up and take his word for it.
“Now, boys,” sez he, “I hope we’ll meet often. I’m your friend, and I want you to use me any time you get a chance. Any time or any place that I can serve one of you, just get me word and I’ll do the best I can. It don’t matter what sort o’ trouble you get into, get me word and I’ll help—if I can find a way. And I wish ’at you’d speak it around that I’m hard on hosses, so that the other fellows will understand when I pick one up, and not cause any delay. I’ll have to hurry along now. Good-bye; I’m sorry I’ve been a bother to ya.”
He swung up on the big roan, waved his hand and trotted out o’ the park; and just as he went down the pass on the other side, it seemed that he couldn’t hold it in any longer; so he opened up his voice in his marchin’ song again, an’ we all stayed silent as long as we could hear the sound of it.
“Well we are a lot of soft marks!” sez Badger-face at last.
“That there is a true man,” replied old Grizzly, shakin’ his head, “an’ I’ll bet my boots on it.”
This seemed to be the general verdict, an’ the Cross brand fellers went off discussin’ the parson, an’ me an’ Spider Kelley collected our ponies an’ went along to the ranch, also discussin’ him.
That was the first time I ever saw Friar Tuck; I made up my mind about him just from hearin’ his voice, an’ before I ever saw him; but I never had to make it up any different. New lead an’ new steel look consid’able alike; but the more ya wear on lead, the sooner it wears out, while the more you wear on steel, the brighter it gets. The Friar was steel, an’ mighty well tempered.
[CHAPTER TWO—THE BETTIN’ BARBER O’ BOGGS]
Yes, this was about the time I got interested in the bettin’ barber over at Boggs. He hasn’t anything to do with this story I’m about to tell ya, except that it was him ’at give the Friar his name; so I’ll just skim through this part as hasty as possible. When a feller is tellin’ me a story, I want him to stick to the trail of it; but it seems like when I try to tell one, myself, some feller is allus askin’ me a question ’at takes me clear out o’ range.
All barbers are more or less different, except in what might be called the gift o’ gab. This one came out to Boggs station, an’ started a shop. His name was Eugene, an’ he was a little man with two rollin’ curls to his front hair, which he wore short behind. A curious thing about little men is, that they don’t never find it out. A little man produces more opinions ’n airy other kind, an’ being small, they haven’t no place to store ’em up until they get time to ripen. A little man gives out his opinion an’ then looks savage—just as if he’d get a switch an’ make ya believe it, whether you wanted to or not.
Eugene had come from every city the’ is in the world, an’ he used to tell scandalous tales about the prominent people who lived in ’em whose hair he had cut. He was also familiar with the other things which had happened since they’ve begun to write history, an’ if any one would doubt one of his statements, he’d whirl about holding up his razor, an’ say: “I’ll bet ya a dollar I can prove it.”
All of us fellers used to go in as often as we got a chance to get our chins shaved an’ our hair shampooed—just to hear Eugene get indignant about things which wasn’t none of our business. We used to bet with him a lot, just for the fun o’ makin’ him prove up things; which he did by writin’ letters to somebody an’ gettin’ back the answers he wanted. We didn’t have any way to prove our side; so Eugene got the money an’ we had the fun.
Ol’ man Dort ran the general store and kept a pet squirrel in a whirlabout cage, which was the biggest squirrel I ever see, an’ had its tail gnawed off by a rat, or something, before Eugene came. Ol’ man Dort had a reputation for arguin’, which spread all over our part of the earth. We had made a habit o’ goin’ to him to get our discussions settled an’ when we began to pass him up for Eugene, he foamed about it free an’ frank.
He wore a prodigious tangle o’ hair and a bunch o’ grizzled whiskers, about as fine an’ smooth as a clump o’ grease-wood. He used to brag that razor nor scissors hadn’t touched his hide for twenty years, an’ one of us boys would allus add, “Nor soap nor water, neither,” an’ ol’ man Dort would grin proud, ’cause it was a point of honor with him.
Eugene used to send out for his wearin’ an’ sech, so ol’ man Dort didn’t get a whack at him in his store; ol’ man Dort batched, an’ Eugene boarded, so they didn’t clash up at their meals; an’ finally ol’ man Dort swore a big oath that he was goin’ to be barbered. The news got out an’ the boys came in for forty miles to see the fun—an’ it was worth it.
We went early to the shop an’ planted ourselves, lookin’ solemn an’ not sayin’ anything to put Eugene on his guard. When at last ol’ man Dort hove in sight with his brows scowled down an’ his jaws set under his shrubbery, we all bit our lips; an’ Eugene stopped tellin’ us about the hair-roots o’ the Prince of Wales, an’ stood lookin’ at ol’ man Dort with his mouth gapped wide open.
The ol’ man came in, shut the door careful behind him, glared at Eugene, as though darin’ him to do his worst, an’ said: “I want my hair shamped, an’ my whiskers shaved off.”
“If you expected to get it all done in one day, you should ought to have come earlier,” sez Eugene soberly, but tossin’ us a side wink.
“Well, you do as much as you can to-day, an’ we’ll finish up to-morrow,” sez ol’ man Dort, not seein’ the joke.
Ol’ man Dort peeled off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, an’ climbed into the chair as if he thought it was liable to buck him off. Then he settled back with a grunt, an’ Eugene tucked the bib in around his neck, combed his fingers through ol’ man Dort’s hair a minute, an’ sez; “Your hair’s startin’ to come out. You should ought to use a tonic.”
“Tonic, hell!” snaps the ol’ man. “My hair sheds out twice a year, same as the rest o’ the animals.”
“Then you should ought to comb it,” sez Eugene. “I’ve got some hair here in my hand which was shed out two years ago. Leavin’ dead hair an’ such rubbish as that layin’ around on your scalp is what kills the hair globules.”
“It don’t either; it acts like fertilizer, the same as dead grass does,” sez ol’ man Dort. He had made up his mind to take the contrary side of everything ’at Eugene said, an’ it was more fun than a dog fight.
Eugene started in by mowin’ away the whiskers, an’ it was a long an’ painful job; ’cause it was almost impossible to tell where they left off an’ ol’ man Dort began, an’ then they was so cluttered up with grit an’ dead hair and kindry deb-ris that his scissors would choke up an’ pull, an’ then ol’ man Dort would bob up his head an’ yell out a bunch o’ profanity, and Eugene would stand back an’ say that he was a barber, not a clearer of new ground, an’ that the job ought to be done with a scythe and hoe, not with scissors an’ razor. Eugene wasn’t covetous of ol’ man Dort’s trade an’ didn’t care whether he insulted him or not.
The most fun came, though, after Eugene had got down to where he could tell the outline of ol’ man Dort’s face. First he soaked it with lather, combin’ it in with a comb, an’ puttin’ hot towels on it to draw out the alkalie grit an’ give his razors some show.
One of ol’ man Dort’s manias was, that a man ought to pay his debts, whether it killed him or not; so as soon as Eugene had him steamin’ under the towels we begun to talk about a man’s first duty bein’ toward his kin, an’ that if he couldn’t pay his debts without bother, he ought to let the debts go an’ show his relatives a good time while they was still on earth an’ able to enjoy themselves.
Ol’ man Dort couldn’t stand it, an’ tried to answer back from under the towels; but got his mouth full o’ suds, an’ choked on the corner of a towel until Eugene said that if he couldn’t sit still an’ behave himself he could go out to some alfalfa farmer to get his tonsoral work completed.
It wasn’t the ol’ man’s fault—he simply couldn’t help it. Touch him up on a ticklish subject, an’ he just had to come back at ya, same as a rattler. Finally, however, Eugene had the stubble wore down an’ softened until he decided that he stood a chance again’ it, an’ then he lathered an’ rubbed, an’ lathered an’ rubbed, until nothin’ stuck out below ol’ man Dort’s eyes except the peak of his nose; an’ then us boys pulled out our trump card an’ played it strong. We began to talk about red squirrels.
Now, we didn’t know anything professional about squirrels, except what ol’ man Dort had told us; but we slewed his talk around this way an’ that as if it was our own private opinions; an’ the ol’ man began to groan audible. He gritted his teeth, though, an’ bore up under it like a hero, until Eugene begin to chip in with what he knew about squirrels.
Eugene was never content to just speak of a thing in a general way—his main method of convincin’ us was to allus fall back on his own personal experience; so this time he began to tell of squirrels what he had been full acquainted with. He called ’em by name an’ told how they would run to meet him an’ climb up on his shoulders an’ chatter for nuts, an’ so on; until the ol’ man’s ears turned red with the strain he was under. And then, we got to discussin’ the size o’ squirrels.
We told about squirrels we had heard about, an’ contested again’ each other to see which had heard o’ the biggest one; but we never even mentioned ol’ man Dort’s squirrel. Eugene had shaved his way down to below the lobe of ol’ man Dort’s right ear, slippin’ in a side remark to our talk every minute or so; an’ purty soon he sez ’at he knows a squirrel by the name o’ Daniel Webster back in Montpelier, Vermont, which was a full half inch longer ’n airy red squirrel we had spoke of. The ol’ man couldn’t stand this. His head bobbed up, cuttin’ a gash on the crook of his jaw, and as soon as he could blow the foam out of his mouth, he sez, “I’ll stake my life, the’ ain’t another squirrel in this country as big as my own Ben Butler.”
Eugene put his hand on ol’ man Dort’s forehead an’ pushed him back into the headrest. “You lie there,” sez he, “until I get done shavin’ ya. Then, I’ll bet ya a dollar that I can produce a livin’ squirrel which’ll out-stand, outweigh, an’ out-fight your squirrel—an’ I ain’t never seen your squirrel.”
“A dollar!” snorts the ol’ man, flickin’ up his head. “I wouldn’t bother wakin’ Ben Butler up for a measly dollar. I’ll bet ya ten dollars.”
“Get back on that headrest,” orders Eugene. “Ten dollars looks a heap sight better to me than one, an’ I’ll be mighty glad to accommodate ya.”
Eugene took his fire-stick an’ burned the ol’ man’s cut, an’ the ol’ man had to scruge up his shoulders with the pain of it; but he did it without noticin’, ’cause his mind was on squirrels. “What breed o’ squirrels is yours?” he asked.
“If you don’t keep your head where I put it, I’ll throw up the job an’ let you go forth lookin’ like the lost Goog o’ Mayhan,” sez Eugene, raisin’ his voice. Ol’ man Dort was a whalin’ big man, an’ it tickled us a heap to see little Eugene givin’ him directions, like as if he was nothin’ but a pup dog.
Ol’ man Dort settled back with a sigh, an’ Eugene leathered up his razor without sayin’ anything for a minute or two. Then he sez, as he begins shavin’ again: “That squirrel I have in mind for ring contests is the short-tailed grizzly ground-squirrel; and it’s the biggest breed of squirrels the’ is.”
“The’ ain’t no such a breed of squirrel as that!” yells ol’ man Dort, springing erect in his chair, an’ dullin’ Eugene’s razor by the operation.
Eugene stepped back an’ looked at the blood flowin’ from the fresh cut, an’ he sez slow an’ sarcastic; “If it don’t make any difference to you whether you have any skin on your face or not, why I’ll just peel it off an’ tack it on a board to shave it; but hanged if I’m goin’ to duck around tryin’ to shave you on the jump. The’ is too grizzly ground-squirrels.”
Well, that’s the way they had it back and forth: every time they would settle down to business an’ Eugene would get a square inch o’ the ol’ man’s face cleared up, one of us boys would speak something in a low tone about there bein’ rumors of an uncommon big squirrel out at some ranch house a hundred miles or so from there. Eugene would ask what breed of squirrel it was, an’ then decide that it couldn’t be a patchin’ on a genuwine short-tailed grizzly ground-squirrel, an’ then ol’ man Dort couldn’t stand it no longer an’ he would forget what he was doin’, bob up in his chair, an’ lose some more of his life fluid.
Eugene scraped down both sides o’ the ol’ man’s face, givin’ all of his razors a chance to take part in the job, an’ then he set his lips an’ started in on the chin.
“What does short-tailed grizzly ground-squirrels eat, Eugene?” asked Spider Kelley, as innocent as an infant pigeon.
“They eat chickens,—” began Eugene, but ol’ man Dort flew clean out o’ the chair an’ stood over Eugene shakin’ with rage.
“Chickens?” he roars. “Chickens! The’ never was a squirrel foaled into this world what et chickens.”
Eugene looked at ol’ man Dort, an’ then he wiped his razor an’ sat down on a chair, so full of disgust that he could hardly breathe.
“I wish you’d take off that apron an’ bleed into the spittoon,” he said as calm as he could. “I’ve got customers whose patronage is what makes up my living expenses; an’ I don’t want ’em to come in here an’ see the whole place a welter of gore.
“What do you think this shop is, anyway?” yelled Eugene springing to his feet an’ entirely losin’ his patience. “Do you think that I make my livin’ by grubbin’ down wire grass which has been let grow for fifty years, an’ educatin’ ignoramuses in the knowledge of squirrels? I don’t care whether you believe in short-tailed grizzly ground-squirrels or not; but if you don’t let me tie your head down to that chair, I won’t shave another sprout off your chin. I take some pride in my profession, an’ I don’t intend to have no man go out o’ my shop leavin’ a trail o’ blood which will draw all the dogs for miles around. Now, you can take your choice.”
Ol’ man Dort had to give in that this was reasonable enough; so he climbed back into the chair, an’ Eugene tied down his head an’ finished him off without any more trouble. As soon as he had stopped the bleedin’ an’ put on the perfume an’ oil an’ powder, he sez: “Now, what I am goin’ to do is to get some nourishment to recuperate back my strength, an’ if you want the waste products washed out o’ your hair, you come back here at one o’clock prompt.”
“I want to settle on that bet first,” said ol’ man Dort, who was just as pernicious as Eugene, once you got him riled up.
“I’ll make that bet with you after dinner,” sez Eugene, “but first off I got to have food; I’m faint with weakness. Now, I’m goin’ to lock up my shop.”
After Eugene had marched off to his boardin’ house, we all gathered around ol’ man Dort, an’ complimented him on his improved appearance, though to be strictly honest, the’ was considerable doubts about it. He had two teeth out in front, an’ the tobacco habit; and now, with no shrubbery to catch the spray, he spluttered terrible when he tried to talk fast. He said, though, that as long as he had started in he intended to take the full course, an’ was comin’ back, as soon as he’d had a bite to eat, to get his hair laundried an’ trimmed up some around the edges; an’ then he was goin’ to make that bet about the squirrels.
It was some amusin’ to see the ol’ man get his hair sluiced out, but not near as much fun as seein’ him shaved. Whenever Eugene found any stray product, he’d call us all over an’ show it to us, an’ this riled the ol’ man up considerable; but the best joke was when Eugene found a woman’s hairpin.
The ol’ man vowed an’ declared an’ carried on somethin’ fierce; but there was the hairpin, an’ we made him pay for three rounds on the strength of it. As soon as Eugene was all through, the ol’ man settled the bill, payin’ for a full day’s work like a regular sport, an’ not tryin’ to beg off at the ordinary retail price; and then he hardened his face an’ sez: “Now I bet you ten dollars, that you can’t bring forward a squirrel as big as my Ben Butler.”
“I’ll take that bet,” sez Eugene, “but you got to give me time to locate a short-tailed grizzly. It’s the scarcest breed the’ is, an’ it’ll probably cost me twice the sum to get one, but I don’t care about that. What I want is to vindicate myself. I’d like to see that squirrel o’ yours.”
“You come right along,” sez ol’ man Dort, glowin’ with pride. “I reckon when you see him, you’ll just hand over the money at once—That is, if you know anything at all about squirrels.”
We all marched around to the general store, an’ ol’ man Dort pounded on the cage. When Ben Butler sat up an’ looked around to see what was up, the ol’ man waved his hand at him, looked down at Eugene, an’ sez: “Well?” He said it just like that: “Wu-el?”
Ben Butler was rollin’ fat, an’ he certainly did look like some squirrel to us; but Eugene merely glanced at him, an’ sez: “Hum, what we call a dwarf red squirrel, up in Nova Scotia. They have tails, though, up there.”
The ol’ man spluttered till we had to pound him on the back. “Dwarf?” he chokes out. “Dwarf! You produce a squirrel to match him, will ya, or else you pack up your truck an’ move on. I don’t intend to have no—”
“See here, ol’ man,” sez Eugene, pointin’ a finger at him the same as if he’d been a naughty child. “A short-tailed grizzly ground-squirrel is from two to four times as big as this one, so if you want to sidestep the bet, you can do it; but if you want to have some show for your money, I bet you fifty to ten that I can get a squirrel three times as big as this one. I own up that for its kind, this squirrel is of fair, average growth; but—”
“I’ll take that bet!” yelled the old man. “We’ll put up our money with Ike Spargle this minute; but I don’t want your odds. I’ll bet you even money.”
Eugene shook his head as if he pitied the ol’ man, an’ he sez, “Haven’t you never travelled none, or seen a zoological garden?”
“Yes, I’ve travelled some, an’ I’ve seen all kinds o’ gardens,” flares back the ol’ man; “but what I want now is to fix up this bet.”
“Who’ll be the judges?” sez Eugene.
“I don’t care a snap. Any man who can see through the holes in a ladder’ll be able to decide between the claims o’ two squirrels. Ike Spargle an’ Bill Thompson can be the judges.”
“There has to be three,” sez Eugene. “We’ll have Dan Stedman be the other.”
So they put up the money an’ Eugene was to have six weeks to get his squirrel; an’ from that on we begun to divide up into rival camps. The’ wasn’t any tree squirrels out in that neck o’ the woods, an’ we had all forgot what wild squirrels really was like. We knew the’ was ground-squirrels, red squirrels, gray squirrels, an’ flyin’-squirrels—although an argument was started about there bein’ flyin’-fish all right, but no flyin’-squirrels, which would have ended in warfare if Eugene hadn’t been handy to settle it.
You wouldn’t think that a little thing like a bet about the size of a squirrel would take the way it did; but Eugene was so confident on his side, an’ ol’ man Dort was so dead sure of Ben Butler, that the rest of us split up an’ we each had a little side bet on the outcome. It seemed a tarnation long time while we was waitin’; but in a little over a month, Eugene got a big box which he took into his back room without lettin’ even the fellers who had backed his squirrel get a peep at it.
From that on we got shaved twice a day an’ our heads washed till the hair started to change color; so that Eugene’s trade was so improved that even if he lost the bet, he was money ahead; but he scoffed the idy o’ losin’ the bet, even after his squirrel arrived; and as he was the only man who had seen both the contestants, he had the whole country up in the air.
Ol’ man Dort had made his squirrel run around the wheel four hours a day, pokin’ him up with a stick when he got lazy; an’ this gave Ben Butler sech a prodigious appetite that the ol’ man had to set up late at night to give him an extra meal. As the day o’ settlement came closer, the ol’ man tapered off on the exercise, an’ doubled up on the feed, until Ben Butler looked a full size larger, an’ us fellers who had our money on Eugene’s squirrel began to get shaky. If it had been just an even race, it would have been a fair deal; but to have to show a squirrel three times larger than Ben Butler seemed an impossibility.
Eugene had been fussin’ over his entry too, an’ we used to sneak up behind his shop at nights to listen to him. We could hear him snippin’ with scissors and pullin’ stoppers out o’ bottles and when he was through he’d say: “Stand up there, Columbus”—which was the name of his champion, an’ then he would seem to pass in a bunch o’ feed, an’ say—“Good boy, Columbus! that dwarf red squirrel can turn a double handspring in your shadder.”
This used to hearten us up again, and we’d lay a little more money on Eugene’s squirrel. Ike, an’ Bill, an’ Dan—the judges—said that they didn’t claim to know anything about the breeds o’ squirrels, an’ all they was to judge on was the size, which would be settled by weight if the’ was any dispute. They got kind o’ nervous toward the end, ’cause the fellers were all on edge, an’ a rank decision meant trouble in bunches.
When the final day o’ settlement arrived, Boggs was seven deep with fellers on edge to see the outcome. Most of us had all we could spare hung up in bets; but the’ was still a lot o’ coin in the crowd, and a crew came over from Cheyenne to take charge of it.
They had a game which certainly was attractive, I’ll say that much for it. It was a round board full o’ numbers, and up the middle was a tower with slopin’ sides covered with nails. A marble was dropped into a hole at the top and bobbled on the nails until it went into a row of holes at the bottom, and came out in a groove leadin’ to one o’ the numbers. Some o’ these numbers doubled the player’s money, some of ’em paid it over to the table; but most of ’em was neutral, and a feller had to double what he already had up, in order to stand a show. It was an innocent-appearin’ game, but deceptive. When a feller had up all he could raise, some stranger would offer him two bits for his chance, put up the doublin’ money—and win. This was a capper o’ course; but crowds don’t have any sense when they start gamblin’, and this crew was cleanin’ us out until, all of a sudden, I heard a clear, low-toned voice say: “If one o’ you boys would upset that table, you’d see the lever which controls the marble.”
I glanced up, and there was the Singin’ Parson, as cool as a frozen fish. Ol’ Tom Williams, commonly known as “Tank,” had just lost six dollars, and he upset the table and saw just how tight braced the blame game was. Then he unlimbered his gun, and suggested that he would feel calmer if he had the six dollars back, and the Cheyenne gambler looked into Tank’s free eye, which was pointin’ at the ceilin’, and he seconded Tank’s motion. After this the rest o’ the boys collected what they felt was due ’em, and the Cheyenne crowd had to fall back on charity for their noon lunch.
Just about one o’clock, the head crook saw the Singin’ Parson standin’ close to Eugene’s barber shop. The shop was locked, and the crowd around was lookin’ at it. The crook didn’t want to attract any attention; so, instead o’ usin’ a gun, he struck at the Parson with a club. He miscalculated, and hit the shoulder instead o’ the head. The Parson whirled, grabbed the club with his left hand, and the crook’s shirt collar with his right. The crook started to pull; but we settled down on him, and were all ready to serve out justice, when the Parson interrupted to say that it was none of our business, and if we’d just form a ring, he’d settle it to everybody’s satisfaction. He said he expected to live among us for the rest of his life, and this would be a good time to introduce his methods.
We took off the crook’s weapons, and then formed a big ring. The Parson was smilin’ a business-like smile, while the crook was palin’ up noticeable. “I am convinced that a man must settle some things, himself, in a new country,” sez the Parson. “I am larger than you, so it is fair for you to use this club; but I warn you in advance that I understand how to guard again’ clubs, so do your best. I’m ready, begin.”
It was quite eddifyin’ to behold: the crook made a vicious smash at the Parson’s head, the Parson bent his arm at the elbow, muscle out, so the bone wouldn’t get bruised, stepped in, and hit the crook a swing in the short ribs. Some say it lifted him ten feet, some say only eight; but any way, when he lit, he gave a grunt like an empty barrel, and the Parson had no trouble in layin’ him over his knee and givin’ him the most liberal spankin’ with that club I ever was spectator to; while the crowd howled itself hoarse in the throat.
Now the Parson wasn’t angry, he grinned all the way through, and when he had taken as much exercise as he felt was good for him, he set the crook on his feet, and talked fatherly advice to him as sober an’ dignified as was possible—considerin’ the fact that the crook was dancin’ about like a spider on a hot skillet, and rubbin’ the part which had got most intimate with the club.
Eugene had seen it all through his window, and when it was over, he came out and shook the Parson’s hand, and said he was just the kind needed in such an ungodly community, and that he reminded him for all the world of Friar Tuck in Robin Hood. Now, we hadn’t none of us heard of Friar Tuck up to that time; but it was a name well fitted to the tongue, and from the way Eugene said it, we elected it was a compliment; so we gave it to the Singin’ Parson on the spot, and it soaked into his bones, and he hasn’t needed any other since.
This little incident kept us all in a good humor until three o’clock, which was the fatal hour for the squirrel-contest.
Then ol’ man Dort marched to the center o’ the street, carryin’ his cage as though it was full o’ diamonds; an’ Ben Butler sat up an’ chattered as if he was darin’ the whole race o’ squirrels to bring forth his equal.
“I don’t reckon a squirrel could get three times as big as him without explodin’,” sez Spider Kelley, who also had his money on Eugene’s squirrel.
“Here comes Eugene with Columbus,” sez I, not carin’ to waste breath on an opinion I had backed up with good money.
Eugene came down the street carryin’ one end of a box, with Doc Forbes carryin’ the other. The box was covered with a clean apron, an’ Eugene wasn’t lookin’ down in the mouth or discouraged.
“From the size o’ that box, we’re goin’ to have a run for our money,” sez Spider. “If Columbus just looks good enough to make ’em settle by the scales, I haven’t any kick comin’.”
Well, as Eugene drew closer, that crowd fell into a silence until all a body could hear was Ben Butler braggin’ about all the nuts he had et, an’ what a prodigious big squirrel he was; but Eugene never faltered. He walked up an’ set his box down careful, motioned Doc over to the side lines, made a graceful motion to ol’ man Dort, an’ sez: “As yours is the local champion you introduce him first, an’ make your claim.”
Ol’ man Dort removed his tobacco, wiped his forehead, an’ sez: “Feller citizens, I make the claim that Ben Butler is the biggest full-blooded squirrel ever sent to enlighten the solitude of lonely humanity. This is him.”
The ol’ man looked lovin’ly down at his squirrel, an’ we every one of us gave a rousin’ cheer. It was all the family the ol’ man had, an’ it meant more to him ’n a body who hadn’t never tried standin’ his own company months at a time could realize. Ol’ man Dort thrust some new tobacco into his face, bit his lips, winked his eyes rapid, an’ bowed to us, almost overcome.
Then Eugene stepped a space to the front, bowed to the crowd in several directions, an’ sez: “Gentlemen, an’ feller citizens—From Iceland’s icy mountains to India’s coral strands an’ Afric’s sunny fountains, every nation an’ every clime has produced some peculiar product o’ nature which lifts it above an’ sets it apart from all the other localities of the globe. When you speak of the succulent banana, the golden orange, or the prickly pineapple, Nova Scotia remains silent; but when you speak of varmints, she rears up on her hind legs and with a glad shout of triumph, she hands forth the short-tailed grizzly ground-squirrel, an’ sez, ‘Give me the blue ribbons, the gold medals, an’ the laurel crowns of victory.’ I have the rare pleasure an’ the distinctive honor of presenting to your notice Columbus, the hugest squirrel ever exhibited within the confines of captivity.”
We was so took by Eugene’s eloquence that we hardly noticed him slip the apron from in front of his cage; but when we did look, we could hardly get our breath. I was standin’ close to the Friar; and at first he looked puzzled, and then his face lit up with a regular boy’s grin; but he didn’t say a word.
Columbus was certainly a giant; he stood full two feet tall as he sat up an’ scrutinized around with a bossy sort of grin. He was dappled fawn color on the sides with a curly black streak down the back an’ sort o’ chestnut-red below, with a short tail an’ teeth like chisels. He won so blame easy that even us what had bet on him didn’t cheer.
Ol’ man Dort give a grin, thinkin’ Ben Butler must have won, an’ then he stepped around an’ looked into Eugene’s cage. He looked first at Columbus, an’ then at Ben Butler, then he looked again. “That damned thing ain’t alive,” he sez. “It’s made up out o’ wool yarn. Poke it up an’ let me see it move.”
“Poke it yourself,” sez Eugene. He was one o’ these cold-blooded gamblers who ain’t got one speck o’ decent sentimentality; an’ he was mad ’cause we hadn’t cheered.
Ol’ man Dort took a stick an’ poked Columbus, an’ Columbus give a threatenin’ grin, chattered savage, an’ bit the stick in two. “Give him the money, Ike,” sez ol’ man Dort. “I own up I never was in Nova Scotia, an’ I never supposed that such squirrels as this grew on the face o’ the whole earth. What’ll you take for him?” he sez to Eugene.
“It ain’t your fault that you didn’t know about him,” sez Eugene, thawin’ a little humanity into himself. “I don’t want to rub it in on nobody; and I’ll give you this here squirrel free gratis, ’cause I admit that you know more about squirrels ’n anybody else what ever I met; an’ you have the biggest red squirrel the’ is in the world.”
Then we did give Eugene a cheer, an’ everything loosened up, an’ we all crowded into Ike Spargle’s so that them what won could spend a little money on them what lost.
After a time, ol’ man Dort got up on a chair, an’ sez: “I want you fellers to know that Columbus won’t never be my pet. Ben Butler has been the squarest squirrel ever was, an’ he continues to remain my pet; but I’ll study feedin’ this condemned foreign squirrel, an’ give him a fair show; so that if any outsiders come around makin’ brags, we will have a home squirrel to enter again’ ’em an’ get their money.”
Eugene led the cheerin’ this time, which made Eugene solider than ever with the boys, an’ when Spider an’ me got ready to ride home, he an’ ol’ man Dort had their arms around each other tryin’ to sing the Star Spangled Banner.
Spider talked about Columbus most o’ the way home, but I was still. The’ was somethin’ peculiar about the Friar’s grin when he first sighted Columbus, and the’ was somethin’ familiar about that squirrel, an’ I was tryin’ to adjust myself. Just as we swung to the west on the last turn, I sez to Spider: “Spider, I don’t know what I ought to do about this?”
“About what?” sez Spider.
“About this bet?”
“Well, it was a fair bet, wasn’t it? Columbus is full four times as big as Ben Butler.”
“Yes,” sez I, “but he ain’t no squirrel.”
Spider pulled up to a stop. “Ain’t no squirrel?” he sez. “What do you take me for, didn’t I see him myself? What is he then?”
“He’s a woodchuck, that’s what he is,” sez I. “He’s a genuwine ground hog with his hair cut stylish and died accordin’ to Eugene’s idy of high art. I remember now that I used to see ’em when I was a little shaver back on my dad’s farm in Indiana.”
Spider give a whoop, an’ then he laughed, an’ then he sobered up, an’ sez: “Well, you can’t do nothin’ now, anyway. The judges have decided it, ol’ man Dort has give it up, it ain’t your game nohow, an’ if you was to try to equal back those bets after they have been paid an’ mostly spent, you’d start a heap o’ blood-spillin’; an’ furthermore, as far as I’m concerned, I ain’t right sure but what a woodchuck, as you call it, ain’t some kind of a squirrel. We’ll just let this go an’ wait for a chance to put something over on Eugene.”
So that’s what we made up to do; but this gives you an idy of how fine a line the Friar drew on questions o’ sport. He knew ’at we weren’t full fledged angels, and that we had to have our little diversities; but when any professional hold-up men tried to ring in a brace game on us, he couldn’t see any joke in it, and he upset the money-changers’ tables, the same as they was upset that time, long ago, in the temple.
[CHAPTER THREE—ABOVE THE DUST]
I’m only about twice as old as I feel; but I’ve certainly seen a lot o’ changes take place out this way. I can look back to the time when what most of us called a town was nothin’ but a log shack with a barrel of cheap whiskey and a mail-bag wanderin’ in once a month or so, from goodness-knows-where. I’ve seen the cattle kings when they set their own bounds, made their own laws, and cared as little for government-title as they did for an Injun’s. Then, I’ve seen the sheep men creep in an inch at a time until they ate the range away from the cattle and began to jump claims an’ tyrannize as free and joyous as the cattle men had. Next came the dry farmer, and he was as comical as a bum lamb when he first hove into sight; but I reckon that sooner or later he’ll be the one to write the final laws for this section.
We’re gettin’ a good many towns on our map nowadays, we’re puttin’ up a lot o’ hay, we’re drinkin’ cow milk, and we’re eatin’ garden truck in the summer. The old West has dried up and blown away before our very eyes, and a few of us old timers are beginnin’ to feel like the last o’ the buffalo. The’s more money nowadays in boardin’ dudes ’n the’ is in herdin’ cattle, an’ that’s the short of a long, long story.
But still we hammered out this country from the rough, and no one can take that away from us. The flag follers trouble, an’ business follers the flag, an’ law follers business, an’ trouble follers the law; but always the first trouble was kicked up by boys who had got so ’at they couldn’t digest home cookin’ any longer and just nachely had to get out an’ tussle with nature an’ the heathen.
They’re a tough, careless lot, these young adventurers; an’ they’re always in a state of panic lest the earth get so crowded the’ won’t be room enough to roll over in bed without askin’ permission; so they kill each other off as soon as possible, and thus make room for the patienter ones who follow after. From what I’ve heard tell of history, this has been about the way that the white race has managed from the very beginning.
As a general rule it has been purt’ nigh a drawn fight between the dark-skins an’ the wild animals; then the lads who had to have more elbow-room came along, and the dark-skins and the wild animals had to be put onto reservations to preserve a few specimens as curiosities, while the lads fussed among themselves, each one tryin’ to settle down peaceable with his dooryard lappin’ over the horizon in all directions. Room, room, room—that was their constant cry. As soon as one would get a neighbor within a day’s ride, he’d begin to feel shut in an’ smothered.
Tyrrel Jones was one o’ the worst o’ this breed. He came out at an early date, climbed the highest peak he could find, and claimed everything ’at his gaze could reach in every direction. Then he invented the Cross brand, put it on a few cows, and made ready to defend his rights. The Cross brand was a simple one, just one straight line crossin’ another; and it could be put on in about one second with a ventin’ iron, or anything else which happened to be handy. Tyrrel thought a heap o’ this brand, an’ he didn’t lose any chances of puttin’ it onto saleable property. His herd grew from the very beginning.
His home ranch was something over a hundred miles northwest o’ the Diamond Dot; but I allus suspicioned that a lot of our doggies had the Cross branded on to ’em. Tyrrel was mighty particular in the kind o’ punchers he hired. He liked fellers who had got into trouble, an’ the deeper they was in, the better he liked ’em. Character seeks its level, the same as water; so that Tyrrel had no trouble in gettin’ as many o’ the breed he wanted as he had place for. They did his devilment free and hearty, and when they had a little spare time, they used to devil on their own hook in a way to shame an Injun.
The sayin’ was, that a Cross brand puncher could digest every sort o’ beef in the land except Cross brand beef. Tyrrel used to grin at this sayin’ as though it was a sort of compliment; but some o’ the little fellers got purty bitter about it. When a small outfit located on a nice piece o’ water, it paid ’em to be well out o’ Ty’s neighborhood. No one ever had any luck who got in his road; but his own luck boomed right along year after year. He allus kept more men than he needed; an’ about once a month he’d knock in the head of a barrel o’ whiskey, an’ the tales they used to tell about these times was enough to raise the hair. Ty would work night an’ day to get one of his men out of a scrape; but once a man played him false, he either had to move or get buried. He wasn’t a bad lookin’ man, except that he allus seemed keyed up an’ ready to spring.
His men all had to be top-notch riders, because he hadn’t any use for a gentle hoss; he didn’t want his hosses trained, he wanted ’em busted, an’ the cavey he’d send along for a round-up would be about as gentle and reliable as a band o’ hungry wolves. If a man killed a hoss, why Ty seemed to think it a good joke, an’ this was his gait all the way along—the rougher the men were, the better they suited him. He kept a pack o’ dogs, and the men were encouraged to kick an’ abuse ’em; but if one of ’em petted a dog, he was fired that instant—or else lured into a quarrel. The’ didn’t seem to be one single soft spot left in the man, an’ when they got to callin’ him Tyrant Jones instead of Tyrrel, why, it suited him all over, an’ he used it himself once in a while.
The next time I saw Friar Tuck, he recognized me at first glance, an’ his face lit up as though we had been out on some prank together an’ was the best pals in the world ever since. He wanted to know all I knew about the crowd that had started to string him up; and when I had finished paintin’ ’em as black as I could, what did he do but say that he was goin’ up their way to have a talk with ’em.
I told him right out that it was simply wastin’ time; but he was set in his ways, so I decided to ride part way with him. He had two hosses along this trip, with his bed an’ grub tied on the spare one; and on the second day we reached a little park just as the sun was setting. It was one o’ the most beautiful spots I ever saw, high enough to get a grand view off to the west, but all the rest shut in like a little room. He jumped from his hoss, had his saddle off as soon as I did, and also helped me with the pack. Then he looked about the place.
“What a grand cathedral this is, Happy!” he sez after a minute.
I didn’t sense what he meant right at first, and went on makin’ camp, until I happened to notice his expression. He was lookin’ off to the west with the level rays of the sun as it sank down behind a distant range full in his face. The twilight had already fallen over the low land and all the hazy blues an’ purples an’ lavenders seemed to be floatin’ in a misty sea, with here an’ there the black shadows of peaks stickin’ out like islands. It really was gorgeous when you stopped to give time to it.
It had been gruelin’ hot all day, an’ was just beginnin’ to get cool an’ restful, and I was feelin’ the jerk of my appetite; but when I noticed his face I forgot all about it. I stood a bit back of him, half watchin’ him, an’ half watchin’ the landscape. Just as the sun sank, he raised his hands and chanted, with his great, soft voice booming out over the hills: “The Lord is in His holy temple—let all the earth keep silence before Him.”
He bent his head, an’ I bent mine—I’d have done it if the’d been a knife-point stickin’ again’ my chin. I tell you, it was solemn! It grew dark in a few moments an’ the evening star came out in all her glory. It was a still, clear night without a speck in the air, and she was the only star in sight; but she made up for it, all right, by throwing out spikes a yard long.
He looked up at it for a moment, and then sang a simple little hymn beginnin’, “Now the day is over, night is drawing nigh; shadows of the evening steal across the sky.” It didn’t have the ring to it of most of his songs; it was just close an’ friendly, and filled a feller with peace. It spoke o’ the little children, and those watchin’ in pain, and the sailors tossin’ on the deep blue sea, and those who planned evil—rounded ’em all up and bespoke a soothin’ night for ’em; and I venture to say that it did a heap o’ good.
Then he pitched in an’ helped me get supper. This was his way; he didn’t wear a long face and talk doleful; he was full o’ life an’ boilin’ over with it every minute, and he’d turn his hand to whatever came up an’ joke an’ be the best company in the world; but he never got far from the Lord; and when he’d stop to worship, why, the whole world seemed to stop and worship with him.
We had a merry meal and had started to wash up the dishes when he happened to glance up again. He had just been tellin’ me a droll story about the first camp he’d ever made, and how he had tied on his pack so ’at the hoss couldn’t comfortably use his hind legs and had bucked all his stuff into a crick, an’ I was still laughin’; but when he looked up, my gaze followed his. It was plumb dark by now, an’ that evening star was fair bustin’ herself, and the light of it turned the peaks a glisteny, shadowy silver. He raised his hands again and chanted one beginning: “Praise the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, praise His holy name.”
The’ was a part in this one which called upon all the works o’ the Lord to praise Him, and I glanced about to see what was happenin’. A faint breeze had sprung up and the spruce trees were bowin’ over reverently, the ponies had raised their heads and their eyes were shinin’ soft and bright in the firelight as they looked curiously at the singer; and as I stood there with a greasy skillet in my hand, something inside of me seemed to get down on its knees, to worship with the other works o’ the Lord.
It was one o’ those wonderful moments which seem to brand themselves on a feller’s memory, and I can see it all now, and hear the Friar’s voice as it floated away into the hills until it seemed to be caught up by other voices rather than to die away.
Well, we sat up about the fire a long time that night. He didn’t fuss with me about my soul, or gettin’ saved, or such things. I told him the things I didn’t understand, and he told me the things he didn’t understand; and I told him about some o’ my scrapes, and he told me about some o’ his, and—well, I can’t see where it was so different from a lot of other nights; but I suppose I’d be sitting there yet if he hadn’t finally said it was bedtime.
He stood up and looked at the star again, and chanted the one which begins: “Lord, now let thy servant depart in peace”; after which he pulled off some of his clothes and crawled into the tarp. I crawled in beside him about two minutes later; but he was already asleep, while I lay there thinkin’ for the best part of an hour.
Next mornin’ he awakened me by singin’, “Brightest and best of the sons of the morning”; and after that we got breakfast, and he started on to Ty Jones’s while I turned back to the Diamond Dot. I didn’t think he’d be able to do much with that gang; but after the talk I’d had with him the night before, I saw ’at they couldn’t do much to him, either. I had got sort of a hint at his scheme of life; and there isn’t much you can do to a man who doesn’t value his flesh more ’n the Friar did his.
[CHAPTER FOUR—TY JONES]
Ty stood in his door as the Friar rode up, and he recognized him from the description Badger-face had turned in. Badger-face had been purty freely tongue-handled for not havin’ lynched the Friar, and Ty Jones was disposed to tilt his welcome even farther back than usual; so he set his pack on the Friar. He had six dogs at this time, mastiffs with a wolf-cross in ’em which about filled out his notion o’ what a dog ought to be.
The Friar had noticed the dogs, but he didn’t have an idee that any man would set such creatures on another man; so he had dismounted to get a drink o’ water from the crick, it havin’ been a hot ride. The pack came surgin’ down on him while he was lyin’ flat an’ drinkin’ out o’ the crick. His ponies were grazin’ close by, and as soon as he saw ’at the dogs meant business, he vaulted into the saddle just in time to escape ’em.
They leaped at him as fast as they came up, and he hit ’em with the loaded end of his quirt as thorough as was possible. He was ridin’ a line buckskin with a nervous disposition, and the pony kicked one or two on his own hook; but as the Friar leaned over in puttin’ down the fifth, the sixth jumped from the opposite side, got a holt on his arm just at the shoulder, an’ upset him out of the saddle. In the fall the dog’s grip was broke an’ he and the Friar faced each other for a moment, the Friar squattin’ on one knee with his fists close to his throat, the dog crouchin’ an’ snarlin’.
As the dog sprang, the Friar upper-cut him in the throat with his left hand and when he straightened up, hit him over the heart with his right. He says that a dog’s heart is poorly protected. Anything ’at didn’t have steel over it was poorly protected when the Friar struck with his right in earnest. The dog was killed. One o’ the dogs the pony had kicked was also killed, but the other four was able to get up and crawl away.
The Friar shook himself and went on to where Ty Jones and a few of his men were standin’. “That’s a nice lively bunch o’ dogs you have,” sez he, smilin’ as pleasant as usual; “but they need trainin’.”
“They suit me all right,” growls Ty, “except that they’re too blame clumsy.”
The Friar looked at him a minute, and then said drily, “Yes, that’s what I said; they need trainin’.”
Ty Jones scowled: “They don’t get practice enough,” sez he. “It’s most generally known that I ain’t a-hankerin’ for company; so folks don’t usually come here, unless they’re sure of a welcome.”
“I can well believe you,” said the Friar, laughin’, “and I hope the next time I come I’ll be sure of a welcome.”
“It’s not likely,” sez Ty shortly.
The Friar just stood and looked at him curiously. He didn’t believe that Ty could really mean it. The’ wasn’t a streak of anything in his own make-up to throw light on a human actin’ the way ’at Ty Jones acted; so he just stood and examined him. Ty stared back with a sneer on his face, and I’m sorry I couldn’t have been there to see ’em eyein’ each other.
“Do you really mean,” sez the Friar at last, “that you hate your fellow humans so, that you’d drive a perfect stranger away from your door?”
“I haven’t any use for hoss-thieves,” sez Ty.
The Friars face lighted. “Oh, that’s all right,” sez he in a relieved tone. “As long as you have a special grievance again’ me, why, it’s perfectly natural for you to act up to it. It wouldn’t be natural for most men to act up to it in just this way, but still it’s normal; while for a man to set his dogs on a total stranger would be monstrous. I’m glad to know ’at you had some excuse; but as far as hoss-stealin’ goes, that roan is back with your band again. I saw him as I came along.”
Ty was somewhat flabbergasted. He wasn’t used to havin’ folks try out his conduct and comment on it right to his face; and especially was he shocked to have his morals praised by a preacher. He knew ’at such a reception as had just been handed to the Friar would have taken the starch out o’ most men an’ filled ’em with a desire for revenge ever after; but he could see that the Friar was not thinkin’ of what had been handed to him, he was actually interested in himself, Ty Jones, and was honestly tryin’ to see how it was possible for such a condition to exist; and this set Ty Jones back on his haunches for true.
“For all time to come,” he sez slow and raspy, “I want you to leave my stuff alone. If you ever catch up and ride one of my hosses again, I’ll get your hide; and I don’t even want you on my land.”
Then the Friar stiffened up; any one in the world, or any thing, had the right to impose upon the Friar as a man; but when they tried to interfere with what he spoke of as his callin’, why, he swelled up noticeable. The Friar’s humility was genuine, all right; but it was about four times stiffer an’ spikier than any pride I’ve ever met up with yet.
“I shall not ride your hosses,” sez he, scornful, “nor shall I tread upon your land, nor shall I breathe your air, nor drink your water; but in the future, as in the past, I shall use for the Lord only those things which belong to the Lord. The things which are the Lord’s were His from the beginning, the things which you call yours are merely entrusted to your care for a day or an hour or a moment. I do not covet your paltry treasures, I covet your soul and I intend to fight you for it from this day forward.”
The Friar spoke in a low, earnest tone; and Ty Jones stared at him. Ya know how earnest an insane man gets? Well, the’ was something o’ this in the Friar when he was talkin’ business. You felt that he believed that what he was sayin’ was the truth, and you felt that if it was the truth, it was mighty well worth heedin’, and you also felt that in spite of its bein’ so everlastin’ different from the usual view o’ things, it might actually be the truth after all and a risky thing to pass up careless.
After waitin’ a minute without gettin’ a reply, the Friar turned on his heel to walk away, stumbled, and slipped to the ground, and then they noticed a pool of blood which had dripped from him as he stood. He had forgotten that the dog had torn him, an’ the men had looked into his eyes, as men always did when he talked, and they had forgot it, too. Now, when he fell, Olaf the Swede stepped forward to help him up.
Olaf was the best man ’at Ty Jones had, from Ty’s own standpoint. Ty had happened to be over at Skelty’s one night when Skelty was givin’ a dance. Skelty had six girls at this time, an’ he used to give a dance about once a week. Along about midnight, they got to be purty lively affairs. This night Skelty had bragged what a fine shot he was, an’ the boys were kiddin’ him about it, because Skelty wasn’t no shot at all as a rule. It was a moonlight night, and while they was sheepin’ Skelty about his shootin’, two strangers rode up, tied their hosses to the corral, an’ started up the path toward the door.
Skelty looked at ’em an’ sez, “Why, if I had a mind to, I could pick one o’ those fellers off with this gun as easy as I could scratch my nose.” He pulled his gun and held it over his shoulder.
All the boys fair hooted, an’ Skelty dropped his gun an’ shot one o’ the strangers dead in his tracks. The other came along on the run with Skelty shootin’ at him as fast as he could pop; but he only shot him once, through the leg, and he limped in an’ made for Skelty with his bare hands. Skelty hit him in the forehead, knocked him down an’ jumped on him. He kept on beatin’ him over the head until the stranger managed to get a grip on his wrists. He held one hand still, an’ puttin’ the other into his mouth, bit off the thumb.
The’s somethin’ about bein’ bit on the thumb which melts a man’s nerve; and in about five minutes, the stranger had Skelty’s head between his knees, and was makin’ him eat his own gun. It must have been a hideous sight! Some say that he actually did make Skelty eat it, and some say that he only tore through the throat; but anyway, Skelty didn’t quite survive it, and Ty Jones hired the stranger, which was Olaf the Swede.
Olaf was one o’ those Swedes which seem a mite too big for their skins. The bones in his head stuck out, his jaws stuck out prodigious, his shoulders stuck out, his hands stuck out—he fair loomed up and seemed to crowd the landscape, and he was stouter ’n a bull. When he let himself go he allus broke somethin’; but he had a soft streak in him for animals, an’ Ty never could break him from bein’ gentle with hosses, nor keep him from pettin’ the dogs once in a while. Olaf hadn’t no more morals ’n a snake at this time, an’ when it came to dealin’ with humans, he suited Ty to the minute; but he just simply wouldn’t torture an animal, and that was the end of it. Olaf wasn’t a talkin’ man; he never used a word where a grunt would do, and he was miserly about them; but he certainly was set in his ways.
The Friar hadn’t fainted, he had just gone dizzy; so when Olaf gave him a lift he got to his feet and walked to his horse. He allus carried some liniment an’ such in his saddle bags, an’ he pulled off his shirt and cleaned out the wound and tied it up, with Olaf standin’ by and tryin’ to help. Now, it made something of a murmur, when the Friar took off his shirt. In the first place, the dog had give him an awful tear, and for the rest, the Friar was a wonderful sight to behold. He was as strong as Olaf without bein’ bulgey, and his skin was as white and smooth as ivory. He was all curves and tapers with medium small hands and feet, and a throat clean cut and shapely like the throat of a high-bred mare. Olaf looked at him, and nodded his head solemnly. Badger-face hated Olaf, because Olaf had a curious way of estimatin’ things and havin’ ’em turn out to be so, which made Ty Jones put faith in what Olaf said, over and above what any one else said.
As soon as the Friar had finished tyin’ up the wound, he turned and walked up to Ty Jones. “Friend,” he said, “I don’t bear you a grain o’ malice, and nothing you can ever do to me will make me bear you a grain o’ malice. I know a lot about medicine, and perhaps I can help you that way sometime. I want to get a start with you some way; I want to be welcome here, and I wish ’at you’d give me a chance.”
“Oh, hell!” sneered Ty Jones. “Do you think you can soft-soap me as easy as you did the boys? You’re not welcome here now, and you never will be. I’ve heard all this religious chatter, and there’s nothin’ in it. The world was always held by the strong, by the men who hated their enemies and stamped them out as fast as they got a chance; and it always will be held by the strong. Your religion is only for weaklings and hypocrits.”
The Friar’s face lighted. “Will you discuss these things with me?” he asked. “I shall not eat until this scratch is healed, I have my own bed and will not bother you; won’t you just be decent enough to invite me to camp here, give me free use of water, and grass for my hosses, while you and I discuss these things fully?”
“I told you I didn’t want you about, and I don’t,” sez Ty. “The’s nothin’ on earth so useless as a preacher, and I can’t stand ’em.”
“Let me work for you,” persisted the Friar. “All I ask is a chance to show ’at I’m able to do a man’s work, and all the pay I ask is a chance to hold service here on Sundays. If I don’t do my work well, then you can make me the laughin’ stock o’ the country; but I tell you right now that if you turn me away without a show, it will do you a lot more harm than it will me.”
Ty thought ’at probably the Friar had got wind o’ some of his devilment, and was hintin’ that his own neck depended on his men keepin’ faith with him; so he stared at the Friar to see if it was a threat.
The Friar looked back into his eyes with hope beamin’ in his own; but after a time Ty Jones scowled down his brows an’ pointed the way ’at the Friar had come. “Go,” sez he, stiff as ever. “The’ ain’t any room for you on the Cross brand range; and if ya try anything underhanded, I’ll hunt ya down and put ya plumb out o’ the way.”
So the Friar he caught his ponies and hit the back trail; but still it had been purty much of a drawn battle, for Ty Jones’s men had used their eyes and their ears, and they had to give in to themselves ’at the preacher had measured big any way ya looked at him; while their own boss had dogged it in the manger to a higher degree ’n even they could take glory in.
As the Friar rode away, he sagged in his saddle with his head bent over; and they thought him faint from his wound; but the truth was, that he was only a little sad to think ’at he had lost. He was human, the Friar was; he used to chide himself for presumptin’ to be impatient; but at the same time he used to fidget like a nervous hoss when things seemed to stick in the sand; and he didn’t sing a note as long as he was on the Cross brand range—which same was an uncommon state for the Friar to be in, him generally marchin’ to music.
[CHAPTER FIVE—THE HOLD-UP]
This was the way the Friar started out with us; and year after year, this was the way he kept up. He was friendly with every one, and most every one was friendly with him. Some o’ the boys got the idea that he packed his guns along as a bluff; so they put up a joke on him.
They lay in wait for him one night as he was comin’ up the goose neck. I, myself, didn’t rightly savvy just how he did stand with regard to the takin’ of human life in self-defence; but I knew mighty well ’at he wasn’t no bluffer, so I didn’t join in with the boys, nor I didn’t warn him; I just scouted along on the watch and got up the hill out o’ range to see what would happen.
He came up the hill in the twilight, singin’ one of his favorite marchin’ songs. I’ve heard it hundreds of times since then, and I’ve often found myself singin’ it softly to myself when I had a long, lonely ride to make. That was a curious thing about the Friar: he didn’t seem to be tampin’ any of his idees into a feller, but first thing the feller knew, he had picked up some o’ the Friar’s ways; and, as the Friar confided to me once, a good habit is as easy learned as a bad, and twice as comfortin’.
Well, he came up the pass shufflin’ along at a steady Spanish trot as was usual with him when not overly rushed, and singin’:
“Guide me, O Thou great Jehovah!
Pilgrim through this barren land;
I am weak, but Thou art mighty;
Hold me with Thy powerful hand.”
He came up out of the pass with his head thrown back, and his boy’s face shinin’ with that radiatin’ joy I haven’t ever seen in another face, exceptin’ it first caught the reflection from the Friar’s; and the notion about died out o’ the boys’ minds. They were all friends of his and wouldn’t have hurt his feelin’s for a lot; but they had itched about his weapons for such a spell that they finally had to have it out; so when he rounded a point o’ rock, they stepped out and told him to put his hands up.
They were masked and had him covered, and his hands shot up with a jerk; but he didn’t stop his singin’, and his voice didn’t take on a single waver. Fact was, it seemed if possible a shade more jubilant. He had reached the verse which sez:
“Feed me with the heavenly manna
In this barren wilderness;
Be my sword and shield and banner,
Be the Lord my Righteousness”;
and as he sang with his hands held high above his head, he waved ’em back and forth, playin’ notes in the air with his fingers, the way he did frequent; and it was one o’ the most divertin’ sights I ever saw.
Those blame scamps had all they could do to keep from hummin’ time to his song; for I swear to you in earnest that the Friar could play on a man’s heart the same as if it was a fiddle. He kept on an’ finished the last verse while I crouched above ’em behind a big rock, and fairly hugged myself with the joy of it. Ol’ Tank Williams was a big man and had been chosen out to be the leader an’ do the talkin’, but he hadn’t the heart to jab into the Friar’s singin’; so he waited until it was all over. Then he cleared his throat as though settin’ off a blast of dynamite, and growls out: “Here, you, give us your money.”
Ten six-shooters were pointin’ at the Friar, but I reckon if he had known it would of exploded all of ’em, he’d have had to laugh. He threw back his head and his big free laugh rolled out into the hills, until I had to gnaw at a corner o’ the stone to keep from joinin’ in. “My money!” sez he as soon as he could catch his breath. “Well, boys, boys, whatever put such a notion as that into your heads. Take it, take it, you’re welcome to it; and if you are able to find more than two bits, why, I congratulate you most hearty; because two bits was all I could find this morning, and that will only be a nickle apiece, and five cents is small pay for robbin’ a volunteer missionary.”
Ol’ Tank Williams was a serious-minded old relic, and he was feelin’ so sheepish just then that it seemed to him as though the Friar had imposed on him by lurin’ him into such a fix; so he roars out in earnest: “If you ain’t got no money, why the deuce do ya tote those guns about with ya all the time?”
“Would you just as soon tie me to a tree, or take some other measures of defence?” asked the Friar politely. “My arms are gettin’ weary and I could talk more comfortable with ’em hanging’ down.”
“Aw put ’em down, and talk on,” sez George Hendricks.
“Thank you,” sez the Friar. “Well, now, boys, the man who doesn’t take the time to put a value on his own life, isn’t likely to make that life very much worth while. He mustn’t overvalue it to such an extent that he becomes a coward, nor he mustn’t undervalue it to such an extent that he becomes reckless—he must take full time to estimate himself as near as he is able.
“I don’t know that I can allus keep from judgin’ my fellow men; but I am sure that I would not judge one to the extent of sayin’ that my life was worth more than his, so I should never use a gun merely to save my own life by takin’ away the life of another man—much less would I use a gun in defence of money; but I am a purty good shot, and sometimes I can get a man interested by shootin’ at a mark with him. This is why I carry firearms. Do you want the two bits?”
“Aw, go on,” yells ol’ Tank, madder at himself ’n ever. “We didn’t intend to rob ya. All we wanted was to hear ya sing and preach a bit”; and he pulled off his mask and shook the Friar’s hand. All the rest o’ the boys did the same; and I clumb up on my rock, flapped my wings, and crowed like a rooster.
Well, we sat on the ground, and he sang for us; and then he sobered and began to talk about cussin’. It used to hurt the Friar to hear some o’ the double-jointed swear words we used when excited. He tried not to show it, because he didn’t want anything to shut us away from him at any time; but whiles his face would wrinkle into lines of actual pain.
“Now, boys,” he began, “I know, ’at you don’t mean what you say in a profane way. You call each other terrible names, and condemn each other to eternal punishment; and if a man said these things in earnest, his life would be forfeit; but you take it merely as a joke. Now, I do not know just how wicked this is. I know that it is forbidden to take the name o’ the Lord thy God in vain; so it is a dangerous thing to be profane even in thoughtlessness; but I have heard the Lord’s name used by the perfectly respectable in a way which must have hurt his tender nature more.
“Once in the crowded slum district of a large eastern city, I saw a freight car back down on a child and kill it. The mother was frantic; she was a foreigner and extra emotional, and she screamed, and cursed the railroad. A man had come to comfort her, and he put his hand on her arm and said, ‘My dear woman, you must not carry on this way. We must always bow our heads in submission to the Lord’s will.’
“For years the poor people o’ that neighborhood had begged protection for their children; and I cannot believe that it was the Lord’s will that even one o’ the least of ’em should have been slain in order to drive the lesson a little deeper home; so, as I said before, I am not going to talk to you of the wickedness of swearing—but I am goin’ to talk about its foolishness, its vulgarity, and its brutality.”
He went on showin’ that swearin’ was foolish because it wasn’t givin’ a man’s thought on things in a man’s way; but merely howlin’ it out the way wolves and wild-cats had to, on account o’ their not havin’ a civilized language with which to express the devilment which was in ’em. He showed how it made a feller lazy; because instead of tryin’ to sort out words which would tell exactly what he meant, he made a lot of noises which had no more real meanin’ than a bunch o’ fire-crackers.
Then his voice got low and serious, and he said ’at the worst thing about cussin’ was, that it led a feller into speakin’ lightly about the sacred things of life. “When you speak the word ‘son,’” he said, “you are bound to also call up the thought of ‘mother’; and I want to say to you right now that any one who can be coarse and nasty in thinkin’ or speakin’ about maternity, is not a man at all—or even a decent brute—but has some sort of soul-sickness which is more horrible than insanity. Always be square with women—all women, good and bad. I know your temptations, and I know theirs. Woman has a heavy cross to carry, and the least we can do, is to play fair.”
Then he sprang some of his curious theories on us: told us how the body was full of poisons and remedies; and it depended on our plan of livin’, whether we used the one or the other. He said he allus cut out food and tobacco on Fridays, and if he didn’t feel bright and clear and bubblin’ over with vitality, he fasted until he felt able to eat a rubber boot, and then he knew he had cleaned all the waste products out of him, and could live at top speed again. He finished up by tellin’ of a cross old doctor he once knew, who used to say ’at cattle and kings didn’t have to control themselves; but all ordinary men had to use self-denial, even in matters of pleasure.
It was more the way the Friar said things than what he said; his voice and his eyes helped a lot; but the thing ’at counted for most was the fact ’at you knew it wasn’t none of it put on. He loved to joke when it was a jokin’ matter; but he was stiff as stone with what he called the foundations of life. A man, you know, as a rule, is mighty timid about the things which lie close to his heart, no matter how bold and free he’ll talk about other things; but the Friar was like a little child, an’ he’d speak out as bold and frank as one, about the things he loved and hated, until he finally put a few drops o’ this queer brand o’ courage into our own hearts.
Of course we didn’t get to be troubled with wing-growth or anything like that; but a short time after this fake hold-up, ol’ Tank Williams went in to fill up with picklin’-fluid, and he started in on Monday and kept fightin’ it all that week until Friday. Then he said that he wouldn’t neither eat, drink, nor smoke on that day; and they couldn’t make him do it. He started in on Saturday to continue what had started out to be one o’ the best benders he had ever took; but the first quart made him sick as a dog, and he came out to the ranch and said ’at the Friar had made him a temperate man, and for the rest of his life he intended to set aside one day a week in the Friar’s favor.
After the boys had started for the ranch, the Friar invited me to spend the night with him; so we unpacked his bed from the lead-hoss and we built a little fire and had a right sociable time of it. Me and him was good pals by this time. He had said to me once: “Happy, you do more general thinkin’ than some varsity men I’ve known.”
“I reckon,” sez I, modest as I could, “that a man who has bossed a dozen men and ten thousand cattle through a three days’ blizzard, has to be able to think some like a general.”
Then he explained to me that general thinkin’ meant to think about stars an’ flowers an’ the human race an’ the past an’ the future, an’ such things, and not to be all the time lookin’ at life just from the way it touched a feller himself. This was another thing I liked about him. Most Easteners is so polite that they haven’t the heart to set a feller right when he has the wrong notion; but the Friar would divvy up on his knowledge as free as he would on his bacon or tobacco; so I opened myself up to him until he knew as much about me as I did myself.
He didn’t have much use for the shut-eye this night, nor he wasn’t as talky as common; so we sat smokin’ and lookin’ into the fire for a long time. Once in a while he’d speak a verse about some big deed a man had done years ago, or else one describin’ the mountains or something like that; until finally I asked him how it came that a man who loved adventure an’ fightin’ an’ feats of skill, the way he did, had selected to be a preacher.
“We don’t select our lives, Happy,” sez he. “You’re surely philosopher enough to see that. As far as we can see, it is like that gamblin’ game; we roll down through a lot o’ little pegs bobbin’ off from one to another until finally we pop into a little hole at the bottom; but we didn’t pick out that hole. No, we didn’t pick out that hole.”
So I up and asked him to tell me somethin’ about his start.
[CHAPTER SIX—A REMINISCENCE]
I pity the man who has never slept out doors in the Rocky Mountains. Swingin’ around with the earth, away up there in the starlight, he fills himself full o’ new life with every breath; and no matter how tough the day has been, he is bound to wake up the next mornin’ plumb rested, and with strength and energy fair dancin’ through his veins. For it to be perfect, a feller has to have a pipe, a fire, and some one close and chummy to chat with. This night me an’ the Friar both went down to the crick and washed our feet. We sat on a log side by side and made noises like a flock of bewildered geese when we first stuck our feet into the icy water; but by the time we had raced back and crawled into his bed, we were glowin’ all over.
We didn’t cover up right away, because the Friar just simply couldn’t seem to get sleepy that night; and after a minute he put some more wood on the fire, filled his pipe again, and said: “So you want me to tell you about my story, huh? Well, I believe I will tell you about my boyhood.”
So I filled my pipe, and we lay half under the tarp with our heads on our hands and our elbows on our boots, which were waitin’ to be pillows, and he told me about the early days, talkin’ more to himself than to me.
“My mother died when I was six years old, my father divided his time between cleanin’ out saloons, beatin’ me, an’ livin’ in the work-house,” began the Friar, and it give me kind of a shock. I’d had a notion that such-like kids wasn’t likely to grow up into preachers; and I’d allus supposed ’at the Friar had had a soft, gentle youth. “I was a tough, sturdy urchin,” he went on, “but I allus had a soft heart for animals. I used to fight several times a day; but mostly because the other kids used to stone cats and tie tin cans on dogs’ tails. I used to shine shoes, pass papers, run errands, and do any other odd job for a few pennies, and at night I slept wherever I could. I had a big dry-goods-box all to myself for several months, once, and I still look back to it as being a fine, comfortable bedroom.
“One morning I was down at the Union Depot when a farmer drove up a big Norman hoss hitched to a surrey. Some o’ the other kids joshed him, called the hoss an elephant and asked where the rest o’ the show was. The man was big, well fed, and comfortable lookin’, same as the hoss, and he didn’t pay any heed to the kids except to call one of ’em up to hold the hoss while he went into the depot. The kid wanted to know first what he was goin’ to be paid, and he haggled so long ’at the farmer beckoned to me to come up. ‘Will you hold my hoss for me a few minutes?’ he asked.
“That big gray hoss with the dark, gentle eyes seemed to me one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen, and I was mighty anxious to have charge of him, even for a few minutes; so I sez, ‘You bet I will.’
“The other kids roasted me and made all manner o’ sport; but they knew I would fight ’em if they got too superfluous, so after a bit they went on about their business. The’s somethin’ about man’s love for a hoss that’s a little hard to understand. I had never had no intimate dealin’s with one before, yet somethin’ inside me reached out and entwined itself all about this big, gray, velvet-nosed beauty left in my charge. I reckon it must be in a man’s blood; that’s the only explanation I can find. All the way back along the trail o’ history we find the bones of men and hosses bleachin’ together in the same heap; and about every worthwhile spot on the face o’ nature has been fought over on hossback, so it’s small wonder if the feel of a hoss has got to be part of man’s nature.
“The farmer had had a woman and a little girl in his care, to see off on the train, and he was gone some time. I had a few pennies in my pocket, and I bought an apple an’ fed it to the hoss, gettin’ more enjoyment out of it than out of airy other apple I’d ever owned. I can feel right now the strange movin’s inside my breast as his moist nose sniffed at my fingers and his delicate lips picked up the bits of apple, as careful an’ gentle as though my rough, dirty little hand had been made o’ crystal.
“I was so interested in the hoss that I gave a start of surprise when the farmer’s voice behind me sez: ‘You seem to like hosses, son.’
“‘I hadn’t no idee ’at a great big one like this could be so smooth an’ gentle,’ I said, with my hand rubbin’ along the hoss’s throat. ‘I think he’s a wonder.’
“‘Do you like other animals?’ asked the farmer.
“‘I reckon I must be an animal myself,’ sez I, ‘because I allus get along well with them, while I have to fight a lot with humans.’
“‘What do you want for tendin’ to this hoss?’ he asked me.
“‘I don’t want nothin’,’ sez I. ‘We’ve got to be friends, an’ I don’t charge nothin’ for doin’ favors for a friend. Besides, he’s got so much sense, I doubt if he needs much watchin’.’
“The farmer grinned, looked into my eyes a long time, and gave me a dollar. ‘Now tell me how you’ll spend your dollar,’ sez he.
“Well, I was purty well floored. I had never owned a dollar before in my whole life, my father havin’ taken away every cent he had ever found on me; and I stood lookin’ at the coin, and hardly knowin’ what to do. The farmer stood lookin’ down at me with his eyes twinklin’, and after a minute, I handed the dollar back to him. ‘This is too much,’ I sez. ‘A dime would be plenty for the job, even if I didn’t like the hoss; but if my old man would find a dollar on me, he’d give me a beatin’ for hidin’ it from him, take it away, get drunk, and then give me another beatin’ for not havin’ another dollar.’
“So he asked me all about my father; and I told about him and about my mother bein’ dead, and the twinkle left his eyes and they grew moist, so ’at he had to wink mighty fast.
“He told me that his own boy was dead and his girl married, and that the’ wasn’t any children out at the big farm, and asked me if I wouldn’t like to come and live with him. He told me about all the hosses an’ the cows an’ the pigs, an’ that I could have a clean little room to sleep in, an’ plenty o’ food and clothes, and could go to school. It sounded like a fairy tale to me, and I sez, ‘Aw go on, you’re just joshin’ me’; but he meant it; so I got on the seat beside him, and as soon as we got out o’ town he let me drive the big gray hoss—and I entered into a real world more wonderful than any fairy tale ever was.
“When we drove up the shady lane and into the big barn lot, a little old lady with sad eyes came to the door, and sez: ‘Now, John, who is that with you?’ and my heart sank, for I thought she wasn’t goin’ to stand for me; but he took me by the hand and led me up to the door, put his arm about the little woman’s shoulder, and sez with a tremble in his voice: ‘This here is a little feller I’ve brought out to be company for ya, mother. He hasn’t any folks, and he is fond of animals, and, and—his name is John, too.’
“At first she shook her head and shut her lips tight; but all of a sudden the tears came to her eyes, and she put her arms about me—and I had found a real home.
“Those were wonderful years, Happy, wonderful; and I have the satisfaction o’ knowin’ that I did them about as much good as they did me. Their hearts had been wrapped up in the boy, and he must have been a fine feller; but just when he had been promoted out o’ the grammar grade at the head of his class, he had took the scarlet fever an’ died. I wasn’t used to kindness when I went there; so I never noticed ’at they kept me out o’ the inner circle o’ their hearts at first. I called the little woman Mrs. Carmichael for some time; but one day after I’d brought home a good report from school, I called her this, and she spoke to me sharp—I never knew any soft-hearted person in the world who got so much solid satisfaction out of actin’ cross as she did. Well, she spoke to me sharp, and sez: ‘John Carmichael, why don’t you call me Mother?’
“I looked into her face, and it didn’t look old any longer, and the sad look had left her eyes, and they were black and snappy an’ full o’ life; so I tried it; and we both broke into tears, but they were tears o’ joy; and then he insisted that I call him Dad, and we became a family; and about the happiest one in the world, I reckon.
“I rode the hosses bareback, shot hawks with my rifle, picked berries, did a lot o’ chores, and worked hard with my books. It was a full, round life with lots of love and happiness in it, and I grew, body and mind and spirit, as free and natural as the big oak trees in the woods pasture.
“Mr. Carmichael had looked up my blood father and had done what he could for him; but it was no use, and one winter’s morning he was found frozen in an alley. I didn’t learn of it until the next June when he took me down to the city cemetery where my father and mother lay side by side. I did feel downcast as we all do in the presence of death; but it wasn’t my real father and mother who were lyin’ there beneath the quiet mounds. Fatherhood and motherhood are somethin’ more than mere physical processes. The real fathers and mothers are those who put the best part o’ their lives into makin’ the big, gloomy world into a tender home for all the little ones; and after my visit to the graveyard I felt drawn even closer to Dad and Mother than I had before.
“Children ought to have dogs and hosses and plenty of air and soil about ’em, Happy. We don’t learn from preachin’, we learn from example; and we can learn a heap from the animals. We talk about our sanitary systems; but we allus mean the sanitary systems outside our bodies. Now, the animals have sanitary systems, but they are inside their own skins, where they rightly belong. Look at the beautiful teeth of a dog—These come from eatin’ proper food at the proper time and in proper quantities. If a dog isn’t hungry, the dog won’t eat. If a child isn’t hungry, it is fed candy in a lot o’ cases, and this is downright wicked. Of course the animals find it hard to live, crowded up the way man allus fixes things; but as a rule animals are temperate and clean, patient and honest, wise and strong; and I wish we’d use ’em more as instructors for the young. Most mothers think a dog’s tongue is dirty—Why, a dog’s tongue is chemically clean, and healin’ in its action; while the human mouth is generally poisonous—ask a dentist.
“And a cow’s breath, after she has rolled in with sweetly solemn dignity from the clover field—Ah, that’s a pleasant memory! I’ll venture to say ’at mighty few monarchs have been as worthy o’ bein’ kissed before breakfast, as Nebukaneezer was while he was undergoin’ punishment for his sins. I had gone to that farm with my soul all stunted and gnarly; but it straightened out and shot its little stems up toward the blue, the same as the stalks o’ corn did.
“All I had as a start was a love of animals; and this is why I allus try to find the one soft spot in a man’s nature—Even if it’s a secret vice, it is something to work on. This is what makes such a problem of Tyrrel Jones. I can’t find out a single soft place in him; but I’m goin’ to get into the heart of him yet, if I can find the way.
“Well, Dad and Mother passed away within a week of each other a short time after I had been graduated. I had made up my mind to stay on the farm with ’em as long as they stayed; although all sorts of voices were callin’ to me from the big outer world; but their daughter lived in the city, and had been weaned away from the farm, so she sold it, and I started on my pilgrimage.
“They had left me an income of three hundred and fifty dollars a year; and I determined to go to college. When I thought of how rich and full my own life had been made, after its stunted beginning, I wanted to do all I could to make the whole earth like that farm had been, and it seemed to me that the best way was to become a priest of the Lord. I tried my best; but I have been consid’able of a failure, Happy. Now, I hardly know where I stand. I am sort of an outcast now, and just doing what seems best on my own hook.
“A lot of my ideals have been lost, a lot of my hopes have faded, a lot of my work has seemed like sweeping back the waves of the sea; but for all I have lost, new things have taken their place, and I have never lost my faith in the Lord. Now, I am weak in doctrine and a stranger to dogma; and the things for which I fight with all my soul and heart and strength, are kindliness and decency.
“As long as one bein’ in the world is cold or hungry or diseased, every other bein’ is liable to become hungry and cold and diseased. What I am fighting for is a world without poverty. Most o’ the ills of life spring from poverty, and poverty is the result of selfishness and greed. The earth is reeking with riches, but its bounty is not divided fairly.
“Happy, if I could only hold up the Lord, so that all men might see the beauty and fullness of Him, the glory and grandeur of His simple life and His majestic self-sacrifice, the fleeting cheapness of material things would sink to their real value, and we would all become one great family, workin’ together in peace and contentment. Now, go on to sleep.”
It was purty late by this time sure enough, and I fell asleep soon after this; but I awakened durin’ the night and found myself alone. It was cold when I stuck my nose out from under the tarp, but it was a wonderful night, clear and still, with the stars swingin’ big and bright just above my reach.
As I lay there, I heard Friar Tuck singin’ softly to himself out where the trail dipped down into the valley:
“The night is dark, and I am far from home,
Lead Thou me on!
Keep Thou my feet: I do not ask to see
The distant scene,—one step enough for me.”
I had never heard his voice so wonderfully beautiful before; but, my stars, the sadness of it made me choke! It wasn’t just a song, it was a cry; and I knew that it came from a lonely, bleedin’ heart. I put my head under the covers again, puzzlin’ over what was on his mind; but first thing I knew I was awakened by the glad voice of the old Friar Tuck, singin’ his favorite mornin’ hymn: “Brightest and best of the sons of the morning”; so I cooked breakfast, and he went his way, and I went mine.
[CHAPTER SEVEN—HORACE WALPOLE BRADFORD]
The Diamond Dot, while it was about the idealest ranch in the West from most standpoints, was run a little loose. Jabez didn’t have any luxurious tastes, and he wasn’t miserly; so he didn’t strain things down to the last penny—not by a whole lot. All he asked was to have his own way and be comfortable; and so he allus kept more punchers ’n he had actual need of, and unless they got jubilant over imposin’ on him, he just shut his eyes and grinned about it.
Takin’ his location and outfit into account, and he just simply couldn’t help but make money; so we all had a fairly easy time of it and grew tender feelin’s, the same as spoiled children; which is why we sometimes quit, for we never had any other excuse for it.
Barbie was a notice-takin’ child, if ever the’ was one; and she stood out for company as a general and standin’ order. Company didn’t affect ol’ Cast Steel one way or the other; they were just the same to him as a couple o’ hundred head o’ ponies, more or less; and so the news got out that we allus had a lot of extra beds made up and any one was welcome to stretch out in ’em who wanted to. The result o’ this was, ’at we drew visitors as easy as molasses draws flies. I lived at the home house on account o’ bein’ Barbie’s pal, and so I got into the habit o’ bein’ a sort of permanent reception committee. Some o’ these visitors was a plague to me; but Jabez didn’t like to run any risk of havin’ ’em ruined beyond repair, so it was generally understood that I had to use ex-treme caution when I started in to file the clutch off their welcome.
This spring ’at I have in mind, we had as visitor one o’ the easternest dudes I was ever tangled up with. He came out for his health, which is the excuse most of ’em gives; but this one took more ways of avoidin’ health ’n airy other of ’em I ever saw. He smoked cigars all day long, big black ones, strong enough to run a sawmill, he ate fattenin’ food from mornin’ till night, and when he drove out in the buckboard to take his exercise, he suffered from what he called fatigue. He used to sit up as wide awake as an owl till along about ten every night; and half the time he didn’t crawl out until near seven in the mornin’. He certainly was a pest!
What he complained of most, was his nerves; and he’d sit for hours, talkin’ about ’em to anything ’at had ears. He said the worst of it was, he couldn’t sleep nights. I had, of course, heard o’ nerves before ever I saw him; but I had never heard of ’em turnin’ to and devilin’ a man, the way his did; so at first I was honestly interested, and asked him all I could think up about ’em; but after a day or so, I’d ’a’ been perfectly willin’ to put up the coin out o’ my own pocket to have him go to a dentist and have every last one of his nerves pulled.
I don’t begrudge sympathy to any afflicted individual; but the more I sympathized with this feller, the more affectionate toward me he got; and he used to trot about after me, warbilin’ out dirges about his nerves until I was tempted to tie a stone around his neck and lose him down the cistern.
He ran to language, too, this one did. His conversation was so full of it that a feller could scarcely understand what he was tryin’ to say. He was ferociously interested in the ancient Greeks; and if a man succeeded in wedgin’ him away from his nerves, he began immediate to discourse about these ancient Greeks. Now, I didn’t have a single thing again’ any o’ these ancient Greeks before this Dude struck us, none of ’em ever havin’ crossed my trail before; but they sure did have a rotten outfit o’ names, and they were the most infernal liars ’at ever existed. Three-headed dogs, and women with snakes for hair, were as common in their tales as thieves among the Sioux. Barbie didn’t have any use for this Eastener either; so I decided to fit him out with a deep-rooted desire for home influences.
I took ol’ Tank Williams into my confidence, he bein’ the most gruesome lookin’ creature we had in our parts. He was a big man of curious construction and he had one eye which ran wild. Tank never knew what this free eye was up to; and while he would be examinin’ the ground, the free eye would be gazin’ up at a tree as intent as though he had set it to watch for a crow. Durin’ his younger days, Tank had formed the habit of indulgin’ in gang fights as much as possible, and all of his features had been stampeded out o’ their natural orbits; but this free eye beat anything I ever see.
They had him down on his back one time, and he was gnawin’ away contentedly at some feller’s thumb, when the feller reached up his trigger finger and scooped out Tank’s eye. The shape and color weren’t hurt a bit; but some o’ the workin’ parts got disconnected, so that he couldn’t see with it; but it appeared to be full as good an eye as the one he looked with.
All the sleep Tank ever wanted was six hours out o’ the twenty-four, and he didn’t care how he got ’em—ten minutes at a time, or all in one lump. He could sleep sittin’ up straight, or ridin’, or stretched out in bed, or most any way. I think he could sleep while walkin,’ though I was never able to surprise him at it. He agreed to back me up, and Spider Kelley also said he was willin’ to do everything in his power to furnish our guest some pleasant recollections after he’d gone back to a groove which fitted him better.
As soon as I began to plan my trip, I started to rehearse curious secrets about Tank to the Eastener, whose name was Horace Walpole Bradford. I told Horace that Tank had a case o’ nerves which made his ’n seem like a bundle of old shoe-laces; and that if something wasn’t done for him soon, I feared he was goin’ to develop insanity. I said that even now, it wasn’t safe to contrary him none, and that I’d be a heap easier in my own mind if Tank was coralled up in a cell somewhere, with irons on.
I didn’t tell Tank what sort of a disposition I was supplyin’ him with for fear he’d overdo it. Tank didn’t know a nerve from an ingrowin’ hair; but when he and Horace paired off to tell each other their symptoms, I’ll have to own up that his tales of anguish an’ sufferin’ made Horace’s troubles sound like dance music.
I told Horace that a trip through the mountains would soothe and invigorate him, until he’d be able to sleep, hangin’ by his toes like a bat; but the trouble was to find something which interested him enough to lure him on the trip. There was a patent medicine almanac at the place, and I studied up its learnin’ until I had it at my tongue’s end, and I also used a lot o’ Friar Tuck’s health theories; so that I got Horace interested enough to talk my eardrums callous; but not enough to take the trip.
I didn’t know much about nerves; but I was as familiar with sleep as though I had graduated from eleven medical colleges, and I knew if he would just follow my directions, it would give him such an appetite for slumber that he’d drop into it without rememberin’ to close his eyelids. Ol’ Jabez happened to mention an Injun buryin’ ground with the members reposin’ on top o’ pole scaffolds, and this proved to be the bait. Horace wanted to see this, and it was a four days’ drive by buckboard; so I heaved a sigh o’ relief and prepared to do my duty.
When all was ready, we packed our stuff in the good buckboard, putting in an extra saddle for the accident we felt sure was goin’ to happen. Spider started as driver, while I rode behind, leadin’ a horse with Tank’s saddle on, though Horace thought it was Spider’s. We had told him that it made our backs ache to ride in a buckboard all day, so we would change off once in a while. Horace wanted to do the drivin’ himself; but we pointed out that he wasn’t used to our kind o’ roads, and consequently favored the little hills too much. He was inhumanly innocent, and it was almost like feedin’ a baby chalk and water.
We trotted along gentle, until the rear spring came loose goin’ down a little dip to a dry crick bed, about ten miles out. We talked it over and decided ’at the best plan would be for Spider to drive back and get the old buckboard; so after unloadin’ our stuff, I took the tap out o’ my pocket, fixed the spring, tied a rope about it to deceive Horace, and Spider drove back for the old buckboard which had been discarded years before, but which we had fixed up for this trip and painted until it looked almost safe to use.
Before long we saw the buckboard comin’ back; but much to our surprise, Tank Williams was drivin’ it, an’ givin’ what he thought was the imitation of a nervous man. He would stand up an’ yell, crack his mule-skinner, and send the ponies along on a dead run. He came up to us, and said that he had had an attack o’ nerves, hadn’t slept a wink the night before; and when Spider Kelley had refused to let him go in his place, he had torn him from the seat an’ had trampled him.
“I trampled him,” sez Tank solemnly, his free eye lookin’ straight into the sun. “I hope I didn’t destroy him; but in my frenzy I trampled him.”
Horace looked worried. “Tank,” sez I soothin’ly, “we don’t really need any one else along. You just help us to load, an’ then go back, like a good feller.”
Tank stood up on the seat, an’ held the whip ready. “My life depends on me takin’ this trip!” he yelled. “My life depends on it; it depends on it, I tell you. My life depends on me takin’ this trip!”
He went on repeatin’ about his life dependin’ on his takin’ that trip, until I made a sign to Horace, and said ’at we’d better let him go along. Horace wasn’t ambitious to be trampled; so he concluded to concur, an’ climbed into the seat beside Tank. Any one else would ’a’ noticed that it was Tank’s saddle on the hoss I was leadin’; but Horace never noticed anything which wasn’t directly connected with his own body. He didn’t even have any idee that the sun had set habits in the matter o’ risin’ an’ settin’—which was another fact I had took into account.
We were drivin’ four broncs to the buckboard, an’ they was new to the game and in high spirits. Tank was also in high spirits, an’ we went at a clip which was inspirin’, even to sound nerves. We did our level best to give Horace somethin’ real to worry about, an’ from the very start his nerves was so busy handin’ in idees an’ sensations that his mind was took up with these instead of with the nerves themselves as was usual.
Well, we sure had a delightful ride that afternoon: every time ’at Horace would beseech Tank to be more careful in swingin’ around down-hill curves, Tank would seize him by the arm with his full squeezin’ grip, an’ moan: “It’s my nerves, my pore nerves. This is one o’ the times when I’m restive, I got to have action; my very life depends on it! Whoop, hit ’em up—Whee!” an’ he’d crack his mule-skinner about the ears o’ the ponies, an’ we’d have another runaway for a spell.
Horace hadn’t the mite of an idee in which direction he was travelin’; all he did was to hang on and hope. The confounded buckboard was tougher ’n we had figured on, and it didn’t bust until near dark. As they went up the slope, I could see the left hind wheel weavin’ purty rapid, an’ as they tore down the grade to Cottonwood Crick, things began to creak an’ rattle most threatenin’. We had decided to camp on the crick, an’ Tank swung up his team with a flourish. The hind wheel couldn’t stand the strain, an’ when it crumbled, Horace, an’ the rest o’ the baggage, whip-crackered off like a pinwheel. Of course when one wheel went, the others dished in company, an’ the whole thing was a wreck.
The ponies were comfortable weary, an’ after I had roped one an’ the rest had fallen over him, we soothed ’em down without much trouble, an’ started to make camp. Horace was all in, an’ was minded to sit on his shoulder blades an’ rest; but this wasn’t part o’ the plan, an’ we made him hustle like a new camp-boy. As soon as supper was over, he lit a cigar, an’ prepared to take a rest. We had decided that those big, black cigars wasn’t best for his nerves, so we had smuggled out the box, an’ had worked a little sulphur into all but the top row. He lit his cigar and gave us one apiece, but he was so sleepy he couldn’t keep his on fire; and it was comical to watch him.
Every time he’d nod off, Tank would utter an exclamation, an’ walk up an’ down, rubbin’ his hands an’ cussin’ about his nerves. Horace was dead tired from bein’ jounced about on the buckboard all day; but he was worried about Tank, an’ this would wake him effectual.
About ten o’clock I sez: “Tank, what happened that night when you got nervous up in the Spider Water country?”
“Oh, don’t ask me, don’t ask me,” sez Tank, gittin’ up an’ walkin’ off into the darkness.
“I wish to glory he hadn’t come along,” I sez to Horace. “I fear we’re goin’ to have trouble; but chances are that a good night’s rest’ll quiet him, all right.”
Purty soon Tank came back, lit his pipe, an’ sat facin’ Horace with his lookin’ eye, an’ everything else in the landscape with his free one. “You know how it is with nerves,” he sez to Horace. “You perhaps, of all them I have ever met up with, know how strained and twisted nerves fill a man’s heart with murder, set his teeth on edge and put the taste of blood in his throat; so I’m goin’ to tell the whole o’ that horrid experience, which I have never yet confided to a livin’ soul before. Have you got a match?”
Tank’s pipe allus went out at the most interestin’ times; and he couldn’t no wise talk without smokin’. We all knew this; so whenever Tank got headed away on a tale, we heaved questions at him, just to see how many matches we could make him burn. He’d light a match and hold it to his pipe; but he allus lit off an idee with the match, and when he’d speak out the idee, he’d blow out the match. Or else he’d be so took up by his own talkin’, he’d hold the match until it burnt his fingers; then, without shuttin’ off his discourse, he’d moisten the fingers on his other hand, take the burnt end of the match careful, and hold it until it was plumb burnt up, without ever puttin’ it to his pipe. I didn’t want to waste matches on this trip so I told Horace to hand Tank his cigar. Horace had already wasted two cigars, besides the ones he had given us; and I wanted him to get to the sulphur ones as soon as convenient.
Tank’s mind was preoccupied with the tale we had made up; so he took Horace’s fresh cigar, lit his pipe by it, threw the cigar into the fire, and said moodily: “He was unobligin’. Yes, that cross-grained old miner was unobligin’. Of course, I wouldn’t have done it if I hadn’t been nervous; but I say now, as I’ve allus thought, that he brought it on himself by bein’ unobligin’.”
Tank’s gloomy tones had wakened Horace up complete; and as he started to light another cigar, I got ready for bed. “You two have already got nerves,” I sez to ’em; “but I don’t want to catch ’em, so I’ll sleep alone, and you can bunk together.” I unrolled my tarp close to the fire and crawled into it, intendin’ to take my rest while I listened to Tank unfold his story.
It was a clean, fresh night, just right for sleepin’; and it almost seemed a shame to put that innocent little Eastener through his treatment; but it was for his own good so I stretched out with a sigh o’ content, and looked at the other two by the fire.
Horace was short and fat around the middle with stringy arms and legs. He wore some stuff he called side-burns on his face. They started up by his ears, curved along his jaws and were fastened to the ends of his stubby mustache. He kept ’em cropped short and, truth to tell, they were an evil-lookin’ disfigurement, though he didn’t seem to feel a mite o’ shame at wearin’ ’em. His face was full o’ trouble, and yet he was so sleepy he had to hitch his eyebrows clear up to his hair to keep his eyes open. Tank’s face never did have what could rightly be called expressions. His features used to fall into different kinds o’ convulsions; but they were so mussed up it was impossible to read ’em. I looked at these two a minute, and then I had to pull my head under the tarp to keep from laughin’.
[CHAPTER EIGHT—A CASE OF NERVES]
“I was all alone,” sez Tank. “I had been up in the Spider Water country lookin’ for a favorite ridin’ pony; but my hoss broke a leg, and I packed my saddle and stuff on my head until my nerves began to swell. Then I threw the stuff away and hunted for a human. I roamed for weeks without comin’ across a white man, and my nerves got worse an’ worse. You know how it is with nerves; how they set up that dull ache along the back o’ your spinal cord until you get desperate, and long to bite and scratch and tear your feller-bein’s to pieces—well, I had ’em worse this time ’n ever I had ’em before; and they loosened up my brain-cells until my self-control oozed out and I longed to fling myself over a cliff. Have you got a match?”
Horace passed over his fresh cigar, and Tank lit his pipe and tossed this cigar into the fire also. Horace looked at it sadly for a moment; but he was game, and lit another.
“Finally,” sez Tank, “I came upon a lonely cabin at the bottom of a gorge; and in it was a little man who was minin’ for gold. He was about your build, except that toilin’ with pick and shovel had distributed his meat around to a better advantage, and he wore his whiskers complete, without any patch scraped off the chin. It was just night when I reached the cabin, and he invited me in to eat; which I am free to say I did until I was stuffed up to my swaller, and then we prepared to sleep.
“Now, a feller would nachely think I’d ’a’ gone right to sleep; but instead o’ this, my nerves began to twist an’ squirm an’ gnaw at me until I was almost beside myself; and after fightin’ it for several hours, I woke up the miner, and asked him as polite as a lady, if he wouldn’t rub my brow for a few minutes. Seems like when I’m nervous, the’ won’t nothin’ soothe me so quick as to have my brow rubbed; but this little coyote refused pointblank to do it.
“I finally got down on my knees and begged him to; but he still refused. He said he had fed me six meals at once and given me shelter, and this was as far as he’d go if my confounded nerves exploded and blew the place up. I was meek about it, I tried my best to ward off trouble; but just then a nerve up under my ear gave a wrench which twisted me all out o’ shape, and I lost patience. I seized that little cuss by the beard and I yanked him out on the floor, and I said to him—”
Tank had once been unusual gifted in framin’ up bright-colored profanity, but he had been shuttin’ down on it since the night he had helped to fake the hold-up on the Friar, and I thought he had lost the knack. This night, though, he seemed to find a spiritual uplift in tellin’ to Horace exactly what he had said to the lonely miner. Before he finished this part, he had used up all of Horace’s good cigars, as lighters, and the Eastener’s face had turned a palish blue. I’d be willin’ to bet that Tank made the swearin’ record that night; though of course, the’ ain’t any way to prove it.
When Tank couldn’t think of any new combinations, he covered his face and broke into tears. Horace sat and looked at him with his eyes poppin’ out. “Don’t you think you could go to sleep?” he asked after a bit.
“Sleep!” yelled Tank. “Sleep? I doubt if I ever do sleep again. I feel worse right now ’n I did that night in the gorge.”
“What did you finally do that time?” asked Horace.
“I hate to think of it,” sez Tank; and he put his elbows on his knees, his chin in his hands, and stared into the fire as though seein’ ghosts.
Horace watched him a while, and then he lit a cigar out of the second layer. He took one puff and then removed the cigar and stared at it. He tried another puff, and then threw it into the fire, where it spluttered up in a blue flame. He tried six more, and then said somethin’ I couldn’t quite catch and threw the whole box into the fire; while Tank continued to stare into it as though he had forgot the’ was any one else on earth.
“Let’s go to bed,” sez Horace.
“Have you got a match?” sez Tank, lookin’ around with a start. Horace took a burnin’ stick from the fire, and Tank lit his pipe with it; and from that on Horace kept a lighted stick handy.
“How in thunder did you get to sleep that night in the gorge?” demanded Horace, who was gettin’ impatient.
“Well,” sez Tank, “after I had told this unobligin’ little cuss exactly what I thought of him, he pulled out a gun and tried to shoot me—actually tried to shoot me in his own cabin, where I was his guest. My feelin’s were hurt worse ’n they’d ever been hurt before; but still I tried to calm myself; and if it hadn’t been for my nerves, I’d have gone out into that gorge in the dead o’ night, and never set eyes on his evil face again; but I couldn’t get control of myself, so I took his gun away from him and knocked him down with it. When he regained consciousness, he was in a repentant mood; and he consented to rub my head.
“He rubbed my head a while an’ I sank into a dreamless, health-given repose; but as soon as I was asleep, the traitorious sneak crept out an’ started to run. I fled after him as swift as I could, an’ caught him about two A. M. I had to twist his arms to make him come back with me; but when I had once got him back to the shack, I tied him good an’ tight, an’ made him rub my brow again. When he’d rub slow an’ gentle, I’d sleep peaceful an’ quiet; but the minute he’d quit, why, I’d wake up again; so he rubbed an’ rubbed an’ rubbed”—Tank smoothed his left hand gentle with his right, an’ spoke slow an’ whispery—“an’ I slept an’ slept an’ slept an’—”
The darn cuss said it so soothin’ an’ natural, that hanged if I didn’t fall asleep myself, though the last I remember, I was bitin’ my lips so I could stay awake an’ see the fun. I must have been asleep full an hour before I was woke up by Tank’s voice, raised in anger. I stuck my nose out o’ the tarp, an’ there was Tank kneelin’ straddle o’ the other bed which he had rolled up in the shape of a man. Horace was standin’ close by with his hands on his hips an’ lookin’ altogether droopy.
“I raised his head from the floor, like this,” said Tank, illustratin’ with the bed, “an’ then I beat it down on the planks o’ the floor; an’ then I raised it up again, an’ then I beat it down, an’ then I raised it up—”
I had to stuff a corner o’ the soogan into my mouth to keep from laughin’ out loud at the expression in Horace’s eyes; but Tank kept raisin’ that poor head an’ beatin’ it down again for so long that I fell asleep again without intendin’ to.
The next time I woke up Horace was speakin’. He was so earnest about it that at first I thought he had been weepin’; but he was simply tryin’ to make his voice winnin’ an’ persuadish.
“I’ll rub it,” he sez. “I’ll rub it soft an’ gentle, just like you say you want it rubbed. Come on, let me rub it.” I looked at Tank with his free eye rollin’ about as though it was follerin’ the antics of a delirious mosquito; and I’d just about as soon have rubbed the brow of a porcupine; but Horace was all perked up with sympathy.
“No,” sez Tank, sadly. “You’re a guest, an’ it wouldn’t be polite. If you was a stranger, now, why, I’d choke your heart out but what I made you rub it; but not a guest. No, I couldn’t do that. I’d wake Happy up an’ make him rub it; but he allus sleeps with a gun under his head, an’ he’s apt to shoot before he’s full awake.”
“Well, just let me try it a while,” sez Horace.
“I’m feared to,” sez Tank, beginnin’ to weaken. “If you was to start, an’ I was to fall asleep, an’ you was to quit, I might dream ’at you was that unobligin’ man which betrayed me back in the lonely shack; an’ I might strangle you or somethin’ before I came to my senses. Nope, the best plan is just to sit an’ chat here till daylight. My nerves is allus better after sun-up.”
“I don’t think I can stay awake much longer,” sez Horace, almost whimperin’.
“What?” sez Tank in surprise. “You claim to have nerves, an’ yet you can talk o’ fallin’ asleep at this time o’ night. Great Scott, man, you ain’t got no nerves! You are as flebmatic as a horn toad. Oh, I wish I could just fall sleepy for one minute.”
“Let me try rubbin’ your brow,” sez Horace, whose eyes were blinkin’ for sleep, but whose face was all screwed up into lines of worry at what was goin’ to happen to him after he had finally give in an’ drifted off.
“Well,” sez Tank, “I’ll let you try; but if you’re already sleepy, I doubt if any good comes of it. You sit there at the head o’ the bed, an’ I’ll lay my head in your lap, an’ you rub my brow soft an’ gentle. If I do get to sleepin’ natural, why o’ course the’ won’t be no harm done in you takin’ a few winks; but for the love o’ peace, don’t sleep sound.”
I blame near choked while they were gettin’ settled, ’cause Horace was one o’ those finicky cusses, an’ Tank’s head looked like a moth-eaten buffalo robe. Finally, however, Tank stretched out with the covers up around his neck an’ his head pillowed in Horace’s lap, and then Horace began to rub his brow as soft an’ gentle as he knew how.
“You don’t do it clingy enough,” sez Tank. “You want to just rest your fingers lightly, but still have ’em draw along so ’at they’ll give a little tingle. There, that’s better. Now then, I’ll lay as quiet as I can, an’ try to go to sleep.” Tank was doin’ such an earnest job, he had plumb fooled himself into believin’ it was mostly true.
He gave a start after layin’ quiet for five or ten minutes, an’ this put Horace on edge again; but Tank didn’t wake up. Horace had a saddle blanket around his shoulders; and the last I saw just before I fell asleep, myself, was Horace gently rubbin’ Tank’s brow, an’ lookin’ down careful for a change of expression. They made a curious sight with the firelight back of ’em.
It was grayin’ up for the dawn next time I woke up; and I’d had my sleep out, but when I stuck my nose out from under the tarp, I found it purty tol’able frosty. I knew it was my duty to roust out an’ keep Horace from gettin’ more sleep ’n my treatment for his nerves called for; but I was too comfortable, to pay much heed to the still, small voice of duty. At the same time I was curious to see what my boon comrades was up to, so I stretched my neck an’ took a look at ’em.
Horace had keeled over so that his elbow rested on Tank’s chest an’ his head rested on his hand; but the other hand was still on Tank’s brow, an’ I reckon Horace must have rubbed until he didn’t care whether it was sleep or death he drew, just so he got rid o’ keepin’ awake. Tank had reached up one hand so it circled Horace’s waist; and they made the most lovable group a body ever see.
While I was still watchin’ ’em, Horace’s arm gave out, an’ he settled down on top o’ Tank’s nose. In about two minutes Tank came to with a jump, an’ heaved Horace to the foot of the bed. Tank was really startled, an’ he came to his feet glarin’. “You blame little squab, you!” he yelled. “What are you tryin’ to do—smother me?”
Horace staggered to his feet, but he couldn’t get his eyes open more ’n a narrow slit. “I didn’t do it on purpose, Mr. Williams,” he blubbled like a drunk man. “I rubbed until I thought my hand would fall off at the wrist; but I reckon I must ’a’ dropped asleep. Lie down again, an’ I’ll rub you some more.”
“Too late,” sez Tank, “too late, too late. I never can sleep while daylight’s burnin’; but still, my nerves don’t get so dangerous until after nightfall; so we’ll just turn to an’ get breakfast.”
Well, I got up after yawnin’ a few times; and after askin’ if they had had a restful night, I started to get breakfast. Horace staggered about, gettin’ wood an’ water an’ doin’ what he was able to, while Tank wrangled in the hosses.
After breakfast, which I must say for Horace, he et in able shape, we started to saddle up, puttin’ the spare saddle on the hoss I had rode the day before. “Which one o’ you is goin’ back after the other buckboard?” asked Horace.
“Why, we ain’t goin’ back at all,” sez I. “It’s full fifty miles, an’ we can’t keep switchin’ buckboards every day on a trip like this. We’ll just ride the ponies the rest o’ the way.”
“Ride?” sez Horace. “Ride!”
[CHAPTER NINE—TREATING THE CASE]
Horace started to enlarge on how much he didn’t know about ridin’; but Tank breaks in with a plea for his nerves. “Look here,” he said, scowlin’ at Horace with his good eye, while the free one rove around wild in his face, “your nerves are a little out o’ fix, an’ mine is plumb tied into knots. This here outin’ will be the best thing we can do for ourselves, an’ you got to come along. No matter which way you go, you got to ride; so the’ ain’t no sense in makin’ a fuss about it. We’ll mount you up on as gentle a cayuse as the’ is in the West; an’ we won’t tell no one if you hang on to the saddle horn goin’ down hill.”
“That’s right, Mr. Bradford,” sez I respectful. “You’d have to ride back anyway, so you might as well come on with us an’ have a pleasant outing.”
“Besides,” sez Tank, “up there in the Wind River country we stand a chance o’ gettin’ somethin’ for our nerves, if the Injuns happen to be in a good humor. Those Injun doctors know all about hurbs an’ which diseases they grow for, an’ when they’re in a good humor, they’ll sell ya some.”
“What’ll they do if they’re not in a good humor?” asked Horace.
“Well, that’s the beatin’est question I’ve yet heard!” sez Tank. “How does any one know what an Injun’ll do when he’s not in a good humor? I don’t reckon any one ever tried to learn the answer to that question. When an Injun’s not in a good humor, either you’ve got to kill him or he’ll kill you. If we hear tell ’at they’re out o’ humor, we’ll simply scurry back at the first hint, an’ don’t you forget it.”
Horace wasn’t resigned yet; so he kept sawin’ away with his questions all the time we were tyin’ on the beds an’ grub. The grass had been purty brown down below, but it was fat an’ green up above, an’ the ponies felt fine. We had picked out good ones, an’ it took some time to get ’em wore down to where they was willin’ to pack; but by seven o’clock we were ready to start, an’ then Tank lifted Horace into the saddle, while I held the pony’s head. We had chose a steady old feller for Horace, because we didn’t want any serious accidents. Ol’ Cast Steel was dead again’ sheepin’ the Easteners, an’ I knew they’d be doin’s about what we’d done already, let alone havin’ any sort of a mishap.
We told Horace just what to do to save himself, an’ we fixed his stirrups to just fit him; but he took it purty hard. It takes a ridin’-man a couple o’ weeks to harden up after he’s laid off a spell; but when a man begins to do his first ridin’ at forty, it comes ex-tremely awkward. Horace was the first feller I ever saw get sea-sick on hossback; but he certainly did have a bad attack. I suppose it was the best thing ’at could have happened to him, an’ after he was emptied out, he rode some easier. We only covered about thirty miles that day altogether, an’ Tank had plenty o’ time to get all the sleep he could use; but when he came to lift Horace down from the saddle, Horace couldn’t make his legs stiff enough to stand on.
We let him stretch out while we were makin’ camp; but he fell asleep, so we had to wake him up to help get supper. I was beginnin’ to feel sorry for him, but he had pestered us regardless about his nerves, an’ I knew ’at pity for him now would be the worse for him in the long run.
After supper, Horace spent consid’able time in bewailin’ his fate because he had got disgusted an’ thrown his whole box o’ cigars into the fire. “I’ve got an extra pipe, if you’d like to try that,” sez Tank. “It’s lots better for the nerves than cigars—though from what I can tell o’ you, you ain’t bothered much with nerves. I wish to glory I was in your skin.”
“Oh, man,” sez Horace, “you can’t imagine how I suffer. I ache like a sore tooth all over, an’ it gives me a cute pain just to sit here on the grass.”
“Sit on the saddle-blankets,” sez Tank, sympathetic. As soon as Horace had piled up the blankets an’ sat down on ’em, groanin’ most bitter, Tank sez with feelin’: “Gee, how I envy you. You have nothin’ but a few muscle-aches and chafed skin an’ such, while my nerves is beginnin’ to threaten me again. I’m not goin’ to bother either o’ you fellers, though. I’m goin’ to have you tie me to a tree to-night if I can’t sleep.”
Horace filled the pipe, which was an ancient one, bitter as gall; but when he began to smoke, his face became almost satisfied. The pipe was purty well choked up, so that he had some bother in keepin’ it goin’, but after we’d run a grass stem through it, it worked purty well, an’ we was right sociable until along about nine o’clock, when I got sleepy, myself. Then Tank began to worry about his nerves. Horace had about forgot his own nerves, he was sufferin’ so from Tank’s.
When we see that Horace couldn’t keep awake any longer without bein’ tortured, Tank began to carry on fiercer. He rumpled up his hair, gave starts an’ jerks, but the thing ’at worked best, was just to sit an’ look at his fingers, an’ pick at ’em. He’d form a circle with his left thumb and forefinger, then poke his right finger through this circle and try to grab it with his right hand before it could back out. It was the craziest thing I’d ever seen; but before long Horace got to tryin’ it himself. While Tank was lookin’ at his fingers with his good eye, the free one rambled around, an’ half the time it rested on Horace, an’ fair gave him the creeps; but when I couldn’t stay awake myself, I gave Tank the sign, an’ he got delirious.
“I can’t sleep,” he wailed, “I can’t sleep! My nerves, oh, my nerves! One minute they’re like hot wires, an’ the next they’re like streaks of ice. You’ll have to tie me up, boys, you certainly will have to tie me up.”
I argued again’ it as bein’ inhuman; but Tank begged so that finally I gave in, an’ we tied him to a down pine tree. Horace helped to tie him, an’ he sure did his best to make a good job of it. I was a little doubtful, myself, about Tank gettin’ loose; but he had blowed up his muscles, an’ he coughed me the all-right signal, so me an’ Horace turned in.
Horace groaned consid’able while stretchin’ out; but he began to snore before I had got through findin’ the soft place. When I first go to bed, I like to roll about a bit, an’ stretch, an’ loosen up my muscles—I like to stay awake long enough to feel the tired spots sink down again’ the earth, an’ sort o’ ooze into it; and before I had drifted off, Horace was buzzin’ away at a log in great shape.
I must ’a’ slept an hour when I was wakened by a bright light, an’ lookin’ out, I saw Tank Williams standin’ with his back to the fire an’ glowerin’ down at Horace. “As soon as this log burns off, I’m goin’ to get you,” sez Tank between set teeth.
“What are you goin’ to get me for?” asked Horace. “You asked me to tie you to it. I didn’t want to tie you to it, but you insisted. I’ll untie you if you want me to, and rub your brow again.”
“It’s too late,” muttered Tank. “It’s too infernal late. Nothin’ could put me to sleep now. As soon as this log burns off, I’m goin’ to get you. You was the one which brought back my nerve trouble, an’ you are the one what has to suffer.”
Tank hadn’t been able to free himself from the pine tree; so he had dragged it in an’ across the fire. It wasn’t such a big one as trees go; but it was a mighty big one for a man, tied to it as he was, to tote along. Horace reasoned with him a while longer, an’ then when he saw that the trunk was about burned through, he got purty well off to one side, an’ threw a chunk at me. I popped out of bed on the instant, an’ began to shoot about promiscuous; so as to live up to my reputation.
When I’d emptied my gun, I looked at Tank, as though seein’ him for the first time, an’ sez: “What in thunder da you mean, by raisin’ all this havoc?”
“My nerves,” sez Tank, “my pore nerves. I can’t sleep, an’ I can’t keep my senses if I’m left tied to this tree any longer. It’s all his fault, an’ as soon as this log burns up, I’m goin’ ta hunt him down.”
Tank an’ I argued fierce as long as we could think of anything to say; an’ just as the dead pine was gettin’ too hot for Tank to stand it any longer, Horace calls in from the darkness, “Don’t you want me to rub your brow a while an’ see if that won’t put you to sleep?”
“Come in here,” I sez, cross. “This man is liable to kill himself, an’ you know more about nerves ’n I do.”
Horace crawled out from behind a big rock, came in, shiverin’ with the cold; an’ we untied Tank from the log. He had managed to get his feet loose; but his hands had been tied behind him an’ when they got cold, he couldn’t make a go of it. “Well,” sez I, as soon as Tank was free, “what are you goin’ to do now?”
“I move we get up the hosses, an’ start at once,” sez Tank. “I don’t trust myself any longer, an’ we can ride faster at night. My one hope, is to get to an Injun doctor, or else get so tired out that I can fall into a dreamless sleep.”
“Why don’t you ride alone?” demanded Horace with a sudden burst of intelligence. “Why don’t you ride alone; an’ then you could ride as fast as you wanted to, an’ if you found the Injuns out o’ humor, you could come back an’ let us know.”
This set us back for a minute: we had been playin’ Horace for bein’ utterly thought-loose; but he had figured out the best plan the’ was, an’ his eyes were bright an’ eager.
“Take the hoss that’s fastened on the rope here,” Horace went on; “an’ we can take the manacled hosses in the mornin’ and foller ya. Yes, that’s the best plan.”
You see the fact was, we were only twenty or twenty-five miles from the ranch house. We had been circlin’ an’ zig-zaggin’ through the hills, an’ at night we hung up Horace’s pony on a picket an’ put hobbles on the balance. Bein’ fooled on direction wasn’t any sign of Horace bein’ a complete lunkhead; I’ve known a heap o’ wise ones get balled up in the mountains.
Tank stood puzzlin’ over it with his free eye trottin’ about in a circle; but he couldn’t think any way out of it. “All right,” sez he, “if you two can get along without me, why, I’ll risk my life by bein’ a scout.”
“Nonsense,” sez Horace; “the Injuns haven’t riz for years, an’ they’re not likely to again.”
Tank only winked his lookin’ eye, an’ proceeded to fling the saddle on the picketed hoss. Horace was smilin’ purty contented with himself, until I sez: “Which hoss are you goin’ to ride to-morrow, Mr. Bradford?”
Then his face went blank as he recalled the blow-up we’d had that mornin’ gettin’ the pack ponies contented with their loads. “By Jove, I can’t ride any of them!” he exclaims. “It would kill me to have a hoss buck with me. I’m so sore now I can hardly move.”
“You don’t look as nervous as you did, though,” I sez to him for comfort.
He didn’t pay me no heed. “Here, Williams,” he calls, “you can’t take that hoss. He’s the only one I can ride, and you’ll have to catch another.”
“You ort have thought o’ that before,” sez Tank, goin’ on with his arrangements, but movin’ slow.
“Well, you two straighten it out among yourselves,” sez I. “I’m goin’ back to bed. No wonder you’re nervous. It would make a saw-horse nervous to jibe around the way you two do.”
I went off grumblin’, an’ I went to sleep before they settled it; but Tank stretched it out as much as he could, an’ Horace didn’t oversleep any that night. Next mornin’ when I looked out, I saw him tied up with his back again’ a tree, an’ Tank’s head in his lap. He was swathed in his slicker an’ saddle-blanket to keep warm, an’ was sound asleep. He looked purty well hammered out, but hanged if he didn’t look a lot more worth while ’n he did when he started to take my treatment.
It seemed a shame to do it, as it was just gettin’ into the gray; but I woke him up, an’ asked him in a whisper what he was doin’. He sat an’ blinked at me for a full minute before he remembered what or where he was, an’ then he told me that he finally induced Tank to try havin’ his head rubbed again, by lettin’ Tank truss him up so he couldn’t keel over on him. “Gee, but I’m cold an’ stiff,” he sez in a husky, raspin’ voice. “I don’t see how it can be so hot daytimes, an’ so cold nights.”
“This’ll do you a world of good, Mr. Bradford,” sez I. “You see, you swell up with the heat daytimes, an’ crimp down with the cold nights; an’ this will goad on your circulation, fry the lard out o’ ya, an’ give your nerves a chance to get toned up.” I quoted from the patent medicine almanac occasional, just so he wouldn’t forget he was takin’ treatment.
“I can’t possibly ride, to-day,” he sez, shakin’ his head. “Honest, I’m in agony.”
“That’s just ’cause you’re stiff,” sez I, kindly. “That’ll all wear off when the sun softens up your joint-oil. Why, man, you’ll look back on this trip as one o’ the brightest spots in your whole life.”
“I got hit in the back o’ the head with a golf ball once,” he flares back real angry; “an’ that showed me a lot o’ brightness, too. I don’t want no more brightness, an’ I don’t intend to ride to-day.”
I was especial pleased at the human traits he was displayin’. He hadn’t acted so healthy an’ natural since he’d been with us, an’ I was encouraged to keep on with the treatment. “You will have to ride with us, even if we have to tie you on,” I sez. “We are now close to the Injun country, an’ we’re responsible for you. O’ course the’ ain’t any danger from regular war parties; but Injun boys is just as full o’ devilment as white boys, an’ they haven’t as many safety valves. They’re all the time sneakin’ off an’ playin’ at war, an’ they play a purty stiff game, too, believe me. If a dozen o’ these voting bucks, eighteen or twenty years old, was to stalk us, they’d try most earnest to lift our hair.”
“I’d as soon be killed one way as another,” he sez. “I can’t stand it to ride, an’ that’s all the’ is to it.”
Here was a queer thing: the little cuss actually wasn’t afeared of Injuns, which I had counted on as my big card. Nerves or no nerves, Horace Walpole Bradford wasn’t no coward; ’cause we are all afeared o’ crazy folks, an’ he thought Tank was crazy. If Tank had had two good eyes, chances are he wouldn’t ’a’ feared him; so I kicked Tank in the side an’ woke him up.
[CHAPTER TEN—INJUNS!]
Well, we sure had a hard time gettin’ Horace in the saddle that day. He was some like a burro, small but strong minded. Finally he agreed to try it if we would put the saddle-blanket on top the saddle instead of underneath.
“The hoss don’t need it as bad as I do,” sez he; “’cause he’s covered all over with hoss-hide an’ has hair for paddin’ besides; and furthermore, the saddle is lined with sheepskin underneath, while it’s as hard as iron on top; and I’m just like a boil wherever I touch it.”
We told him that a hard saddle was lots the easiest as soon as a feller got used to it; but he broke in an’ said he didn’t expect to live that long, an’ that we could take our choice of leavin’ him, or puttin’ the saddle-blanket on top. The’s lots of folks with the notion that a soft saddle or a soft chair or a soft bed is the easiest; an’ it ain’t much use to argue with ’em, though the truth is, that if a feller lived on goslin’ down, he’d get stuck with a pin feather some day an’ die o’ loss of blood; while if he lived on jagged stones, he’d finally wear into ’em until he had a smooth, perfect fittin’ mold for his body. Still, the truth is only the truth to them ’at can see it; so we put the blanket on top, an’ perched Horace astride it.
He stood it two hours, an’ then said it was stretchin’ his legs so ’at he was afeared a sudden jerk would split him to the chin; an’ then we put the saddle on right, an’ he found it full as easy as it had been the day before. The best way, an’ the easiest an’ the quickest, to toughen up, is just to toughen up. The human body can stand almost anything in the way o’ hardship. After it has sent up word, hour after hour, that it is bein’ hurt, an’ no attention gets paid to it, why, it sets to work to remedy things on its own hook. In order to ride comfortable, a lot of muscles have to loosen an’ stretch. Most o’ the pain in ridin’ comes from ridin’ with set muscles. A feller can’t balance easy with set muscles, it’s just one strainin’ jerk after another, an’ the trick o’ ridin’ is to move with the horse. Just as soon as ya get to goin’ right along with the hoss, loose an’ rubbery, you take the strain off o’ both you an’ him; but while you’re bumpin’ again’ him, it’s painful for both.
We rode about forty miles that day; and at the end of it Horace wasn’t complainin’ any worse ’n at the start. Well, he couldn’t, as far as that goes; but his body had already begun to find the motion o’ the hoss. Of course he hadn’t learned to balance, an’ he still rode rigid; but we had give him an easy-gaited old hammock, an’ when we drew up to make camp, he sat on his hoss without holdin’ to the horn, an’ said he was beginnin’ to like it. When Tank lifted him down, though, his legs wobbled under him like rubber an’ he squashed down in a heap, groanin’. We let him sleep where he lit while we were gettin’ supper; ’cause we was sure he would need it before mornin’. He wasn’t nervous any longer; all he wanted was food, sleep, an’ a lung full o’ tobacco smoke. I felt rather proud o’ my treatment.
Tank had to boot him about purty freely to waken him up enough to take his vittles; but he took a good lot of ’em, an’ I was glad of it, ’cause this was the night the Injuns were goin’ to attack us, an’ he wasn’t scheduled to have any more solid nourishment until we got back to the ranch house. After supper he went to his pipe like a young duck to a puddle o’ water. He hadn’t learned to handle his moisture while smokin’ a pipe, an’ when the pipe began to gargle, he muttered a little cuss-word under his breath. H. Walpole Bradford was comin’ out wonderful.
The stiffenin’ had all blew out o’ the rim of his hat, givin’ the sun full swing at him, an’ his nose looked like a weakly tomato flung in a bed o’ geraniums. He had wrinkled up his face around where his glasses fit, an’ now with the sun gone down his skin had loosened up again, showin’ the unburned wrinkles like painted marks. He sure did look tough! He was wearin’ a gray suit with a belt around the middle an’ canvas leggins.
Along about nine o’clock he nodded over into the fire, right at the most excitin’ part of an Injun tale which Tank was makin’ up for his especial benefit. We fished him out an’ shook him awake; but he came to as cross as a hornet, an’ swore he was goin’ to sleep right where he was with all his clothes on.
“You’re a wise pigeon to sleep with your clothes on, to-night,” sez Tank; “’cause this is the Injun country, an’ ya can’t tell what’ll happen; but the best plan for us to do is to divide up an’ keep watch durin’ the night.”
“Keep watch!” yells Horace, glarin’ at Tank. “I wouldn’t keep watch to-night if I was bound to a torture stake. You can keep watch if you want to—an’ it wouldn’t discommode you no more ’n if you was an owl. Your dog-gone, doubly condemned nerves won’t let you nor any one else sleep—but I’m goin’ to get some rest if I die for it.”
“You’re a nice one, you are!” sez Tank. “This here expedition was got up just on account o’ your nerves, an’ now that we’ve come to the most important point of all, why, you flam out an’ put all the risk on us.”
“You make me tired,” sez Horace, scowlin’ at Tank as fierce as a cornered mouse. “If you’re so everlastin’ feared o’ the Injuns—what ya got this bloomin’ fire for?”
“We don’t intend to sleep near the fire, Mr. Bradford,” sez I, soothin’. “We intend to roll up our beds like as if we was in ’em an’ then sneak off into the bushes an’ sleep. We don’t want any trouble if we can avoid it. If you’ll notice, you’ll see we haven’t turned the hosses out to-night.”
“These here Injuns is livin’ on a reservation,” sez he, “an’ I don’t believe ’at they’d dare outrage us.”
I was indignant with the little cuss for not bein’ afeared of Injuns. My theory was, ’at nerves was a lot like hosses: keep a hoss shut up an’ he’ll get bad an’ kick an’ raise Cain; but take him out an’ ride his hide loose, an’ he’ll simmer down consid’able. I wanted to give Horace’s nerves such a complete stringin’ out that they wouldn’t worry him any more for a year; an’ here he was, not carin’ a hang for Injuns. “Beliefs is all right to the believers,” sez I, stiffenin’ up; “but facts is facts whether you believe in ’em or not. Every Injun outrage since the Civil War was planned on a reservation, an’ we can’t take no chances.”
While he was studyin’ over this with a pouty look on his face, Tank sez: “It’s time we fixed up an’ moved out into the dark”; so we put rolls o’ brush in the beds, an’ went on up the side o’ the rise where the’ was a level spot I knew of, Horace stumblin’ an’ grumblin’ every step o’ the way. We were about two hundred yards from the fire an’ it looked cozy an’ cheerful, dancin’ away beside the tarps. I was half a mind to join in with Horace, an’ go on back; but our plans were all laid, an’ besides, I had a little bet up with Spider Kelley, that I’d return Horace in such fine condition that he’d be willin’ to drink blood or milk a cow calf-fashion.
“You go to sleep first,” sez Tank to Horace; “I’ll watch till I get sleepy an’ then I’ll call Happy, he’ll watch two hours, an’ if it ain’t dawn by that time, he’ll call you. I may not get sleepy at all, but you know how nerves is. I stayed awake ninety-six hours once, an’ couldn’t get a speck sleepy. Then I decided to stay out the even hundred an’ see how far I could jump after stayin’ awake a hundred hours. I went to sleep in ten minutes an’ didn’t wake up for two days—so I’m liable to be took sleepy to-night.”
We had brought the slickers up, an’ Horace rolled up in one, under a low evergreen, and began to snore in half a minute. As soon as he had got to wrastlin’ with his breath in earnest, I went to the head o’ the trail an’ whistled for Spider Kelley. He an’ four others were there, an’ I told ’em it was all right to start in an hour, an’ then I came back to Horace chucklin’. Spider enjoyed anything like this, an’ he had fixed up the boys with feathers an’ fringe an’ smears o’ chalk an’ raspberry jam, till they looked as evil-minded as any Injuns I’d ever seen.
We set Horace’s watch ahead five hours. Tank curled up an’ went to sleep, an’ then I started to wake Horace up. It took so long; to get him to consciousness that I feared the hour would be up; but he finally got so he remembered what he was, an’ then I told him not to make any fuss if he saw any Injuns, but to just wake us up. I tried to get him to take one o’ my guns, but I didn’t wear triggers on ’em an’ he didn’t savvy snap-shootin’, so he took a club in his hand an’ started to parade.
He looked at his watch while I was stretchin’ out in his warm spot, an’ he looked at it again before I was through loosenin’ up my muscles. It beats the world how slow time crawls to a man on watch. I was sleepy myself, but I’d have bit out my tongue before I’d have give in. I lay half on my right side with my hat drawn down, watchin’ Horace. After about ten minutes, he pulled out his watch again an’ looked at it. He pulled out the snap to set it ahead, in order to fool us, but he was troubled with too much morality, so he snapped it shut an’ spoke to himself between his set teeth for several moments.
I reckon he must have kept on his feet for twenty minutes, an’ then he settled down with his face to the fire, which I had fed up on my way back from seein’ Spider, an’ said loud enough for me to hear: “This is all damn foolishness.”
He said it so slow an’ solemn an’ earnest, that I purt nigh choked; but I kept still, he kept still, an’ the fire kept dancin’ before him. His breathin’ grew deep an’ steady, his nerves was all coiled up comfortable; and tired muscles don’t make a feller wakeful. Purty soon Horace began to gargle his palate, an’ then I was ready for Spider Kelley.
The plan was for him to come up close so as to entertain Horace while his braves sneaked on to the dummies in the tarps; but the’ was no occasion for sneakin’. Horace had turned over the camp to fate, an’ he wasn’t worryin’ his head about what was goin’ to happen to it.
Finally, Spider got disgusted an’ he went down an’ joined the others, an’ they sure raised a riot; but all the time, Horace slumbered on. Spider caught up our hosses, put our saddles an’ packs on ’em, threw some pieces of old canvas he brought along on the fire; and he an’ the rest raised a wild warwhoop and galloped away; but Horace was too busy to pay any attention. Spider an’ the boys had to work next day, an’ they was some put out not to have a little more fun for their trouble. It was all Spider could do to keep ’em from sneakin’ back an’ kidnappin’ Horace, but this was liable to give the whole thing away, so he talked ’em out of it. As soon as the noise had died down, I set Horace’s watch back five hours, an’ then I went to sleep myself. It was purty chilly, and I wasn’t quite sure who the joke was on.
When Tank woke up, he started in on Horace; but his noise wakened me up first. When Horace saw what had happened to the camp, he was about wordless; but after we had called him down about it for five or ten minutes, he flared up an’ talked back as harsh as we did. He said ’at he had kept guard for over three hours, fightin’ off sleep by walkin’ back an’ forth; and hadn’t sat down until it had started to lighten in the sky. He stuck to this tale, and I’m sure he believed it himself. He’d been so sleepy the night before that he couldn’t have told a dream from an actual happenin’, so when he began to get excited, we dropped it.
“All right,” sez Tank at last; “you’ve put us into a nice fix, but the’ ain’t no use tryin’ to pickle yesterday. What we’ve got to do is to hoof it back, an’ we might as well begin. We’re in a nice fix: nothin’ to eat, not a single cabin on the road back, an’ for all we know the’s a pack of Injuns watchin’ us this blessid moment.”
“How do ya know it was Injuns?” sez Horace.
“Look there, an’ there, an’ there,” sez Tank, pointin’ at moccasin prints an’ feathers. “Then besides, no white men would ’a’ burned up the tarps.”
“Do you mean to say ’at we got to walk all the way back?” sez Horace.
“All the way, an’ without no grub,” sez Tank.
Horace sat down on the end of a charred log. “Well, I’ll die right here,” sez he. “This spot suits me as well as any other.”
“You don’t have to die at all,” sez I. “A body can go forty days without food, an’ it does more good than harm.” Friar Tuck had told me a lot about fastin’, an’ I was keen to try it out on Horace. From all I could see from the theory o’ fastin’, it was just what was needed for Horace’s nerves.
“Look at me,” sez Horace, pullin’ at the waist of his clothes. “I bet I’ve lost twenty pounds already, on this fool trip. Twenty pounds more would make me a corpse, an’ I’d just as soon be made one here as anywhere. As soon as I rest up a little, I’m goin’ to begin to yell until I draw those blame Injuns back, an’ have ’em finish the job in short order.”
He wasn’t bluffin’, he was simply desp’rit. “You’ll have to walk with us,” sez I; “come on.”
Tank took one arm, an’ I took the other, an’ we started forth. For the first hour he hung back, and then he began to step out on his own hook. When we rested at noon, he was the freshest one of us. Tank an’ I had ridin’ boots, an’ ridin’ muscles; while he had walkin’ shoes, an’ no muscles at all worth mentionin’. “I can play at this game as well as any one,” sez Horace, chewin’ a blade o’ grass, an’ lookin’ proud of himself.
Tank was purty well fussed up; he wasn’t workin’ out any theories, he had just come along to help pester Horace an’ have a little amusement; but it began to appear to him that his fun was comin’ high-priced.
By nightfall we was all tol’able hungry; but Horace was so set up over bein’ able to put over a full day’s walk on nothin’ to eat that he was purty speechy, an’ it was nine o’clock before he went to sleep. As soon as he had dropped off, I went down to meet Spider Kelley an’ get the grub he had brought out for me ’n’ Tank. He said ’at the other boys wasn’t braggin’ none about their trip the night before; but they were all ready to roast me an’ Tank as soon as we got in. We’d had it fixed that Spider an’ the rest was to take turns worryin’ Horace on the back trip; but Spider said that it looked to him as if I’d win the bet anyway, so he intended to play neutral from that on. As soon as me an’ Tank had eaten, we turned in, an’ all of us slept like logs.
[CHAPTER ELEVEN—BENEFITS OF FASTING]
The next day Horace walked easier ’n any of us. Now I’m tellin’ this to ya straight ’n’ you can believe it or not just as ya please; but that little cuss stepped right along, began to notice the scenery, an’ even cracked a few jokes now an’ again; while me an’ Tank just plodded with our minds fixed on the meal we were goin’ to get that night. Horace had give up all thought o’ meals, so they didn’t pester him any.
At the end of the third day Horace had lost his appetite complete. Friar Tuck had swore that hunger didn’t worry a man more ’n three days, an’ sure enough, it didn’t. Horace didn’t care whether he ever et again or not. He’d get a little dizzy when he’d start out, an’ once in a while he’d feel a bit fainty; but as far as bein’ ravenous went, me an Tank had him beat a mile.
“Where is the joke o’ this fool trip?” growled Tank to me on the evenin’ of the fourth day as we were eatin’ the supper Spider Kelley had brought out. “He ain’t a human at all, Horace ain’t; he’s a reptile, an’ can live without food.”
Spider was tickled a lot, and said he didn’t care if he did lose his bet, that it was worth it to find how everlastin’ tough a little half-hand like Horace could be when drove to it. I’d been thinkin’ it over all day, but I didn’t say anything.
Friar Tuck had said it was a question of will power, more ’n anything else: that if a man just held his thoughts away from food it wouldn’t bother him; but if he kept thinkin’ of it, the digestin’ juices would flow into his stomach an’ make him think he was starvin’; so I was minded to try a new plan next day.
“Spider,” I sez, “you put a cow an’ calf up in Nufty’s Corral”—which was the name of a little shut-in park we would go through the next afternoon. “Put ’em there in the mornin’, a cow with an off brand, if you can find one, an’ trim their hoofs down close, so they won’t go back to the bunch. Remember ’at we’re on foot, an’ trim ’em close enough to make it hurt ’em to walk. I’m goin’ to make Horace hungry if I can.”
“I hate to play again’ him and my own bet,” sez Spider; “but I’ll have the cow there, just to see what you’re up to. If you’re goin’ to butcher it, though, I don’t see why a young steer wouldn’t be better.”
“I’ll count on you havin’ it there,” sez I; an’ then Spider rode back to the ranch house, an’ me an’ Tank went to sleep.
Next mornin’ me an’ Tank put the cartridges out of our belts into our pockets. As soon as we started to walk I began to talk about my hunger, an’ weakness, an’ the empty feelin’ in my head an’ stomach. At first Horace didn’t pay any heed; but from the start, ol’ Tank Williams caught every symptom I suggested; until I feared he’d curl up on the trail an’ die o’ starvation. Finally, though, Horace began to pay heed to my suggestions, an’ to sigh an’ moan a little. What finally got him was my gnawin’ at my rope an’ gauntlet. Tank an’ I had saved our ropes, ’cause we expected to have need of ’em; and when noon came an’ I sat with a stupid look in my face, chewin’ first the rope, an’ then the wrist o’ the gauntlet, Horace began to have some of the symptoms I was fishin’ for. Finally he borrowed one o’ my gauntlets, an’ after he had munched on it a while, he was as hungry as any one could wish.
“I can’t go another peg,” he sez when I got up to start on again.
“How does that come?” I asked him. “When we stopped to rest you was feelin’ more chipper ’n any of us.”
“I’m dyin’ o’ hunger,” he replied, solemn. “I’ve got a gnawin’ pain in my stomach, an’ I’m all in. I fear my stomach is punctured or stuck together or somethin’.”
I had had a lot o’ discussions with Friar Tuck about the power o’ suggestion; but I had never took much stock in it. I could see now, though, that it actually did work. As long as Horace was tellin’ himself that everything was all right, why, it was all right. Then when I suggested ’at we were dyin’ of hunger, why, he actually began to die of hunger; an’ it was wonderful to see the change in him. He showed us how he had ganted down; and the fact was, his bones had become purty prominent without any help from suggestin’. He didn’t have any more belly ’n a snake; but his eyes were bright, an’ his skin clear, except that it was peelin’ off purty splotchy, from sun-burn.
We finally left him an’ started on; and after we’d got some distance, he staggered after us; but he was just goin’ on his nerve now, an’ not gettin’ much joy out of existence.
About four in the afternoon, we reached Nufty’s Corral, a fine little park with only a narrow entrance at each end. Horace was up with us by this time, an’ we were all ploddin’ along head down. Suddenly Horace grabbed us by the arms. “Hush!” he sez.
“What’s up?” sez I, lookin’ at him.
“Look,” he whispers, pointin’ at the cow an’ calf; “there’s food.”
We drew back an’ consulted about it. “The great danger after a fast,” I sez in warnin’, “lies in overeatin’. All we can do is to drink a little blood for the first few hours.”
“Why can’t we broil a steak over some coals?” sez Horace.
“It would kill us to eat steak now,” sez I.
He held out for the steak; but I finally sez that if he won’t promise to be temperate an’ eat only what I tell him, I’ll drive off the cow; and then he comes around, and agrees to it.
“You sneak around to the far openin’, Tank,” I sez, then I pauses, an’ looks at him as though shocked. “Where’s your cartridges, man?” I asked.
Tank felt of his belt, and seemed plumb beat out, then he looked at mine, an’ yelled, “Where’s yours?”
We both sat down on stones an’ went over what we had done every minute o’ the time since we had started out; until Horace became frantic, an’ sez: “What’s the difference what became of ’em? Your revolvers are loaded. You can sure kill one cow out o’ twenty-four shots.”
“Twenty shots,” I corrected. “We allus carry the hammer on an empty chamber; an’ I’m so bloomin’ weak I doubt if I could hit a cow in ten shots.”
Horace turned loose an’ told us what he thought of us, an’ it was edifyin’ to hearken to him—he hit the nail on the head so often. Finally I sez: “Well, a man can do no more than try—Go ahead, Tank, but don’t let her get by you, whatever happens.”
The cow, which was a homely grade-whiteface with a splotch on her nose which made it look as if most of the nose had been cut off, stood in the center of the park, an’ she was beginnin’ to get uneasy, although the wind was from her way.
As soon as Tank got to his entrance he shot in the air; an’ she came chargin’ down on me. I shot over her, an’ she charged back. We kept this up until Horace lost patience an’ called me a confounded dub. “Here,” sez I, “the’s two cartridges left. You fire ’em, I won’t.”
At first he refused, but he was desperate, and finally after I’d told him to use both hands, he took a shot. The cow was standin’ closest to us, but lookin’ Tank’s way, an’ Horace nicked her in the ham. Instead of chargin’ Tank, like a sensible cow, she came for us head on. Now, when a bull charges, he picks out somethin’ to steer for, then closes his eyes, and sets sail; but a cow keeps her eyes open, an’ she don’t aim to waste any plunges either. Horace stood out in the center of the entrance an’ banged away again, strikin’ the ground about ten feet in front of him.
“Run!” I yells to him, jumpin’ back behind a big rock, “Run!”
He forgot all about bein’ hungry, an’ he started to backtrail like a scared jack-rabbit. The cow had forgot all about havin’ had her hoofs pared, an’ she took after him like a hungry coyote. As she passed me, I roped her, took a snub around the rock, an’ flopped her; but she did just what I thought she’d do—rolled to her feet an’ took after me. She was angry. I’d have given right smart for a tough little pony between my knees.
The cow had forgot all about havin’ had her hoofs pared, an’ she took after him like a hungry coyote
The rock was too big to get a half hitch over, so I just ran at right angles from her, hopin’ to stretch out more rope ’n she could cover. I did it by a few feet; but she swung around into my rope head on, an’ this flung me up again’ her side. I managed to hang on to the rope, however, an’ this fixed her, ’cause she’d have had to pull that rock over before she could ’a’ come any farther. Horace had stopped an’ was gappin’ at us from a safe distance; but Tank arrived by this time an’ put another rope on her an’ we had her cross-tied between two big rocks by the time Horace arrived.
“What ya goin’ to kill her with?” he asked, his eyes dancin’ like an Injun’s at the beef whack-up.
“My cartridges are all gone,” sez Tank.
“Mine too,” sez I.
“Can’t you use a knife, or a stone?” sez Horace, the dude.
“You can try it if you want to,” sez I; “but hanged if I will.”
He took a big stone an’ walked to the head of the cow, but his nerve gave out, an’ he threw down the stone. “What in thunder did you tie her up for, then?” sez he.
“I beg your pardon,” sez I, “but I thought perhaps she might be a little vexed with you on account o’ your shootin’ her up. She was headed your way.”
He sat down on a stone an’ looked at the cow resentful. Suddenly his face lit up. “Why don’t you milk her?” sez he. “We can live on milk for weeks.”
It’s funny how much alike hungry animals look. As Horace sat on the stone with his anxious face, his poppin’ eyes, his mussed up side-burns, an’ the water drippin’ from his mouth at thought o’ the milk, he looked so much like a setter pup I once knew that it was all I could do to hold a straight face.
“Do you know how to milk, Tank?” I sez.
“I don’t,” sez Tank; “nor I don’t know what it tastes like.”
“Go ahead an’ milk her, Mr. Bradford,” I sez. “You’re the only one what knows how to milk, or who cares to drink it. What you goin’ to milk it in?”
“I never milked in my life,” sez he; “but I saw it done once when I was a boy, an’ I’m goin’ to try to milk in my hat.”
He had a bad time of it; but he only got kicked twice, an’ both times it was short, glancin’ blows, not much more ’n shoves. Finally, he came over to where me an’ Tank was settin’ an’ flopped himself down beside us. “Can’t you strangle her with those ropes?” he sez, in what might well be called deadly earnest.
We shook our heads, an’ continued to sit there lookin’ at the cow as though we expected she’d point the way out of our trouble. Presently the calf remembered his own appetite, an’ rushed up an’ gave a demonstration of what neat an’ orderly milkin’ was. Horace sighed. “Gee, I bet that’s good,” he said, the water drippin’ from his lips again. He had been four days without food, walkin’ all that time through the mountains, sleepin’ out doors with no cover but a slicker; and he had about burned up all his waste products, which Friar Tuck said was a city man’s greatest handicap. His eyes got a little red as he watched the calf, an’ I saw that he meant to slaughter it; so I sez to him: “That’s the way to milk, Mr. Bradford. Why don’t you sneak up on the other side an’ try it that way, the same time the calf is?”
He studied a moment, an’ then shook his head. “No, she could tell me from the calf,” he said sorrowful. “Our foreheads are shaped different, an’ I’d have to get down on my hands and knees. She’d tell me in a minute, an’ I don’t want to be on my hands an’ knees when she kicks me.”
“We could throw an’ hog-tie her,” sez Tank; “and you could get it easy an’ comfortable. Would you want us to do that, Mr. Bradford?”
Horace jumped to his feet an’ shook his fist in Tank’s face. “Don’t call me Mister again,” he yelled. “I’m plumb sick of it. If I ever live to get another bath an’ back East where the’s food in plenty, why, I’ll take up the Mister again; but now that I’ve got to a point where I have to suck milk from a hog-tied cow, you call me Horace, or even Dinky—which was my nickname at school. Yes, for heaven’s sake, tie the cow. I have to have milk, an’ that’s the only way I see to get it.”
Well, Tank an’ I was so full o’ laugh we could hardly truss up the cow; but we finally got her on her back so ’at she couldn’t do nothin’ but snap her tail, an’ then Horace threw his hat on the ground, an’ started in. I was entirely joyful: I knew ’at Spider Kelley, an’ as many o’ the boys as could sneak away, were watchin’ us from up on the hill, an’ this was the grand triumph of my treatment for nerves.
Horace approached the cow with consid’able caution, as she was in an awkward position. The calf had been interrupted in his meal, before he had squenched his thirst, an’ he was still prospectin’ about on his own hook.
“Here,” said Horace, givin’ him a push, “this is my turn.”
You know how a calf is: a calf ain’t afeared o’ nothin’ except hunger. Here was his food-supply bein’ robbed, right when he was needin’ it. He blatted down in his throat, an’ tried to nose Horace out of the way. Horace was findin’ that milk the best stuff he had ever tasted, an’ he fought off the calf with his right hand, while he steadied himself by puttin’ his left on the hind leg o’ the calf’s mother, an’ got a nice coat o’ creamy froth in his side-burns. He was so blame hungry he didn’t see a speck o’ humor in it; but me an’ Tank nearly died.
“Say,” sez Horace, raisin’ his head, the milk drippin’ from his lips, “can’t one o’ you fellers fend off this calf till I finish?”
Tank held the calf while I advised Horace to be temperate, an’ after a bit he gave a sigh an’ said, that that was all he could hold just then, but not to let the cow escape. We loosened her, left one o’ the ropes on for a drag picket, an’ took off the other. She was purty well subdued; but we refused to give Horace any more milk that night, an’ he went to sleep before we had a fire built. Spider Kelley was wabblin’ with laughter when he brought us our supper. He had been the only one who could stay after bringin’ up the cow; but he said he wouldn’t ’a’ missed it for three jobs.
[CHAPTER TWELVE—A COMPLETE CURE]
Next mornin’ we fed Horace all the milk he could hold, an’ tried to drive the cow along with us; but her hoofs had been pared so thin that it made her cross an’ we had to give that projec’ up.
“How far are we from the ranch house?” asked Horace.
“About sixty miles,” sez Tank.
“That’s what I thought,” sez he. “Now, I can’t see any sense in all of us hoofin’ that distance. I’d go if I knew the way; but one of you could go, an’ the other stay with me an’ the cow. Then the one which went could bring back food on the buckboard, and it would be as good as if we all went.”
Now this was a fine scheme; but neither Tank nor I had thought of it. We had intended to follow our own windin’ circle back every step o’ the way; but when the milk set Horace’s brain to pumpin’, he fetched up this idee which saved us all a lot o’ bother.
“I shall go myself,” sez Tank; “weak as I am, I’ll go myself.”
It was only about fifteen or twenty miles by the short cut, an’ this would get him back to regular meals in short order; so he left me his rope an’ set out. Horace helped me with the cow that night, an’ he proved purty able help. He was feelin’ fine, an’ the milk had filled him out wonderful. He said he hadn’t felt so rough ’n’ ready for twenty years; but Spider Kelley failed to arrive with my meal that night, and I went to bed feelin’ purty well disgusted. Tank had met him before noon that day, an’ he had gone in for a hoss; and they had decided that it would be a good stunt to give me some o’ my own treatment.
Next mornin’ I felt as empty as a balloon; so after Horace had enjoyed himself, I took a little o’ the same, myself; but I didn’t take it like he did. I held my mouth open an’ squirted it in, an’ it was mighty refreshin’.
“Huh,” sez Horace, “you’re mightily stuck up. The calf’s way is good enough for me.”
“I got a split lip,” I sez, half ashamed o’ myself.
They left us there three days to allow for the time it would have taken Tank to walk if it had been as far as we claimed it was; and then Tillte Dutch drove out the buckboard. He said ’at Spider an’ Tank had quit and gone into Boggs for a little recreation; but after I had eaten my first meal out o’ the grub he brought, I didn’t bear ’em any ill will. The joke was on me as much as it was on Horace; but I’d ’a’ gone through twice as much to test that theory, an’ I’d had the full worth o’ my bother. Horace was a new man: he was full o’ vim an’ snap, an’ he gave me credit for it an’ became mighty friendly an’ confidential.
He stood up in the buckboard an’ made a farewell speech to the cow which lasted ten minutes. He also apologized to the calf, an’ told him that when he got back East, he would raise his hat every time he passed a milk wagon. He sure felt in high spirits, and made up a ramblin’ sort of a song which lasted all the way back to the house. It had the handiest tune ever invented and he got a lot o’ fun out of it. It began:
“Oh we walked a thousand miles without eatin’ any food,
An’ then we met a cow an’ calf, an’ gee, but they looked good!
Her eyes like ancient Juno’s were so in-o-cent an’ mild,
We couldn’t bear to take her life, we only robbed her child.
She strove to save the lactual juice to feed her darling boy;
So we had to fling her on her back to fill our souls with joy.
Now Tank an’ Happy were too proud to compete with a calf,
So they sat them down an’ dined on wind, while they weakly tried to laugh.
I’m but a simple-minded cuss, not proud like one of these;
So I filled myself so full of milk, I’m now a cottage cheese.”
Horace was as proud o’ this song as though it was the first one ever sung. He used the same tune on it that blind men on corners use. I reckon that tune fits most any sort of a song; it’s more like the “Wearin’ of the Green” than anything else but ten times sadder an’ more monotonous. He said he had once wrote a Greek song at college but it wasn’t a patch on this one, and hadn’t got him nothin’ but a medal. I used to know twelve or eighteen verses, but I’ve forgot most of it. It was a hard one to remember because the verses wasn’t of the same length. Sometimes a feller would have to stretch a word all out of shape to make it cover the wave o’ the tune, an’ sometimes you’d have to huddle the words all up into a bunch. Horace said that all high class music was this way; but it made it lots more bother to learn than hymns.
The verse which pleased me the most was the forty-third. Horace himself said ’at this was about as good as any, though he liked the seventy-ninth one a shade better, himself. The forty-third one ran:
“A cow-boy does not live on milk, that’s all a boy-cow’ll drink;
But the cow-ma loves the last the most, which seems a funny think,
I do not care for milk in pans with yellow scum o’er-smeared.
I like to gather mine myself; and strain it through my beard.”
I never felt better over anything in my life than I did over returnin’ Horace in this condition. It was some risk to experiment with such a treatment as mine on a feller who regarded himself as an invalid; but here he was, comin’ back solid an’ hearty, with his shape shrunk down to normal, an’ full o’ jokes an’ song.
Tillte Dutch had been one o’ the braves in Spider’s Injun party; so when we got in, about ten in the evenin’, he lured the rest o’ the pack out to the corral, an’ we agreed not to make the details of our trip public. The ol’ man wouldn’t have made a whole lot o’ fuss seein’ as it had turned out all right; but still, he was dead set on what he called courtesy to guests; and he might ’a’ thought that we had played Horace a leetle mite strong. Barbie noticed the change in Horace and, o’ course, she pumped most o’ the story out o’ me.
Horace himself was as game a little rooster as I ever saw. He follered me around like a dog after that, helpin’ with my chores, an’ ridin’ every chance he had. He got confidential, an’ told me a lot about himself. He said that he hadn’t never had any boyhood, that his mother was a rich widow, an’ was ambitious to make a scholar out of him; that she had sent him to all kinds o’ schools an’ colleges an’ universities, and had had private tutors for him, and had jammed his head so full o’ learnin’ that the’ wasn’t room for his brain to beat; so it had just lain smotherin’ amidst a reek of all kinds o’ musty old facts. He said that he never had had time for exercise, and had never needed money; so he had just settled into a groove lined with books an’ not leadin’ anywhere at all. He said that since his mother’s death he had been livin’ like a regular recluse, thinkin’ dead thoughts in dead languages, an’ not takin’ much interest in anything which had happened since the fall o’ Rome; but now that he had learned for the first time what a world of enjoyment the’ was in just feelin’ real life poundin’ through his veins, he intended to plunge about in a way to increase the quality, quantity, and circulation of his blood.
Ya couldn’t help likin’ a feller who took things the way he did—we all liked him. He told us to treat him just as if he was a fourteen-year-old boy, which we did, an’ the’ wasn’t nothin’ in the way of a joke that he wasn’t up against before the summer was over; but he came back at us now an’ again, good an’ plenty.
Tank an’ Spider tossin’ up their jobs had left me with more work on my hands ’n I generally liked, so I had to stick purty close to the line until they went broke an’ took on again. Then one day me an’ Horace took a ride up into the hills. We had some lunch along and about noon we sat down in a grassy spot to eat it. We had just finished and had lighted our pipes for a little smoke when we heard Friar Tuck comin’ up the trail. I hadn’t seen him for months, an’ I was mighty glad to hear him again. He was fair shoutin’, so I knew ’at things was right side up with him. He was singin’ the one which begins: “Oh, come, all ye faithful, joyful an’ triumphant,” and he shook the echoes loose with it.
Horace turned to me with a surprised look on his face; “Who’s that?” he sez.
“That’s Friar Tuck,” sez I, “an’ if you’ve got any troubles tell ’em to him.”
“Well, wouldn’t that beat ya!” exclaimed Horace, an’ just then the Friar came onto our level with his hat off an’ his head thrown back. He was leadin’ a spare hoss, an’ seemed at peace with all the world.
When he spied me, he headed in our direction, an’ as soon as he had finished the chorus, he called: “Hello, Happy! What are you hidin’ from up here?”
I jumped to my feet, an’ Horace got to his feet, too, an’ bowed an’ said: “How do ya do, Mr. Carmichael?”
A quick change came over the Friar’s face. It got cold an’ haughty; and I was flabbergasted, because I had never seen it get that way before. “How do you do,” he said, as cheery an’ chummy as a hail-storm.
But he didn’t need to go to the trouble o’ freezin’ himself solid; Horace was just as thin skinned as he was when it was necessary, an’ he slipped on a snuffer over his welcomin’ smile full as gloomy as was the Friar’s. I was disgusted: nothin’ pesters me worse ’n to think a lot o’ two people who can’t bear each other. It leaves it so blame uncertain which one of us has poor taste.
Well, we had one o’ those delightful conflabs about the weather an’ “how hot it was daytimes, but so cool an’ refreshin’ nights,” an’, “I must be goin’ now,” an’ “oh, what’s the use o’ goin’ so soon”—and so on. Then Horace an’ the Friar bowed an’ the Friar rode away as silent an’ dignified as a dog which has been sent back home.
“Well,” sez Horace, after we’d seated ourselves again, “I never expected to see that man out here. I wouldn’t ’a’ been more surprised to have seen a blue fish with yaller goggles on, come swimmin’ up the pass.”
“Oh, wouldn’t ya?” sez I. “Well, that man ain’t no more like a blue fish with goggles on than you are. He’s ace high anywhere you put him, an’ don’t you forget that.”
“You needn’t arch up your back about it,” he sez. “I haven’t said anything again’ him. I gave up goin’ to church on his account.”
“That’s nothin’ to brag about,” sez I. “A man’ll give up goin’ to church simply because they hold it on Sunday, which is the one day o’ the week when he feels most like stackin’ up his feet on top o’ somethin’ an’ smokin’ a pipe. A man who couldn’t plan out an excuse for not goin’ to church wouldn’t be enough intelligent to know when he was hungry.”
“You must ’a’ set up late last night to whet your sarcasm!” sez Horace, swellin’ up a little. “Why don’t you run along and hold up a screen, so ’at folks can’t look at your parson.”
“How’d you happen to quit church on his account?” sez I.
“He was only a curate, when I first knew him,” sez Horace.
“He’s a curate yet,” sez I. “I tried one of his cures myself, lately; an’ it worked like a charm.” I turned my head away so ’at Horace wouldn’t guess ’at he was the cuss I had tried it on.
“A curate hasn’t nothin’ to do with doctorin’,” sez Horace. “A curate is only the assistant of the regular preacher which is called a rector. The curate does the hard work an’ the rector gets the big pay.”
“That’s the way with all assistants,” sez I; “so don’t bother with any more details. Why did you quit goin’ to church?”
“I quit because he quit,” sez Horace.
“What did he quit for,” sez I; “just to bust up the church by drawin’ your patronage away from it?”
“He quit on account of a girl,” sez Horace; an’ then I stopped my foolishness, an’ settled down to get the story out of him. Here I’d been wonderin’ for years about Friar Tuck; an’ all those weeks I had been with Horace I had never once thought o’ tryin’ to see what he might know.
[CHAPTER THIRTEEN—AN UNEXPECTED CACHE]
Humans is the most disappointin’ of all the animals: when a mule opens his mouth, you know what sort of a noise is about to happen, an’ can brace yourself accordin’; an’ the same is true o’ screech-owls, an’ guinea-hens an’ such; but no one can prepare for what is to come forth when a human opens his mouth. You meet up with a professor what knows all about the stars an’ the waterlines in the hills an’ the petrified fishes, an’ such; but his method o’ bein’ friendly an’ agreeable is to sing comic songs like a squeaky saw, an’ dance jigs as graceful as a store box; while the fellow what can sing an’ dance is forever tryin’ to lecture about stuff he is densely ignorant of.
The other animals is willin’ to do what they can do, an’ they take pride in seein’ how well they can do it; but not so a human. He only takes pride in tryin’ to do the things he can’t do. A hog don’t try to fly, nor a butterfly don’t try to play the cornet, nor a cow don’t set an’ fret because she can’t climb trees like a squirrel; but not so with man: he has to try everything ’at anything else ever tried, an’ he don’t care what it costs nor who gets killed in the attempt. Sometimes you hear a wise guy say: “No, no that’s contrary to human nature.” This is so simple minded it allus makes me silent. Human nature is so blame contrary, itself, that nothin’ else could possibly be contrary to it. To think of Horace knowin’ about the Friar, an’ yet doggin’ me all over the map with that song of his, was enough to make me shake him; but I didn’t. I wanted the story, so I pumped him for it, patient an’ persistent.
“I never was very religious,” began Horace. Most people begin stories about other people, by tellin’ you a lot about themselves, so I had my resignation braced for this. “I allus liked the Greek religion better ’n airy other,” he went on. “It was a fine, free, joyous religion, founded on Art an’ music, an’ symmetry—”
I was willin’ to stand for his own biography; but after waitin’ this long for a clue to the Friar’s past, I wasn’t resigned to hearin’ a joint debate on the different religions; so I interrupted, by askin’ if him believin’ in the Greek religion was what had made Friar Tuck throw up his job.
“No, you chump,”—me an’ Horace was such good friends by this time that we didn’t have any regard for one another’s feelin’s. “No, you chump,” he sez, “I told you he quit on account of a girl. I don’t look like a girl, do I?”
“Well,” sez I, studying him sober, “those side-burns look as if they might ’a’ been bangs which had lost their holt in front an’ slipped down to your lip; but aside from this you don’t resemble a girl enough to drive a man out o’ church.”
I allus had better luck with Horace after I’d spurred him up a bit.
“You see, Friar Tuck, as you call him, was a good deal of a fanatic, those days,” sez Horace, after he’d thrown a stone at me. “He took his religion serious, an’ wanted to transform the world into what it would be if all people tried their best to live actual Christ-like lives. He was a big country boy, fresh from college, an’ full of ideals, an’ feelin’ strong enough to hammer things out accordin’ to the pattern he had chose.
“It was his voice which got him his place. He had a perfectly marvelous voice, an’ I never heard any one else read the service like he did. This was what took me to church, and I’d have gone as long as he stayed. You see, Happy, life is really made up of sensations an’ emotions; and it used to lift me into the clouds to see his shinin’ youth robed in white, an’ hear that wonderful voice of his fillin’ the great, soft-lighted church with melody an’ mystery. It was all I asked of religion an’ it filled me with peace an’ inspiration. Of course, from a philosophical standpoint, the Greek religion—”
“Did the girl believe in the Greek religion?” I asked to switch him back.
“No, no,” he snapped. “This Greek religion that I’m speakin’ of died out two thousand years ago.”
“Then let’s let it rest in peace,” sez I, “an’ go on with your story.”
“You understand that this was a fashionable church,” sez Horace. “They was willin’ to pay any sum for music an’ fine readin’ an’ all that; but they wasn’t minded to carry out young Carmichaels plan in the matter of Christianizin’ the world. They was respectable, an’ they insisted that all who joined in with ’em must be respectable, too; while he discovered that a lot o’ the most persistent sinners wasn’t respectable at all. His theory was, that religion was for the vulgar sinners, full as much as for the respectable ones; so he made a round-up an’ wrangled in as choice a lot o’ sinners as a body ever saw; but his bosses wouldn’t stand for his corralin’ ’em up in that fashionable church.
“He stood out for the sinners; an’ finally they compromised by gettin’ him a little chapel in the slums, an’ lettin’ him go as far as he liked with the tough sinners down there through the week; but readin’ the service on Sundays to the respectable sinners in the big church. This plan worked smooth as ice, until they felt the need of a soprano singer who could scrape a little harder again’ the ceilin’ than the one they already had. Then Carmichael told ’em that he had discovered a girl with a phe-nominal voice, an’ had been teachin’ her music for some time. He brought her up an’ gave her a trial—”
“An’ she was the girl, huh?” I interrupted.
“She had a wonderful voice, all right,” sez Horace, not heedin’ me; “but she wasn’t as well trained as that church demanded; so they hired her for twenty-five dollars a Sunday on the condition that she take lessons from a professor who charged ten dollars an hour. She was game, though, an’ took the job, an’ made good with it, too, improvin’ right along until it was discovered that she was singin’ weeknights in a café, from six to eight in the evenin’, an’ from ten to twelve at night.
“The girl had been singin’ with a screen o’ flowers in front of her; and some o’ the fashionable male sinners from the big church had been goin’ there right along to hear her sing; but they couldn’t work any plan to get acquainted with her, and this made her a mystery, and drew ’em in crowds. Finally, as her voice got better with the trainin’, critics admitted ’at she could make an agreeable noise; and the common sinners was tickled to have their judgement backed up, so they began to brag about it. The result o’ this was, that one ol’ weasel had to swaller his extra-work-at-the-office excuse, and take his own wife to hear the singer. Then the jig was up. The woman recognized the voice first pop; and within a week it was known that Carmichael had been goin’ home with her every night.
“Now, you may be so simple-minded that you don’t know it; but really, this was a perfectly scandalous state of affairs, and the whole congregation began to buzz like a swarm of angry bees. Carmichael was as handsome a young feller as was ever seen; but he had never taken kindly to afternoon teas and such-like functions, which is supposed to be part of a curate’s duties; so now, when they found he had been goin’ home nights with a girl ’at sang in a café it like to have started an epidemic of hysteria.
“They found that the girl lived in a poor part o’ the town, and supported her mother who was sickly, that they were strangers to the city, and also not minded to furnish much in the way o’ past history. They insisted upon her givin’ up the café-singin’ at once; and from what I’ve heard, they turned up their noses when they said it.
“Carmichael pointed out that she was givin’ up twenty a week for lessons which they had insisted upon; and asked ’em if they were sure a girl could be any more, respectable, supportin’ a sickly mother on five a week, than if she added fifteen to it by singin’ in a café. He got right uppish about it and said right out that he couldn’t see where it was one bit more hellish for her to sing at the café than for other Christians to pay for a chance to listen to her.
“This tangled ’em up in their own ropes consid’able; but what finally settled it was, ’at their richest member up and died, and they simply had to have a sky-scrapin’ soprano to start him off in good style; so they gave her twenty a week and paid for her lessons. The café people soon found what a card she’d been and they offered her fifty a week; but she was game and stuck to the agreement.”
“How did you find out all this, Horace?” I asked.
“A friend o’ mine belonged to the vestry,” sez Horace; “and he kept me posted to the minute. This was his first term at it, and it was his last; but he was a lucky cuss to get the chance just when he did. I have since won him over to see the beauty o’ the Greek religion.”
“What became o’ the girl?” sez I with some impatience, for I didn’t care as much as a single cuss-word for the Greek religion.
“Carmichael was a gentle spoken young feller,” sez Horace, “but for all that, he wasn’t a doormat by inheritance nor choice, and he kept on payin’ attention to the girl, and got her to sing at his annex in the slums. Night after night he filled the place with the best assortment o’ last-chance sinners ’at that locality could furnish; and he an’ the girl an’ the sinners all pitched in and offered up song music to make the stars rock; but St. Holiernthou wasn’t the sort of a parish to sit back and let a slum outfit put over as swell a line o’ melody as they were servin’, themselves; so they ordered Carmichael to cut her off his list. He tried to get ’em to hire another curate, and let him have full swing at the annex; but they told him they’d close it up first.
“Next, a delegation o’ brave an’ inspired women took it upon ’emselves to call on the girl. They pointed out that she was standin’ in the way o’ Carmichael’s career, that, under good conditions, his advance was certain; but that a false step at the start would ruin it all. They went on and hinted that if it wasn’t for her, he might have married an heiress, and grow up to be one o’ the leadin’ ministers o’ the whole country.”
“What did she do, Horace?” sez I.
“The girl was proud; she thanked the delegation for takin’ so much interest in her—and said that she would not detain ’em any longer; but would think it over as careful as she could. Then she walked out o’ the room; and the delegation strutted off with their faces shinin’ like a cavey o’ prosperous cats. The girl vanished, just simply vanished. She wrote Carmichael a letter, and that was the end of it. Some say she committed suicide, and some say she went to Europe and became a preemie donner—a star singer—but anyway, that was the end of her, as far as that region was concerned.”
“She was a fine girl,” sez I; “though I wish that instead of slippin’ off that way, she had asked me to drown the members o’ that delegation as inconspicuous as possible. I wouldn’t put on mournin’, if the whole outfit of ’em was in the same fix your confounded Greek Religion is. What was her name, Horace?”
“Janet Morris,” sez he.
I said it over a time or two to myself; and it seemed to fit her. “I like that name,” sez I. “Now tell me the way ’at the Friar cut loose and tied into that vestry. I bet he made trade boom for hospitals and undertakers.”
[CHAPTER FOURTEEN—HAPPY’S NEW AMBITION]
Ol’ Tank Williams allus maintained that I had a memory like the Lord; but this ain’t so. What I do remember, I actually see in pictures, just like I told you; but what my memory chooses to discard is as far out o’ my reach as the smoke o’ last year’s fire. I’ve worked at my memory from the day I was weaned, not bein’ enough edicated to know ’at the proper way is to put your memory in a book—and then not lose the book. I’ve missed a lot through not gettin’ on friendly terms with books earlier in life; but then I’ve had a lot o’ fun with my memory to even things up.
This part about the Friar, though, isn’t a fair test. Horace’s vestry-man friend was what is known as a short-hand reporter. Short-hand writin’ is merely a lot o’ dabs and slips which’d strain a Chinaman; but Horace said it was as plain to read as print letters, and as fast to write as spoke words. Hugo took it down right as it was given; and Horace had a copy which I made him go over with me until I had scratched it into the hardest part o’ my memory; and now it is just the same as if I had seen it with my own eyes—me knowin’ every tone in the Friar’s voice, and the way his eyes shine; yes, and the way his jaws snap off the words when he’s puttin’ his heart into a thing.
Horace sat thinkin’, before he started on with his tale; and I sat watchin’ his face. It was just all I could do to make out the old lines which had give me the creeps a few weeks before. Now, it had a fine, solid tan, the eyes were full o’ fire, and he looked as free from nerves as a line buckskin. The Friar sez we’re all just bits o’ glass through which the spirit shines; and now that I had cleaned Horace up with my nerve treatment, the’ was a right smart of spirit shinin’ out through him, and I warmed my hands at it. He simply could not learn to roll a cigarette with one hand; but in most things, he was as able a little chap as ever I took the kinks out of.
“I’m sorry I didn’t belong to that vestry,” sez Horace, after a bit. “When I look back at all the sportin’ chances I’ve missed, I feel like kickin’ myself up to the North Pole and back. From now on I intend to mix into every bloomin’ jambaree ’at exposes itself to the vision of my gaze. I’m goin’ to ride an’ shoot an’ wrestle an’ box an’ gamble an’ fight, and get every last sensation I’m entitled to—but I’ll never have another chance at a vestry-meetin’ like the one I’m about to tell you of.
“You saw how toppy Carmichael got this afternoon; so you can guess purty close how he looked when he lined up this vestry.”
“Oh, I’ve seen the Friar in action,” sez I; “and you can’t tell me anything about his style. All you can tell is the details. So go to ’em without wastin’ any more time.”
“How comes it you call such a man as him Friar Tuck?” asked Horace, who allus was as hard to drive as an only son burro.
“Well, I don’t approve of it,” sez I, “and I kicked about it to the Friar; but he only laughed, and said ’at one name was as good as another. A bettin’ barber over at Boggs give it to him for admonishin’ a gambler from Cheyenne.”
“Was he severe?” asked Horace.
“Depends on how you look at it,” sez I. “He took a club away from the gambler an’ spanked him with it; but he didn’t injure him a mite.”
“Humph,” sez Horace, “I guess the name won’t rust much while it’s in his keepin’. He took other methods at this vestry meetin’, though I don’t say they were any more befittin’. Hugo—such was the name of my friend—said it was the quietest, but the most dramatic thing he ever saw.
“They started in by treatin’ him like the boy he was, gave him a lot o’ copy-book advice, especially as to the value o’ patience, how that Paul was to do the plantin’, Appolinaris, the waterin’; but that the size an’ time o’ the harvest depended on the Lord, Himself; and that it was vanity to think ’at a young boy just out o’ college could rush things through the way he was tryin’ to.
“The’ was a hurt look about Carmichael’s eyes; but the hurt had come from the letter, not from them, so he sat quiet and smiled down at ’em in a sort of super-human calmness. They thought he was bluffed speechless, so they girded up their loins, an’ tied into him a little harder, tellin’ him that his conduct in walkin’ home nights with a café-singer was little short of immoral, although they wouldn’t make no pointed charge again’ the woman herself. Then they wound up by sayin’ ’at they feared he was too young to spend so much time amid the environs o’ sin, and that they would put an older man in charge o’ the annex, and this would leave him free to attend strictly to cu-ratin’.
“When they had spoke their piece, they were all beamin’ with the upliftin’ effect of it; and they settled back with beautiful smiles o’ satisfaction to listen to Carmichael’s thanks and repentance. He sat there smilin’ too—not smilin’ the brand o’ smiles ’at they were, but still smilin’. It would strain a dictionary to tell all there is in some smiles.
“Presently he rose up, swept his eyes over ’em for a time, and said in a low tone: ‘Then I am to understand that I am to follow in the Master’s footsteps only as far as personal chastity goes?’ said he. ‘That I may respectably pity the weak and sinful from a distance; but must not dismount from my exalted pedestal to take ’em by the hand an’ lift ’em up—Is that what you mean?’ sez he.
“They still thought he was whipped, so one of ’em pulled a little sarcasm on him: ‘Takin’ the weak an’ sinful by the hand an’ liftin’ ’em up is all right,’ said he; ‘but it’s not necessary to go home with ’em after midnight.’
“Carmichael bit his lips; he tried to hold himself down, he honestly tried for some time; but he wasn’t quite able. His hands trembled an’ his lip trembled while he was fightin’ himself; but when he kicked off his hobbles an’ sailed into ’em, his tremblin’ stopped an’ the words shot forth, clear an’ hot an’ bitish. Hugo sat back in a corner durin’ this meetin’, without speakin’ a single word; and he was glad of it. It saved him from gettin’ his feelin’s kicked into flinders about him, an’ interferin’ with the view; and it gave him a chance to take his notes.
“‘As a matter o’ faith,’ said Carmichael, ‘we believe that Jesus never sinned; but we cannot know this as a matter of fact. Yet we can know, and we do know, as a matter of history, that He mingled an’ had fellowship with the fallen, the sinful, the outcast, and the disreputable. With these He lived, and with these and for these He left the power and the life and the glory of His religion—and you say that I must live in a glass case, may only look in holy dignity down at the weak and sinful; but that I mustn’t go home with ’em after midnight. With God, a thousand years is but as a day—and yet it would be wrong for me to be in a sinner’s company after midnight!’
“Carmichael paused here to give ’em a comeback at him; but their mouths were dry, and they only hemmed an’ hawed. ‘Every Sunday, in the service of this refined an’ respectable church, hunderds of you admit that you have no health because of your sins—and yet, because of my youth, you say I must remain with you where sin is robed in silk and broadcloth, and not risk my soul where sin is robed in rags.’
“He paused again, and this time his eyes began to shoot jerk-lightning, an’ when he started to speak his deep voice shook the room like the low notes of a big organ. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I am not content to walk with the Lord, only on the day of His triumph—The very ones who strewed the pathway of His majesty with palms, and filled the air with hosaners, deserted Him at the cross—but I must walk with Him every step of the way. I do not pray that my earthly garments be spotless, I do not pray that my sandals be unworn an’ free from mud; but I do pray that when I stand on my own Calvery I may stand with those who bear crosses, not with those who have spent their lives in learnin’ to wear crowns.’
“Carmichael had discarded that entire vestry by this time, and he didn’t care a blue-bottle fly what they thought of him. He towered above them with his face shinin’, and his voice rolled down over ’em like a Norther sweepin’ through the hills. ‘Many there were,’ he went on, ‘who cried to Him, Lord, Lord; but after the tomb was sealed, it was the Magdalene whose faith never faltered, it was to her He first appeared; and on the final resurrection morning, I hope the lesser Magdalenes of all the ages, and from all the nasty corners of the world into which man’s greed has crowded ’em, will know that I am their brother, and, save for a lovin’ hand at the right moment, one of them to the last sordid detail.’
“Carmichael stopped after this, and the room was so quiet you could hear the consciences o’ that vestry floppin’ up and down again’ their pocketbooks. When he began again his voice was soft, an’ the bitterness had given way to sadness. ‘The old way was best, after all,’ he said. ‘When you pay a priest a salary, you hire him and he becomes your servant. The custom is, for masters to dictate to their servants; it is an old, old custom, and hard to break. I think I could suit you; but I do not think I shall try. The roots of my own life lead back to the gutter, and through these roots shall I draw strength to lift others from the gutter. I do not value my voice as a means to amuse those already weary of amusement: I look upon it as a tool to help clean up the world. You are already so clean that you fear I may defile you by contagion. You do not need me; and with all your careful business methods, you have not money enough to hire me.
“‘What you need here, is a diplomat; while I yearn to be on the firm’ line. I care little for the etiquette of religion, I want to get down where the fightin’ is fierce an’ primitive—so I hereby resign.
“‘This girl whom you have driven out of my life, needs no defence from me or any man. I have known her since she was a little child; poverty was her lot, and self-sacrifice has become her second nature. We are forbidden to judge; so I judge neither her nor you; but I will say that often I have stood silent before the beauty of her character, and often my face has burned at the tainted money you have put on the plate. Part of this money comes from the rental of dives. I have seen the dives themselves, I have seen their fearful product; and I cannot believe that profit wrung from a helpless slave can find its way to God—even on the contribution plate.
“‘I love the music an’ the service an’ the vestments o’ this church; and I hope I need not give them up; but my heart is in rebellion, and from this time on I take the full responsibility of my acts. I shall not choose my path; but will go as the spirit moves me; and if ever I find one single spot which seems too dark for the Light of the world to enter, then shall the soul in me shrivel and die, and I shall become a beast, howling in the jungle.’”
Horace said that after the Friar had left the room, those vestry fellers sat in a sort of daze for some time, and then got up an’ sneaked out one at a time, lookin’ exceeding thoughtful; while Hugo had hustled around to his room to read off his notes.
We sat there on the hill until dark, me tryin’ to pump him for more details, but he didn’t have ’em. He said the Friar had started to work in the slums; but was soon lost sight of, and the first he had heard of him for years was when he had come up the pass, singin’ his marchin’ song. Course, I’d liked it some better if the Friar had knocked their heads together; but still, takin’ his eyes an’ voice into consideration, it must ’a’ been a fine sight; and if ever I get the chance, I’m goin’ to take on as a vestry-man, myself, for at least one term.
[CHAPTER FIFTEEN—TENDER FEELINGS]
Me an’ Horace was regular chums after this. I had got to likin’ him after he had showed up good stuff under treatment; but I never took him serious until he got enthusiastic about Friar Tuck. This proved him to have desirable qualities and made him altogether worth while. A man never gets too old to dote on flattery; but the older he gets the more particular he is about its quality. It’s just like tobacco an’ pie an’ whiskey an’ such things: we start out hungry for ’em an’ take a lot o’ trouble to get ’em in quantity; but after a time we’d sooner go without altogether than not to have a superior article; an’ it’s just the same way with flattery.
I took Horace into my most thoughtful moods as soon as I found out that he was as sound as a nut at heart, an’ that it wasn’t altogether his fault that he had been a pest to me at first. The human mind is like new land, some of it’s rich an’ some poor. Facts is like manure, idees is like seed, an’ education is like spadin’ up an’ hoein’ an’ rakin’. Rich soil is bound to raise somethin’, even if it’s nothin’ but weeds; but poor soil needs special care, or it won’t even raise weeds. Now, manure can be put on so thick it will turn ground sour, an’ seeds can be sowed so thick they will choke each other, an’ a green hand will sometimes hoe up the vegetables an’ cultivate the weeds; but the soil ain’t to blame for this.
Poor Horace’s mind had been bungled to an infernal degree; an’ it kept me busy rootin’ up sprouts o’ Greek religion. I’d have stood this better if the Greek gods an’ godduses had had Christian names; ’cause I own up ’at some o’ his tales of ’em was interestin’; but I couldn’t keep track of ’em, an’ so I made him discard ’em in his conversations with me; an’ the way he flattered me was, to reform himself accordin’ to what I demanded.
I was teachin’ him how to shoot, an’ he was enjoyin’ it a lot. He had plenty o’ money, and took pleasure in spendin’ it. This was good, ’cause it costs a lot o’ money to become a good shot. I’m glad I don’t know what it cost me to learn how to shoot a man through both ears after doin’ the double reverse roll. I never had but one fit chance to use this, an’ then I shot Frenchy through his ears without rememberin’ to use the roll. I allus felt bad about this, ’cause I had a good audience, an’ nothin’ saves a man from the necessity o’ shootin’ his fellows, so much as havin’ it well advertised that he is thoroughly qualified to do it in proper style. I kept up my own practicin’ while teachin’ Horace, an’ we had right sociable times.
He could throw up a tin can with his left hand, pull his gun and, about once out o’ ten shots, hit the can before it fell; which is purty fair shootin’; but he was beginnin’ to suspect that he was a regular gun-man; which is a dangerous idee for any one to get into his head. I tried to weight down his head a little to keep him sensible, but instead o’ thankin’ me he went off with Tank, who shot up a lot of his cartridges at target practice; and in return, puffed up the top-heavy opinion Horace already had of himself.
He took Horace down to a warm cañon where the’ was a lot o’ rattlesnakes, claimin’ it was necessary to test him out an’ see if he had nerve on a livin’ creature. He shot off the heads o’ three snakes, hand-runnin’, an’ it nearly broke his hatband.
When he told me about it, I let him know ’at Tank was only workin’ him. “A rattlesnake will strike at a flash, Horace,” sez I; “an’ it was the snake’s eyes which were accurate, not yours.” This cut him up an’ made him a little offish with me for a few days, until he found I had told him the truth. Ol’ Tank Williams wasn’t no fancy shot; but I’d rather have tackled Horace with a gun, cocked in his hand, than ol’ Tank, with his gun asleep in its holster.
After Horace had made the test of shootin’ at dead snakes an’ had found that he couldn’t pop off three heads hand-runnin’, he simmered down a little an’ paid more heed to what I told him; but after I had proved that I told him straighter stuff ’n Tank did, I decided it would be necessary to punish him a little. I didn’t get downright cold with him, because I didn’t want to exaggerate his vanity any more ’n it already was; but I made it a point to do my loafin’ with Spider Kelley. Horace was crazy to go bear-huntin’; but I didn’t seem interested, an’ I recommended ol’ Tank Williams as bein’ some the best bear-hunter the’ was in existence. I wasn’t jealous of Horace goin’ off shootin’ with Tank; but still if a feller chooses to dispense with my company, I allus like to show him ’at I can stand it as long as he can.
Quite a string o’ years had slipped away since the bettin’ barber o’ Boggs had strung ol’ man Dort; so I reminded Spider ’at we had agreed to help even that up sometime; and Spider, he said he was ready to do his part, whatever it happened to be; so we planned idees out among ourselves, while Horace hung around lookin’ wishful.
We had never given it away about the woodchuck not bein’ a regular squirrel; so the boys still used to congregate together purty often at ol’ man Dort’s to marvel at the way Columbus had filled out an’ took on flesh. He had got rough an’ blotchy soon after he had won the contest from Ben Butler, the red squirrel, an’ it was plain to all that Eugene had done some high-toned barberin’ on him before the day o’ the show.
Ol’ man Dort didn’t have no affection for Columbus—fact is, he sort o’ hated him for bein’ bigger ’n Ben Butler; but he kept him fat an’ fit so as to be ready to enter in a contest the minute any feller came along with a squirrel he thought was big enough to back up with a bet. The trouble was, that mighty few fellers out that way owned any squirrels, an’ as the years dragged by without him gettin’ any pastime out o’ Columbus, ol’ man Dort’s affection for him grew thinner an’ thinner. Some o’ the boys discovered him to be a woodchuck; but no one told of it for fear the old man would slaughter Eugene.
The old man kept on gettin’ barbered, so as to have the chance o’ clashin’ with Eugene about every subject which came up; but finally he got so he could be shaved in a decent, orderly manner without havin’ his head tied down to the rest. Him an’ Eugene was the most antagonistic fellers I ever met up with; but it was a long time before me an’ Spider could think up a way to get ’em fairly at it again.
One day Spider came ridin’ in from Danders, bubblin’ over with excitement, and yells out—“Pete Peabody’s got a freak guinea-pig.”
“That’s glorious news,” sez I. “Let’s get all the boys together an’ hold a celebration.”
“I guess a freak guinea-pig’s as worthy o’ bein’ commented on as airy other kind of freak,” sez Spider, stridin’ off to the corral, purty well pouted up.
He hadn’t more ’n reached it before an idee reached me, an’ I ran after him. “What is the’ freakish about this guinea-pig, Spider?” sez I.
“He’s got a tail,” snapped Spider.
“Ain’t they all got tails?” sez I.
“You know they ain’t,” he sez. “You remember what that feller from the East said last spring—if you hold up a guinea-pig by the tail, his eyes fall out, an’ then when we didn’t believe it, he told us they didn’t have no tails. Pete sez that this guinea-pig is the only one in the world what has a tail.”
“Do you reckon he’d sell it?”
“He’d sell the hair off his head,” sez Spider.
“Well, you go back there an’—But say, has Pete got any others?”
“He had ten when I left, an’ no knowin’ how many he’s got by this time. Pete sez ’at guinea-pigs is the prolificest things the’ is,” sez Spider.
“You buy three of ’em, Spider,” sez I; “a male one an’ a female one, an’ this here freak.”
“What do I want with ’em?” sez Spider.
“I’ll pay half, an’ show you how to make money out of ’em,” sez I.
“I don’t want to tinker with no such cattle as them,” sez Spider.
“You get a fresh pony, an’ it won’t take you no time at all,” sez I.
So Spider got the pony an’ went off grumblin’. When he brought ’em back he had ’em in a small box an’ they certainly was curious lookin’ insects. “I paid four bits apiece for the male an’ the female,” sez Spider, “an’ twenty-five real dollars for the freak.”
“If that’s the way prices run,” sez I, “it ain’t no wonder that guinea-pigs what are ambitious to be popular, are willin’ to give up the luxury o’ tails.”
“Now then, what in thunder are we goin’ to do with ’em?” sez Spider.
“Get a fresh pony,” sez I, “an’ we’ll go on over to Boggs.”
“You go to the equator!” yells Spider. “I ain’t had no sleep for a week.”
“Sleep,” sez I, “what’s the use o’ botherin’ about sleep? You keep on losin’ your strength this way, an’ in about a year they’ll be trundlin’ you around in a baby cart. All right then, you stay home an’ be company for the freak. We’ll hide him up in the attic so the rats can’t get him.”
“Oh I could stand it to go without sleep, if I saw any sense in it,” sez Spider; “but hanged if I’m goin’ to ride my bones through my skin just to please you.”
“Suit yourself,” sez I. “We’ll put the freak in the tin cake-box an’ punch a few holes in it to give him air. I’ll do that while you’re makin’ up your mind about goin’ along to Boggs.”
“What you goin’ to do with the male an’ the female?” sez Spider as I started away.
“I’m goin’ to sell ’em to Eugene,” I calls back over my shoulder, an’ then I knew I’d have company.
“I thought you was goin’ to Boggs,” sez Spider as soon as we had settled into a travelin’ trot. I allus find that I get along easier with people if I just leave ’em one or two items to puzzle over.
“Webb Station is closer,” sez I; “an’ if this deal causes any hard feelin’ it will be just as well not to be mixed up in it ourselves.”
“I thought you was goin’ to sell these to Eugene?” sez Spider.
“If you’d just go to sleep, Spider,” sez I, “it would save your brain the trouble o’ thinkin’ up a lot o’ thoughts which ain’t no use anyhow. I’m goin’ to let Shorty take ’em over this evenin’ an’ sell ’em to Eugene.”
“How do you know he wants ’em?”
“’Cause I know Eugene,” sez I. “I’ll fix up Shorty’s tale for him.”
Well, we explained to Shorty the bettin’ principle of guinea-pigs, an’ gave him the pigs, tellin’ him he could have all he won from Eugene on the first bet; but to then sell ’em to Eugene without lettin’ any o’ the other fellers know anything about it, an’ to make Eugene think that he had picked ’em up from a train passenger, not from us.
Shorty said that he’d go over that afternoon as soon as the passenger had gone—Shorty was the telegraph operator—so Spider an’ I came back, he sleepin’ all the way.
“Where do we come in on this deal?” sez Spider next day.
“We’ll give Eugene a chance to cut their hair a new way, an’ then we’ll go over to Boggs an’ line things up.”
“I’m beginnin’ to see how it could be worked out,” sez Spider, grinnin’.
In about a week we went over to Boggs, an’ found the town purty well deserted. We dropped into ol’ man Dort’s to compliment Columbus some an’ sympathize with Ben Butler a little, while tryin’ to hear if Eugene had made his play yet. The ol’ man was gloatin’ over the fact that Eugene wasn’t havin’ much trade, but he didn’t mention anything about guinea-pigs.
“You don’t seem rushed, yourself,” sez I.
“Course I ain’t,” he flares back. “Most o’ the fellers are still roundin’ up, an’ the rest are out huntin’ for Red Erickson.”
“Red been gettin’ thoughtless again?” sez I. Red Erickson was a big Dane who had the habit o’ runnin off stock an’ shootin’ any one who disagreed with him.
The ol’ man merely pointed to a paper pinned up on the wall offerin’ fifteen hundred dollars for Red, dead or alive. He hadn’t been operatin’ on Diamond Dot stuff, so we hadn’t paid much heed to him.
We strolled on over to Eugene’s an’ found him sittin’ down an’ talkin’ about the peculiar custom o’ guinea-pigs; so we knew that he had swallered the bait; but he didn’t offer to bet with us.
Then we went back an’ asked ol’ man Dort if he believed that a guinea-pig’s eyes would fall out if he was held up by the tail.
“It’s all rot!” sez the ol’ man, indignant. “Any one who sez such nonsense never studied the way eyes is fastened in. The tail ain’t got nothin’ to do with it.”
“What kind o’ tails has guinea-pigs got?” sez I.
“Why they got—?” sez the ol’ man, an’ then stopped an’ looked blank. “What kind o’ tails have they got?”
“They haven’t got any,” sez I. “Now listen; would you be willin’ to risk a little money to even up with Eugene?”
“I’d risk every thing I got, down to my very hide,” sez the ol’ man, earnest to a degree.
“Well, then, you play careful an’ we’ll provide you with the cards,” sez I. “Eugene has some guinea-pigs, an’ he is plannin’ to string you on a bet. You come right along just as though you was as ignorant as you look, have a day fixed to decide the bet, let us know, an’ for the small sum of fifty dollars we’ll provide you with a guinea-pig which has a tail.”
“I’ll make a pauper out of him,” sez the ol’ man. “I haven’t had a chance to get a bet on Columbus since I owned him.”
“You just land Eugene,” sez I, “an’ that’ll be sport enough for one while.”
“I got shaved twice to-day,” sez the ol’ man feelin’ his chin, “’cause we got into a discussion about comets; but I reckon I can stand another to-morrow.”
The next day the old man asked Eugene what all kind o’ game grew in Africa. “Elephants, hippopotamusses an’ guinea-pigs,” sez Eugene.
“Guinea-pigs?” sez the ol’ man.
“Yes, they’re the most curious animals the’ is in existence,” sez Eugene.
“How big are they?” asked ol’ man Dort. He hadn’t an idea in the world, an’ was beginnin’ to think that if they sized up with elephants an’ hippopotamusses, he didn’t want to have to lift one by the tail to win his bet.
“They ain’t any bigger ’n young rabbits,” sez Eugene, stroppin’ his razor; “but the curious part of ’em is that if you hold up one by the tail, his eyes’ll drop out.”
“I’ll bet a hundred dollars they wouldn’t do it,” sez the ol’ man.
“That’s a safe enough bet,” sez Eugene, calm an’ easy. “They’re worth all the way up to five hundred dollars a pair, an’ it ain’t likely that a man would invest that amount in something, just to win a hundred-dollar bet.”
They sparred back an’ forth for a couple o’ days until finally Eugene bet nine hundred in cash—all he had in the world—an’ his shop an’ fixin’s, again’ eleven hundred dollars, that the old man couldn’t lift a guinea-pig by the tail without his eyes fallin’ out. If the ol’ man didn’t lift one by the tail, he lost the bet. They set the date for a week ahead, an’ the ol’ man bet Eugene three hundred dollars that he’d win the bet, takin’ Eugene’s promissory agreement for his end of it.
We brought in the freak the day before the contest an’ the ol’ man’s eyes lit up when he see the tail. It wasn’t much of a tail at that; but it was a sure enough tail an’ plenty long enough to lift him by, an’ strong enough too, an’ the’ was regular bones in it, just like any tail.
The’ was only a fair sized crowd of us on hand to see the test; but Eugene went through all the preliminaries, an’ then took the cover off his box an’ pointed to the guinea-pigs. He had shaved the parts of ’em where tails naturally belong, an’ when the boys see that they didn’t have no tails, they howled with laughter an’ began to hoot ol’ man Dort; an’ Eugene confided to ’em the plans he had for spendin’ the money he’d won.
Ol’ man Dort, he walked calmly up to the box, examined the guinea-pigs, an’ sez: “These here is not the full-blooded guinea-pigs. The full-blooded ones live in a mountainous? country an’ use their tails to steer with when they jump from rock to rock; while this kind live in swamps an’ the young alligators keep on eatin’ off their tails until they don’t have any. I’ll go get a thoroughbred an’ do my liftin’ on him.”
Well this set ’em back a good ways; an’ as the ol’ man was walkin’ off to get his own speciment, a good many bets was put up, but Eugene didn’t take any.
Purty soon, back come the ol’ man; an’ hanged if he hadn’t clipped the hair off o’ his one’s tail too. He reached in his hand an’ stroked the long-faced little duffer, an’ sez: “Gently, George the Third, gently.” Then he put on an anxious look an’ picked up the guinea-pig by the tail, holdin’ his other hand underneath to catch any eyes what happened to spill out. They didn’t none drop out, an’ the crowd give a cheer; but Eugene was all in.
He was a bad loser was Eugene, an’ he didn’t join in the festivities any. He just took up his two guineas an’ went back to his shop, while the rest of us celebrated a few. After a time me an’ Spider went to console with him a little. He was so infernally down in the mouth that I began to get a little conscience-struck. Eugene said he had been savin’ up his money to pay off the mortgage on his birthplace; an’ he made a purty sad story out of it. Fact was, that he made so sad a story out of it that I decided to get him back his tools and give him a new start.
[CHAPTER SIXTEEN—THEMIS IN THE ROCKIES]
“How much money you got, Spider?” I sez.
“I reckon I got sixty dollars,” sez Spider.
“I don’t mean just what you got with ya, I mean how much cash do you possess in the world.”
“I suppose I could raise a hundred an’ fifteen,” sez Spider, after thinkin’ a while. “What do you want to know for?”
“We got to give Eugene a start,” sez I.
Spider looked at me until he saw I was in earnest, an’ then he talked out loud. “What’s the matter with you?” he yells. “We haven’t adopted Eugene, have we? Why-for do we have to give him a start? Didn’t he lose at his own game. Great Snakes! You make me tired!”
“That was a low-down trick we played,” sez I.
“It wasn’t no lower down ’n him ringin’ in a woodchuck on the old man; and all we did it for was to square things up.”
“Yes,” sez I; “but it took us some several years to square it up, and I don’t intend to have Eugene’s moanful voice surgin’ through my ears until I’m able to think up a come-back for him. I’m goin’ to give him a start, and if you don’t feel like riskin’ your money, I’ll do it alone.”
“Do you mean ’at you’re just goin’ to pay over the price of his tools, an’ let it go at that?” sez Spider.
“That wouldn’t be any fun,” sez I. “I’m goin’ to get the tools; but I intend to get ’em for as little expense as possible, and if I can have a little fun out of it, I don’t intend to pass it up.”
Spider studied it over a while. “Well, I’ll risk fifty,” he sez after a bit; so we went back to Eugene’s.
“Would you be willin’ to do a stunt to get back your tools?” sez I.
He raised a pair o’ weepy eyes to me an’ sez: “Aw, the’ ain’t no show. I’ve a good mind to kill myself.”
“Please don’t do that,” sez Spider, who never could stand a bad loser. “When you lose your money, you allus stand a chance to win more money; but when you lose your life, why, the’ ain’t nothin’ left except to go up an’ find out what reward it earned for you.”
“Aw hell,” muttered Eugene.
“Ye-es,” agreed Spider, talkin’ through his nose, like a missionary preacher, “I reckon that is about what you’d draw, if you was to cash in now; but if you stick around an’ do your duty, you run the risk o’ havin’ better luck later on.”
After Spider had insulted Eugene until he began to sass back a little, I broke in and sez that if Eugene will agree to do what I tell him, I’ll agree to get him back his outfit; so then he wants to know what I have in mind.
“Are you willin’ to disguise yourself as a genuwine mountain trapper?” sez I.
When I sez this, Spider exploded a laugh which would ’a’ hurt the feelin’s of a sheep, and Eugene tied into us as wordy as a fox terrier; but I soothed him down an’ told him I was in earnest. “I’m willin’ to do most anything to get my tools back,” sez Eugene; “but I don’t see how I can make myself look like a genuwine trapper.”
“Have you got any false wigs and beards?” sez I.
“No, I haven’t,” sez he; “but I saved up the stuff I reaped off o’ ol’ man Dort, and I reckon I could make some.”
“The very thing!” sez I. “You fix up a rig that’ll make you look to be a hundred years old; and we’ll hunt up clothes for ya. All you’ll have to do will be to guide a green Eastener out to shoot a bear, and we’ll have the bear and everything ready for ya.”
“No, ya don’t,” sez Eugene. “I don’t fool around no bears.”
“I thought you was tired o’ life,” sez Spider.
“Well, I’m not so tired of it that I’m willin’ to have it squeezed out o’ me by a bear,” sez Eugene.
“This won’t be a real bear,” sez I; “and anyhow, they’ll be a ravine between you and it. You claimed once to be a show actor, and all you’ll have to do will be to pertend ’at you’re actin’.”
“I once was a genuwine amateur actor,” sez Eugene, “and if you’ll make it clear to me that there ain’t no danger, I’ll take the job.”
Then I explained just what he had to do; and after this me an’ Spider, who was now keen for the outcome, went around to dicker with ol’ man Dort. He was bumpin’ around among the clouds, so we didn’t have any trouble in buyin’ back Eugene’s stuff on time. When I asked him what he’d charge for Columbus, the woodchuck, he gave a snort, and said he’d throw him in for good measure; so I told him to just keep him out o’ sight for a few days, and we started back to Eugene’s.
“What do you want with that dog-gone woodchuck?” asked Spider.
“I want him to take the part of a grizzly bear,” sez I.
Spider stopped an’ looked at me. “This is goin’ too far,” sez he. “It’s bad enough to try to fool some one into believin’ ’at Eugene’s a genuwine trapper; but you couldn’t make a rag doll believe ’at Columbus was a grizzly bear.”
“You go borrow that squaw dress from Ike Spargle, an’ then we’ll see how much like a trapper Eugene’ll look,” sez I.
I went on an’ found ’at Eugene had done a master job o’ wig makin’, even fixin’ false eyebrows, an’ when he put on ol’ man Dort’s hair-crop he locked older ’n the human race. As soon as Spider came in with the squaw dress, we put it on Eugene; and while he didn’t look like anything I’d ever seen before, he looked more like the first man ’at ever started trappin’ than like anything else, an’ Spider Kelley nearly had a convulsion.
We bunked with Eugene that night; but he kept us awake bemoanin’ his cruel fate until Spider threatened to drown him head first in a bucket o’ water and after that we had a little go at slumberin’. I routed ’em out about two an’ drilled ’em up to the high ground above Spear Crick, where we waited until sun-up. Eugene was wearin’ his trapper riggin’, and in the starlight, he sure was a ghastly sight.
Just across from us on the other side o’ the crick was Sholte’s Knoll, and when the sun rose, I lined us up to be just in a direct line with it across the knoll. Both Eugene, and Spider bothered me with questions and discouragin’ kicks; but I felt purty sure my scheme would work, and only told ’em what was really for their good.
The crick ran south in a gorge, and just below us it ran into Rock River, which came from the east and made a sharp turn to the south just where Spear Crick ran into it. After the sun was up, we climbed down a circlin’ trail until we came to Rock River. Eugene refused to try to ford it; but Spider and I went across and up to Ivan’s Knoll. Rock River was bigger than Spear Crick, and Ivan’s Knoll was bigger than Sholte’s Knoll; but not one tenderfoot in a million could have told ’em apart, and Spider got gleeful at the plan—except that he kept at me to know who I was tryin’ to land. Back of Ivan’s Knoll was a round hole about ten feet across, called the Bottomless Pit, because the’ was no bottom to it. After examinin’ this place, we went on and crossed Rock River again until we came out at Sholte’s Knoll across from where the shootin’ was to be done.
“What you are to do, Spider,” sez I, “is to be at this place before dawn with Columbus tied by a stout cord. Tie him to the rock at the south end of the knoll by a weak cord, then pass your stout cord up over that jag o’ rock at the top, and just as soon as the sun hits the knoll, pull hard enough to break the weak cord, lead him gently up the slope until he has been shot at several times, then—”
“Is Eugene, that genuwine, ancient trapper goin’ to do the shootin’?” interrupted Spider.
“He is not,” sez I. “If Columbus gets shot, all you’ll have to do will be to wind around to Boggs and meet me there. If he don’t get shot, you can either turn him adrift, kill him yourself, or pack him back to ol’ man Dort’s, accordin’ to the dictates o’ your own conscience. I’ll bring the party ’at does the shootin’ up to Ivan’s Knoll, an’ make him think the bear has fallen down the Bottomless Pit after he was shot.”
“Happy,” sez Spider, “hanged if I believe it’ll go through; and I won’t be a sucker unless you tell me who is to do the shootin’.”
“Horace,” sez I, “Horace Walpole Bradford.”
Spider’s face changed expression a half dozen times in two moments; but he didn’t have any more kicks; so we went back to Eugene, and took him up to a deserted cabin, where he was to stay until needed. I left him and Spider to fix up the cabin, while I went back to the Dot to fix up Horace. Horace had a lot o’ money; but it did go again’ me to make him pay for Eugene’s outfit by puttin’ up a practical joke on him. Still, I felt called upon to square it up with Eugene, and this seemed the fairest way.
When I reached the Dot, Horace came forth to meet me; and he was so glad to see me ’at I purt’ nigh gave up the scheme; but I had gone too far to back out now, so I acted cool, and cut him short with my answers.
After supper I got Tank started on bear. He saw I had something up my sleeve, so he talked bear until Horace’s mouth began to water. “I’d give a hundred dollars, just to get a shot at a bear,” sez Horace.
“This ain’t the time o’ the year to hunt bear,” sez I. “Food’s so common at this season that a bear spends most of his time loafin’; and it’s hard to get sight o’ one. Course, if you was to go to a professional hunter, he’d know where bears were spendin’ their vacation; but it might take a month for one of us to root one out.”
“Do you know of any professional hunters?” sez he.
I didn’t say nothin’, and Tank told of some he knew several hundred miles off. After Tank had talked himself out, I mentioned careless like that old Pierre La Blanc was livin’ less ’n twenty miles away; but that I doubted if he’d take a bear-huntin’ job. I went on to state that he had money saved up, and it would take a sight o’ coin to tempt him.
“I’d give five hundred dollars for a shot at a real grizzly,” sez Horace.
“Did you ever use a rifle?” sez I.
“Ask Tank,” sez Horace.
Tank told about Horace havin’ borrowed ol’ Cast Steel’s forty-five-seventy, and that he had learned to hit a mark with it in able shape. Before we turned in that night, I had let Horace tease me into takin’ him over to Pierre’s next day.
We reached the old cabin next afternoon, and found it lookin’ purty comfortable. Eugene had soiled his hands and what part of his face showed; and he certainly did look outlandish. He could act some, I’ll say that for him; and he pertended so natural that it took Tank a half hour to tell who he was. He didn’t talk much, but when he did he used broken French, and he made a contract with Horace to get the five hundred as soon as he had showed him the bear, Tank to hold the check.
Eugene couldn’t get food through his whiskers; so he said most of his teeth were gone, and et his supper in private. After supper, I stole down the gulch and found Spider waitin’. He promised to be on hand the next mornin’ and we turned in early.
Next mornin’ we started at three, and took up our place at the mark I had made across from Sholte’s Knoll. Horace thought it perfectly wonderful that the old trapper would know exactly where a grizzly bear would be at sun-up; and he chattered constant in a hushed voice. We told him it was a full quarter across to the knoll, and he had a regular ecstasy about how deceivin’ the atmosphere was—which was rank libel, the atmosphere bein’ about the least deceivin’ member o’ that party.
Presently, I caught the smell o’ dawn, and I told Horace to keep his eyes glued on Chimney Peak, a little over twenty miles to the west. He did so, and in about five minutes, a gob o’ rich crimson splashed on it, rippled down the sides, and poured along the foothills at the bottom. Horace gave a gasp. You don’t see such a dawn as that with your eyes alone; you see it with somethin’ inside your bosom; and when I saw the gleam in Horace’s eyes, it made me feel ashamed of what I was up to; but I couldn’t stop just for this; so I nudged Eugene, and that hoary old trapper growled out to Horace to watch the knoll, or he’d miss his chance.
Horace was surprised to see the east still in a black shadow. He started to speak words about it, but just then the sun, lookin’ like an acre of red fire, jumped up from behind Sholte’s Knoll like a sacred jack-rabbit.
The knoll was consid’able higher than us, and just as the sun was half-circle behind it, a gigantic form started to walk across it from south to north. I knew, positive, that this was Columbus the woodchuck; but it was just all I could do to believe it, myself, and Horace thought it was the biggest silver-tip in creation. I didn’t think the woodchuck ran much risk of gettin’ shot; but Horace didn’t lose his nerve a particle. He banged away, Columbus gave a lurch, took a snap at his side, and rolled out o’ sight behind the knoll, as natural as a fried egg.
Horace jumped up and down, hugged himself, slapped us on the back, and almost knocked the aged trapper’s fur off; but if he had, I doubt if he would have noticed it, he was so eager to get to his first bear.
We wound down the path, and he complained about it bein’ so much farther ’n he had expected; but I spoke a few words about the atmosphere, and he was soothed. When we struck Rock River, he was surprised to see how much wider it was than it looked from where he’d shot; but he didn’t falter none about goin’ in; while I purt’ nigh had to twist off the seasoned trapper’s arm before he’d get his feet wet. The water was purty high, and Tank and I had our hands full gettin’ ’em across.
We climbed the trail on the other side to Ivan’s Knoll. This was about a mile south o’ Sholte’s Knoll, and naturally I didn’t expect to find any game on the other side of it; so you can judge my feelin’s when we got around to the other side, and saw that woodchuck’s carcass, lyin’ flat on its back with its front feet folded across a piece o’ paper.
Horace saw it, too; but he wasn’t interested at first, and dove all about, lookin’ for his bear. He was plumb wild; but finally he picked up the piece o’ paper, and read what was wrote on it in scrawly letters, which I knew to be the work o’ Spider Kelley: “Before I was shot I was a grizzly bar but it made me feel so small to get shot by a tender-foot that I have shrank to what you see befor you.”
That confounded Kelley hadn’t been able to resist workin’ the joke back on me; so he had toted Columbus down from Sholte’s Knoll, and then skipped. I knew I wouldn’t see him for some time—but I also knew I wouldn’t forget what was comin’ to him when I did.
Horace read the note through in silence, then he looked at the remains of the woodchuck, then he read the note again, and his face got like a sunset. He read the note once more, and then he leaped through the air for that veteran trapper, and grabbed him by the beard. The beard and wig came off in his hands, and Eugene started to flee, with Horace a close second, kickin’ the seat o’ that squaw dress at every jump. Horace was in able shape, and Eugene was flimsy; so when he tripped and rolled over, Horace got him by the ears, and proceeded to beat his head on a stone, the way Tank had told about doin’ to the unobligin’ old miner.
I pulled Horace off to save Eugene’s life, and then Horace pulled out a gun and tried to take my life. It took us two solid hours to cool Horace down below the boilin’ point; and then he started off alone with his lips set and his eyebrows pulled down to the bridge of his nose. I liked him better ’n ever. He was as game as they made ’em, and had even forgot the check ’at ol’ Tank Williams was still holdin’; but I was honestly worried about Eugene.
Part of it may have been due to havin’ his head beat mellow on a stone; but still he allus did lack sand when he was losin’, and now he sat tuggin’ at his real hair an’ swearin’ he was ruined, and would take his own life the first chance he had. It was partly my fault; so I made Tank help me tote back Eugene’s needin’s from the deserted cabin to his shop, Eugene goin’ along in a stupor and repeatin’ to us constant that he intended to drink his own heart’s blood.
I sent Tank back to the Dot to see what he could do toward pacifyin’ Horace, and then I returned the squaw dress to Ike Spargle. He broke into a side-split when I stepped into his place, and fairly deluged me with liquor; but I wasn’t in no mood for it. Ike told me ’at Spider had gone out to the Dot to notify that he had quit temporary; and then he was goin’ out to hunt down Red Erickson for the bounty. Ike was equally willin’ to talk about bears or Red Erickson; but I wasn’t conversational, so I went back to Eugene’s.
He had his door locked, and at first refused me admittance; but finally he let me in, and I told him I would let him have his outfit on time. He wouldn’t scarcely listen to me; so the best I could do was to get his promise that he wouldn’t slay himself inside the house, as the boys were superstitious again’ it, and would burn it down. As it was again’ my credit at ol’ man Dort’s, I felt more agreeable toward payin’ for a standin’ house, than for just the ashes of one.
“When I’m gone, Happy,” sez Eugene, “I want you to send my watch back to Sommersville, Connecticut. That’s all I ask of ya. You’ve been as near a friend to me as any one in this ungodly community has, and I don’t bear ya no ill will. If I could just have paid off that mortgage—”
I shook hands with him and went outside, where I settled myself comfortable and made ready to keep watch on him until he started to drink. I felt sure that if he’d once get to elevatin’ a bottle, it would take his mind off suicide; but he paced up and down inside his room until I was purt’ nigh out o’ my own head.
It must have been nine in the evenin’ when he stole out his side door with a forty-five under his coat; and started up the ravine which opens west o’ town, and I follered like a coyote.
He went up it about a mile, an’ then he stopped an’ I flattened out an’ crept closer an’ closer. I knew he would make a few remarks first, even though he was alone, an’ I judged I could wriggle up close enough to grab him in the act.
He fished out his gun, an’ I see that he didn’t savvy the use of it, which put a little uncertainty into my end o’ the game.
“Farewell, cruel world,” he muttered mournfully, usin’ his gun to gesture with. “Farewell, sweet dreams of childhood; farewell ambition an’ love an’ dear tyranic duty; farewell moon an’ stars an’ gentle breezes, farewell—”
Eugene would probably have gone on sayin’ farewell to each particular thing in the world until he talked himself to sleep, but just then a pebble slipped from the side o’ the ravine and rolled to his feet, and he stopped with a jerk an’ listened. Then he straightened himself an’ sez in a determined tone: “Nobody can’t prevent me. I shall end it now.”
Before I could move, he placed the muzzle to his forehead an’ fired, rollin’ over on his back. I heard a sort of cough, like when a man hits his best with an ax, an’ somethin’ came plumpin’ down the ravine like an avalanche.
I rushed up, lit a match, an’ there on his back was Eugene, a small red welt on his forehead, but looking calm and satisfied, while almost on top of him lay a man in a heap. I straightened him out, lit another match, an’ looked at the stranger. His hair was flamin’ red an’ you could have tied his red mustaches around the back of his neck. He was shot through the forehead an’ plumb dead.
I saw how it was in a flash: Eugene had almost missed himself, but had shot Red Erickson, who had been hidin’ up the side of the ravine behind him. I slipped Red’s empty gun into his hand, emptied Eugene’s gun; an’ then I tore for town, gathered up the boys an’ told ’em that Eugene had gone up the ravine bent on mischief. We got a lantern and hurried up the ravine where Eugene was just comin’ back to genuwine consciousness again.
He sat there with his head in his hands tryin’ to cheer himself with some o’ the mournfullest moanin’ ever I heard. I held the lantern to Red’s face a moment an’ bawled out: “Boys, this is Red Erickson! Him an’ Eugene has been duelin’, an’ they have killed each other.”
This gave Eugene his cue—an’ a cue was all Eugene ever needed. He pulled himself together, took plenty o’ time to get the lay o’ the land; an’ then he gave us a tale o’ that fight which laid over anything I ever heard in that line.
We carried ’em back to town, an’ Eugene was a hero for true. He got the reward all right, paid off his debts, an’ kept addin’ details to that fight until it was enough to keep a feller awake nights. His reputation picked up right along until even ol’ man Dort had to admit the’ was more to Eugene than he had allowed.
Next day when I got back to the Diamond Dot, I found Horace all packed up for leavin’; and it made me feel mournful to the bones o’ my soul. I didn’t know how much I thought of him until he started to pull out; and I felt so ashamed at what I had done, that I offered to let him kick me all about the place if he’d just forget about it and stick along.
But Horace had a stiff neck, all right, and he wouldn’t give in. Tank had had all he could do to get Horace to take the check back; and now, try as I would, I couldn’t get him to stay. I drove over to the station with him, and we had a long talk together. He was in a good humor when he left, and I could see he was wishful to stay; but havin’ made up his mind, he stuck to it. He said he had had more fun while with us than durin’ all the procedure of his life; and that if we had just kept the joke among us Dotters, he wouldn’t have felt so cut up about it. I told him he had acted just right and that I had acted dead wrong, although it was him takin’ Tank’s word above mine which had first made me sore.
This was new light to him, and he softened up immediate. Fact was, we got purt’ nigh girlish before the train pulled out with him wavin’ his handkerchief from the back porch.
I still feel some shame about this episode; and if any o’ you fellers ask any more questions to lead me into tellin’ of my own silly pranks, why, I’ll drive you off the place, and then get my lips sewed shut.
[CHAPTER SEVENTEEN—KIT MURRAY]
Horace had left, I felt purty lonely for a while. It’s hard for me to look back and keep things in regular order; because the different lines cross each other and get mixed up. Always, little Barbie’s affairs came first with me; but I reckon most of you have heard her story, so I’m keepin’ shy of it this time. First of all there was my innermost life, which would have been mostly mine no matter where I’d gone; then there was the part of my life which touched Barbie’s, and this was the best and the highest part of it; and then there was the part which touched Friar Tuck an’ a lot of others, each one of which helped to make me what I am; but back of it all was my work; so it’s not strange if I find it hard to stick to the trail of a story.
Anyway, it was while I was feelin’ lonesome about Horace leavin’ that the Friar first began to use me as a trump card, and called on me for whatever he happened to want done. I was mighty fond o’ bein’ with the Friar; so I lent myself to him whenever I could, and we got mighty well acquainted. He loved fun of a quiet kind; but the’ was allus a sadness in his eyes which toned down my natural devilment and softened me. The’ was lots o’ things I used to enjoy doin’, which I just couldn’t do after havin’ been with the Friar a spell, until I had give myself a good shakin’, like a dog comin’ up out o’ water.
For several quiet years about this time, I used to act as scout for him, now and again, goin’ ahead to round up a bunch when he had time to give ’em a preachin’; or goin’ after him when some one who couldn’t afford a doctor was took sick. We talked about purt’ nigh everything, except that some way, we didn’t talk much about women; so I was never able to pump his own story out of him, though he knew exactly how I felt toward Barbie, long before I did myself.
Durin’ these years, the Friar tried his best to get on terms with the Ty Jones crowd; but they refused to get friendly, and the more he did to make things better in the territory, the more they hated him.
It was right after the spring round-up that I first heard the Friar’s name mixed up with a woman. This allus makes me madder ’n about anything else. When a man and a woman sin, why, it’s bad enough, and I’m not upholdin’ it; but still in a way it’s natural, the same as a wolf killin’ a calf. It’s the cow-puncher’s business to kill the wolf if he can, and he ought to do it as prompt as possible. This is all right; but gossip and scandal is never all right.
Gossip and scandal is like supposin’ the wolf had only wounded the calf a little, and a posse would gather and tie the two of ’em together, the wolf and the wounded calf; and take ’em into the center square of a town and keep ’em tied there for all to see until they had starved to death; and then to keep on stirrin’ up the carrion day after day as long as a shred of it remained.
The Friar was allus a great one to be talkin’ about the power of habits. He said that if folks would just get into the habit of lookin’ for sunshiny days, an’ smilin’ faces an’ noble deeds, and such like, that first thing they knew they’d think the whole world had changed for the better; but instead o’ this they got into the habit of lookin’ for evil, and as that was what they were on the watch for, o’ course they found it. He said it was like a cat watchin’ for a mouse. The cat would plant herself in front of the mouse hole and not do anything else but just watch for the mouse. While she would be on guard, a king might be assassinated, a city might fall in an earthquake, and a ship-load o’ people go down at sea; but if the mouse came out and the cat got it, she would amuse herself with it a while, eat it and then curl up before the fire and purr about what a fine day it had been, all because she had got what she had been lookin’ for; and the’s a lot in this.
Now, when I came to think it over, I hadn’t heard the Friar express himself very free on women. I had heard him say to allus treat ’em kind an’ square, the good ones and the bad; but when ya come to ponder over this, it wasn’t no-wise definite. Still I couldn’t believe ill of him; so I took a vacation an’ started to hunt him up.
The feller who had told me didn’t know much about it, but the feller who had told him knew it all. When I found this feller, he was in the same fix; and he sent me along to the one who had told him. They were all a lot alike in not knowin’ it all; but I finally found out who the girl was.
She was a girl named Kit Murray, and she allus had been a lively young thing with a purty face, an’ could ride an’ shoot like a man. She had took part in a couple o’ frontier-day exhibitions, and it had turned her head, and she had gone out with a show. When she had come back, she had put on more airs ’n ever, and naturally the boys were some wild about her—though I hadn’t seen her myself.
News o’ this kind travels fast, and I heard buzzin’ about it everywhere; but it was just like all other scandal. Most people, when they gossip, believe an’ tell the story which comes closest to what they’d ’a’ done if they’d had the same chance; and what I figured out to be true was, that Olaf the Swede and another Cross-brander by the name o’ Bud Fisher had scrapped about the girl, Olaf near killin’ the kid and the girl runnin’ off to the Friar. Now, all the good deeds ’at the Friar had done hadn’t caused much talk; but this news spread like wild-fire; and a lot o’ those he had helped the most turned again’ him and said they wished they could find out where he was hidin’.
I took it just the other way; I knew the Friar purty well, and what I feared most was, that he wasn’t hidin’ at all, and that Olaf would find him before I could give him warnin’. It was two weeks before I found the Friar; but once I came upon Olaf, face to face, and we eyed each other purty close. This was the first time I ever noticed his eyes. They were the queerest eyes I ever saw, a sort of blue; but a deeper blue, a bluer blue ’n anything I had ever seen outside a flower. The’s a flower on the benches in June just the color of his eyes, a soft, velvety flower; but Olaf’s eyes weren’t soft and velvety the day we met, and they gave me a queer, creepy feelin’. I hope I didn’t show it any; but I did feel relieved after I’d passed him.
Finally I found the Friar, just as I might have expected—by the sound of his voice. I had got clear over into the Basin and was crossin’ through Carter Pass when I heard his voice above me, singin’ one of his marchin’ songs. I was mightily rejoiced to find him; but I had that all out of my face by the time I had wound around up to him. He was totin’ a log on his shoulder, and struttin’ along as jaunty as though the whole earth was simply his backyard.
“Here,” I growls to him, indignant, “what do you mean by makin’ such a noise? Haven’t you got a grain o’ gumption!”
He looked up at me with the surprise stickin’ out from under his grin. “Well, well, well!” sez he. “Who are you—the special officer for the prevention of noise?”
“I ain’t no special officer of anything,” I answers; “but the’s people lookin’ for you, and you ought to have sense enough to keep quiet.”
“And I’m lookin’ for people,” sez he, grinnin’ like a boy; “and the best way to find ’em is by makin’ a noise. The’ ain’t any rules again’ walkin’ on the grass up here, is there?”
“Olaf the Swede is after you on account o’ the gal,” I blunted; “and he ain’t no bluffer. He intends to do away with you for good and all; and you’d better be makin’ your plans.”
“Goin’ to do away with me for good an’ all,” he repeats, smilin’. “Well, Olaf the Swede is a gross materialist. The worst he can do will be to tear off my wrapper and leave me free to find out a lot of things I’m deeply interested in. Why, Happy, you’re all worked up! You’ve lost your philosophy, you’ve become a frettish old woman. What you need is a right good scare to straighten you up again. This Olaf the Swede is part of Ty Jones’s outfit, isn’t he?”
“He is,” I replied, shakin’ my head in warnin’, “and the whole gang’ll back him up in this.”
“Good!” sez the Friar, smackin’ his hand. “I’ve wanted an openin’ wedge into that outfit ever since I came out here. Of a truth, the Lord doth move in a mysterious way, his wonders to perform.”
“Well, he certainly will have to perform some mysterious wonders to get you out of this scrape,” I said. I was put out at the way he took it.
“Don’t be irreverent, Happy,” sez he, the joy-lights dancin’ in his eyes. “We are all merely instruments, and why should an instrument take it upon itself to question the way it is used. Where is this Olaf?”
“I met him yesterday; and for all I know, he’s been followin’ me.”
“Fine, fine!” sez the Friar. “Now, you go on back to the Diamond Dot, and I’ll go back over your trail and save Olaf as much bother as possible.”
“I’m goin’ along with you,” I sez.
“No,” sez he.
“Yes,” sez I.
“It’ll make folks think ’at I’m afraid for my skin, and have you along for protection,” sez he, gettin’ earnest.
“If you had good judgment, you would be afraid for your skin,” sez I. “I tell you that Olaf is after your blood. He’s one o’ the worst; he kills with his bare hands when he gets the chance.”
“Fine, fine!” sez the Friar again, his eyes glowin’ joyous. “I’d have a right to defend myself with my hands, Happy. I would have a right to do this, for the sake of Olaf, you see—to prevent him from risking his own soul by committin’ murder. This is a great chance for me, Happy; now, please, please, go on back like a good fellow.”
I was secretly tickled at the argument the Friar had put up for a chance at physical warfare—and a barehand fight between him and Olaf would have been worth goin’ a long way to see—but I was as obstinate as either of ’em; so I just said ’at I was goin’ along.
“Well, you’re not goin’ with, me,” sez the Friar, as pouty as a schoolboy. “I’ll not speak to ya, and I’ll not have a thing to do with ya”; and he threw down his log and glared at me.
I took a certain amount o’ pride because the Friar lived up to his own standards; but I also found a certain deep-rooted amusement in havin’ him slip out from under ’em for a spell and display a human disposition which was purty much kindred to my own. “What do you purpose doin’ with that club, Friar?” I asked, pointin’ to the log he had flung down.
He pulled in his glare and looked to be a little discomposed. “Why I—I’m livin’ in a cave I got back there.”
“Are you dead set again’ havin’ a little company?” sez I, slow an’ insinuatin’, “or are ya livin’ alone?”
First off, he was inclined to be resentful, then he grinned, shouldered his log again, and said: “Come and see.”
I follered him back into the hills until we came to a little park in which his ponies were grazin’, and then I hobbled mine, cached my gear alongside his, and trailed after him again. His path turned a crag and then skirted along the edge of a cliff as straight up and down as the real truth. The path kept gettin’ narrower, until every time the Friar turned a corner ahead of me, I expected to see him walkin’ off in the air with the log still on his shoulder.
Presently I turned a corner around which he had disappeared, and there wasn’t a soul in sight. The ledge still led along the cliff; but it had got thinner than a lawyer’s excuse, and a worm couldn’t have walked along it without hangin’ on. While I stood there puzzlin’ about it, a hand reached out o’ the side of the cliff, and the Friar’s voice said mockingly: “Take my hand, little one; and then shut your eyes for fear you might get dizzy.”
Then I saw a jag of rock stickin’ out just above my head, I grabbed it with my left hand, and swung around into what was the mouth of a cave. It was nothin’ but a crack about eighteen inches wide, and the far side was sunk in enough to keep it hid from where I was standin’. The Friar was standin’ a few feet back in the entrance with his log leanin’ up again’ the side. “I know not what other animals may have sought shelter here,” he said, “but for the past three years this has been my castle, and, Happy Hawkins,”—here the Friar bowed low—“obstinate and unreasonable as you are, I offer you a hearty welcome.”
The Friar said this in fun, but the’ was an undertone to it which tightened the laces around my heart consid’able. Well, that cave was a sure enough surprise; he had three or four pelts and a couple of Injun blankets on the floor, he had a couple o’ barrels fixed to catch snow water, he had some cookin’ tools; and books! Say, he must have had as many as a hundred books, all of ’em hard-shells, and lookin’ so edicated an’ officious that I had to take off my hat before I had nerve enough to begin readin’ the titles.
After I’d taken everything in, I sat down in an easy chair he’d made out o’ saplin’s and rawhide, and looked all about; but I couldn’t see any signs of their bein’ any other rooms to this cave; and then I jumped square for the mark, and sez: “Friar, the’s a lot o’ talk about you havin’ run off with Kit Murray. Now I want the straight of it.”
His face went grave and a little hurt. “It’s strange,” he said after a time, “how hard it is for a man to believe in his own guilt, and how easy for him to believe in the guilt of his neighbor. Have you had any dinner?”
“Yes,” sez I. “I didn’t know just where I was headin’; so I et three different times this mornin’ to make sure of havin’ enough to run on in case of emergency.”
“It’s a fine thing to be an outdoor animal,” sez the Friar, smilin’. “Well then, I’ve made up my mind to take you to see Kit Murray.”
He didn’t waste any time askin’ me not to talk about what was other folks’ affairs; he just went to the door, grabbed the jag of rock, swung around to the ledge, and I follered after.
We saddled up, rode down a windin’ path ’at I’d never heard of before, and then rode up again until we came to a little clump o’ swamp shrubbery, backed up again’ the north face o’ Mount Mizner. We follered a twisty path through this and finally came out on an open space in which stood a fair-sized cabin. He whistled a five-note call, and the door was opened by an old woman who was a stranger to me. “Mother Shipley, this is Happy Hawkins,” sez he. “How’s Kit?”
The old woman gave me a gimlet look, and then her sharp features expanded to a smile, and she bobbed her head. “Kit’s gettin’ hard to manage,” sez she.
We went into the cabin, and found Kit with a bandage around her ankle, sittin’ in a rockin’ chair, and lookin’ patiently disgusted. She was a fine-lookin’ girl, with a fair streak of boy in her, and she had never had enough practice at bein’ an invalid to shine at it. Her face lit up at the Friar; but her gaze was mighty inquirin’ when she turned it at me.
“You know Happy Hawkins, don’t ya?” sez the Friar. She nodded her head, and he went on. “Well, he’s one o’ the fellers you can trust, if you trust him entire; but he’s got such a bump of curiosity that if you don’t tell it all to him in the first place, he can’t do no other work until he finds it out on his own hook. He’s my friend, and he’ll be your friend; so I want you to tell him just how things are, and then he’ll be under obligations to do whatever we want him to.”
So Kit cut loose and told me her story. Her father, ol’ Jim Murray, had got crippled up about ten years before, and since then had become a professional homesteader, nosin’ out good places, an’ then sellin’ out to the big cattle outfits. He also made it his business to find ways to drive off genuwine homesteaders; and in addition to this he was a home tyrant and hard to live with. He allus had plenty o’ money, but was generally dead broke when it came to pleasant words an’ smiles—which was why Kit had gone off with the show.
While she was away, she had married a low-grade cuss, who had misused her beyond endurance; so when he had skipped with another woman, she had come back to the old man. She didn’t want folks ’at knew her to find out how bad hit she’d been; so she had tried to bluff it out; but the young fellers kept fallin’ in love with her and wantin’ to marry her. She hadn’t meant no harm; but she had played one again’ the other, hopin’ they’d soon have their feelin’s hurt and let her alone. This was a fool notion, but she had been honest in it.
Bud Fisher, the Texas kid in the Ty Jones outfit, had got daffy about her; and then one night at a dance she had shot some smiles into the eyes of Olaf the Swede. She said he was such a glum-lookin’ cuss she had no idee he would take it serious; but he had stood lookin’ into her eyes with his queer blue ones, until she had felt sort o’ fainty; and from that on, he had declared war on all who glanced at her.
Bud Fisher thought it a fine joke for Olaf to fall in love, and he had teased him to the limit. This made a bad condition, and all through the spring round-up, each had done as much dirt as possible to the other; but Ty was mighty strict about his men fightin’ each other; so they hadn’t come to a clash.
Finally the kid brags that he is goin’ to elope with Kit; and then Olaf kicks off his hobbles an’ starts to stampede. The kid was wise enough to vamoose; so Olaf rides down to ol’ man Murray’s, and reads the riot act to him. Kit was hidin’ in the back room and heard it all. He told the old man that he would slaughter any one who eloped with Kit or who had a hand in it; and then he had gone back to hunt the kid again.
The ol’ man turned in and gave Kit a complete harrowin’ as soon as Olaf had left and she had told him pointedly that she’d eat dirt before she’d eat his food again; so she saddled her pony and started to ride without knowin’ where. Her pony had slipped on Carter Pass and she had sprained her ankle so bad she couldn’t stand. Just at this junction, the Friar had come along, and had put her up on his horse and held her on with one arm about her, because the pain in her ankle made her head light. On the way they came smack up again’ the kid, and he gave ’em a grin, and went out without askin’ questions.
He went straight to Olaf, and told him that Kit had eloped with the Friar. The Friar had brought her up to Shipley’s, they havin’ been friends of his in Colorado. They had a daughter livin’ up in Billings, Montana; and as soon as her ankle could stand it, Kit was goin’ up to live with the daughter, she havin’ three little children and a railroad husband who was away from home more ’n half the time.
This was the whole o’ the story; but you can easy see what a fine prospect it made for gossip, and also what a fine time a young imp like Bud Fisher could have with a sober feller like Olaf. Olaf wouldn’t have just grounds for makin’ away with Bud for doin’ nothin’ except grin, so long as the Friar remained alive with the girl in his keepin’. It was a neat little mess; and from what we found out afterwards, the kid was as irritatin’ as a half-swallered cockle-burr.
Big, silent fellers like Olaf are just like big, new boilers. A little leaky boiler fizzes away all the time, but when it comes to explode, it hasn’t anything on hand to explode with; while a big, tight boiler, when it does go off, generally musses up the landscape consid’able; and when Olaf started to stampede he made more noise in a week ’n Bud Fisher had in his whole life.
When Kit had finished tellin’ me the story, I shook hands with her, and said that while she hadn’t used the best judgment the’ was, she had probably used the best she had; and that it was more the men’s fault than hers, so she could count on me as far as I could travel. Then I went outside while the Friar and ol’ Mother Shipley fixed up her ankle.
They all seemed pleased about the way it was healin’, and after it was tied up, Kit stood on it and even took a few steps. It twisted her face a time or two at first; but after she’d gone across the room and back a few times, she said it felt better ’n it had for years. This made us all laugh, ’cause fact was, she hadn’t been housed in near up to the average of a sprained ankle. The Friar allowed ’at she’d be fit to travel day after the next; so it was planned to start in the evenin’, and for both of us to go with her. Then we had an early supper an’ started home.
On the way, I complained about the foolish way in which Kit had acted, for the sole purpose of drawin’ the Friar out and gettin’ his views on women. Nearly always when I got him started, I was able to pick up some little sayin’ which furnished me with more thought-food than his blocked-out sermons did.
“Of course Kit was foolish,” he admitted; “but what show has she ever had? Her father never was fit to bring her up; and he didn’t even do the best he could. A woman has more vital strength than a man, because the future of the race depends on her; but she also has more emotions, so ’at the wear an’ tear is greater. Man, on the other hand, has more muscle ’n woman, and more brutality. Foolin’ man has been the best way a woman had to fight for a good many centuries; and this was the way poor Kit tried to fight. The plain, simple truth generally works best; but it takes wisdom to see this, and wisdom is seldom anything more than the dregs o’ folly. The’ was no one to teach Kit wisdom; so she has had to strain off her own folly; but she is a fine, brave girl, and I think she will profit by experience.”
Now this was a new thought to me, about wisdom bein’ nothin’ but the dregs o’ folly; but it’s a good tough thought, and I’ve had a heap o’ chewin’ on it since then; so I feel repaid in havin’ took sides again’ Kit and lurin’ the Friar into heavin’ it at me.
It was dark when we reached his twistin’ path along the ledge, and I stepped as cautious as a glow-worm in a powder-mill; but as soon as we had our pipes an’ the fire goin’, I wouldn’t have swapped seats with the fattest king in the universe.
[CHAPTER EIGHTEEN—TESTING THE FRIAR’S NERVE]
As soon as we had eaten breakfast next mornin’, the Friar sez: “You, bein’ one o’ the earth animals, have never had much chance to see a view. Yesterday your curiosity was itchin’ so ’at I doubt if you could have told a mountain peak from a Mexican hat; but now that you have temporarily suppressed your thirst for gossip, had a good sleep, and a better breakfast, drag yourself out to the front porch and take a bird’s-eye view of the world.”
Well, it was worth it, it certainly was worth it! What he called the front porch, was the ledge after it had flipped itself around the jutting; and when a feller stood on it, he felt plenty enough like a bird to make it interestin’. The Big Horns ran across the top o’ the picture about a hundred an’ forty miles to the north, and gettin’ all blended in with the clouds. On the other two sides were different members of the Shoshone family, most o’ which I knew by sight from any angle; and down below was miles an’ miles of country spread out like a map, but more highly colored.
“Friar,” I sez, “you’re a wealthy man.”
This tickled him a lot, ’cause he was as proud o’ that view as if he’d painted it. “I am, Happy,” he said, “and I have yielded to a wealthy man’s temptations. Any one who comes here will be welcome; but I own up, I have kept this place a secret to have it all to myself.”
“A man like you needs some quiet place to consider in,” sez I.
“Get thee behind me, Satan, get thee behind me,” cried the Friar. “I have been on far too friendly terms with that excuse for many a long month. But I do enjoy this place; so I am going to let you help me lay in my winter’s supply of wood, and then make you a joint member in full standing.”
We packed wood along that spider thread of a path all morning; and finally I got so it didn’t phaze me any more ’n it did him. He sang at his work most of the time, and I joined in with him whenever I felt so moved, though it did strike me ’at this was a funny way to keep a place secret; and my idee is that he sang to ease his conscience by showin’ it that he wasn’t sneakin’ about his treasure.
I remember him mighty plain as he walked before me on the ledge, totin’ a big log on his shoulder, and singin’ the one ’at begins, “Hark, my soul! It is the Lord!” This was one he fair used to raise himself in, and it seemed as if we two were climbin’ right up on the air, plumb into the sky. When he’d let himself out this way, he’d fill me so full of a holy kind of devilment, that it would ’a’ given me joy to have leaped off the cliff with him, and take chances on goin’ up or down.
We had about filled his wood place, and were goin’ back after the last load when just as he swung around a corner, I saw his hand go up as though warnin’ me to stop; and I froze in my tracks. He hadn’t been singin’ this trip, for a wonder; but the next moment I heard a sound which purt nigh jarred me off. It was a low, deep growl which I instantly recognized as belongin’ to Olaf the Swede. Olaf didn’t talk with much brogue, though when he got excited he had his own fashion for hitchin’ words together.
“Where is the girl?” he asked with quiet fierceness, and for a space I was sorry my parents hadn’t been eagles. There wasn’t room to fight out on that ledge, the Friar didn’t have a gun on, I couldn’t possibly shoot around him; and Olaf was seven parts demon when he laid back his ears and started to kick.
“Where she cannot be bothered,” sez the Friar, full as quiet but without any fierceness. The’ was a little bush about eight feet up, and I felt sure it would hide me, so I stuck my fingers in the side o’ the cliff and climbed up; but the’ was no way for me to get out to the bush, and I had to drop back to the ledge and stand there with the sweat tricklin’ down between my shoulders until I felt like yellin’.
“I intend to kill you,” said Olaf, as calm as though talkin’ about a sick sheep.
“It would be a foolish waste of time,” replied the Friar, as if he was advisin’ a ten-year-old boy not to fish when the Blue Bull was high and muddy. “It wouldn’t do any good, and I shall not allow it.”
“I intend to kill you,” said Olaf, as calm as though talkin’ about a sick sheep.
“It would be a foolish waste of time,” replied the Friar, as if he was advisin’ a ten-year-old boy not to fish when the Blue Bull was high and muddy. “It wouldn’t do any good, and I shall not allow it.”
I got out my gun, and made ready to do whatever the angels suggested; but for some time the’ was silence, and durin’ this time I was keyed up so tight my muscles began to ache. I knew they were lookin’ into each other’s eyes, and I’d have given a finger off each hand to see how the Friar’s steady gray eyes handled those queer blue ones of Olaf.
“Is she all right?” asked Olaf, and all the threat had left his voice, and it had just a glint o’ pleadin’ in it. I wouldn’t have been one bit more surprised to have seen a prairie-dog come flyin’ up the gorge, blowin’ a cornet with his nose.
“She has sprained her ankle; but aside from this has no physical ill,” sez the Friar. “You men have caused her a lot of worry, and her soul is sick; but her body is well.”
After another silence, Olaf said slowly: “Yes, yes; I can tell by the light that you speak true. What do you intend to do with her?”
“I intend to cure her,” sez the Friar. “I intend to help and strengthen her; and I want you to help her, too. Olaf, she has had a lot of trouble, and her wild gaiety is only a veil to hide the wounds in her heart. I want you to help her.”
“I know, I know she is honest,” said Olaf, and blamed if his voice didn’t sound like a new boy talkin’ to the boss; “but she made me love her. Yes, I do love her. I must marry her. Yes, this is so.”
“She cannot marry you, or any one else, now,” sez the Friar, kindly. “This is why she has gone from one man to another—to disgust them all and make them leave her alone.”
“That is a damn devil of a way,” cried Olaf in anger. “Why should she go to dances, and out ridin’, and so on, if she wants men to leave her alone?”
“She was foolish, she knows that now; but her father is not the right sort of a man, and her home was not pleasant,” said the Friar.
“I told him I kill him, if she marry any one but me,” said Olaf. “I know he is not honest; but he is afraid of me, and he will not bother her now. I go to see him again purty soon, and tell him some more. Won’t you tell me where she is?”
“I want to be your friend, Olaf,” said the Friar gently. “I tell you honest that she cannot marry now. When I see her again, I shall tell her of meetin’ you, and what you have said. I have no desire except to do the best for all of you, and if you love her truly, all you will want will be to do that which is best for her.”
The Friar paused, and I pulled my ear clear to the edge o’ the rock, so as not to miss a word. “Olaf,” he went on in a low, sorrowful voice, “the love of a man for a woman is a wonderful thing, a terrible thing, a soul-testing thing. Don’t let your love become common for men to talk over. In believing what men have told you of me you have insulted her, by admitting that such a thing is possible. Go back to your work, kill no man for what he says of her; but keep her pure in your own heart, and this will be the best way to keep her pure before the world. Silence the gossips by living above them; and if it becomes necessary for you to take your own love by the throat, then do it, and do it for love of her. I shall do all I can to make her worthy of you.”
You should have heard the Friar’s voice when he was sayin’ this. I stood on the little ledge, just breathin’ enough to keep my lungs ventilated, and lookin’ out across the landscape—mountains on all sides of me, and down below the broken ground and the benches, with the green strips along the cricks lookin’ like lazy snakes in the hot sunshine. I couldn’t see a livin’ creature, I felt like the last man on earth; and that deep, musical voice seemed comin’ to me from somewhere out beyond the limits of life. I didn’t have any more fear now: the’ wasn’t anything in the shape of a human who could have done violence to the Friar after hearin’ him say the words I’d just heard; so I put up my gun, and listened again.
“Can’t ya tell me why she can’t marry me?” asked Olaf, and the’ was a tremble in his voice, almost as though it flowed up from a sob.
“I think I can trust you to keep her secret,” sez the Friar. “She is married already. The man was a beast and deserted her; but he is still alive, and she cannot marry again.”
I heard Olaf make a queer, animal sound with his breath, and then he said: “Yes, you speak true—I can tell by the light; but she loves me—I can tell that also by the light. Will you tell me when she can marry?”
“I will,” sez the Friar, and his voice was a pledge. “There’s my hand on it.”
They brought their hands together with a smack I could hear, and then Olaf turned on the narrow ledge, with the Friar holdin’ him on, an’ started off. The Friar went along with him, and I sneaked after, keepin’ a turn between us. Olaf mounted his hoss and rode away without lookin’ back, which, as a matter o’ fact, was his way o’ doin’ things; and when he was out o’ sight, I joined the Friar.
The’ was still a look of sadness in the Friar’s face; but back of it, and shinin’ through it, was a quiet satisfaction. He was full o’ the scene he had just gone through; and presently he turned an’ said: “That was a glorious victory he gained over himself, Happy. That man has a good heart, and who knows but what he will yet be the means of bringin’ me an’ Tyrrel Jones together.”
“What do you reckon he meant by the light tellin’ him that you were an honest man?” I asked. This was the most curious part of the whole thing to me.
“How can I tell,” he sez. “Life is so crowded with wonders that I have quit wonderin’ about ’em; but I always feel a thrill when I see the stubborn spirit of a strong man melt and run into the mold the Master has prepared for it.”
“I’ll own it was about the weirdest thing I ever saw,” sez I; “but I’m willin’ to bet that whatever else Olaf’s spirit has molded itself into, it’s not a doormat with ‘welcome’ wrote on it; as the first feller ’at fools with that girl is likely to find out.”
“Never doubt the power of the Lord, Happy,” sez he. “The hand that piled up these hills can easy shape even so stubborn a thing as the human will.”
“Yes,” I agreed; “but it generally takes just about the same length of time to do it, and a man don’t usually last that long.”
“Time!” sez he; “what do you know about time? It may have taken ages to form these hills; and then again, it may have been done in the twinklin’ of an eye. From the way the streaks tilt up, I’m inclined to think it was done sudden.”
I looked at the lines along the faces o’ the hills, and I was inclined to believe it, too; so I dropped that subject, and we sat down close together and looked off down the trail where Olaf had vanished.
We sat in silence a long time, me thinkin’ o’ what sort of a light Olaf had seen to make him know ’at the Friar was honest; and of the way the Friar’s voice had gone through me when he had talked of love.
This was a new idee to me, and one o’ the biggest I had ever tried to grapple with. Before this, my notion o’ love was, for a man to get the girl any way he could; and it took me some time to see the grandness of a man takin’ his own love by the throat for love of a woman. I knew ’at the Friar had done this himself; but it never was clear to me until I heard the heartache moanin’ through his voice as he laid out this law for Olaf, and Olaf bowed his stiff neck and accepted it.
I’m purty sure that if I’d ’a’ known that day, that a few years later I would have to take my own love by the throat for the sake of little Barbie, I wouldn’t ’a’ had the nerve to go on playin’ the game—but this is life. We pick up a stone here, and another there, and build them into our wall until the flood comes; and then if the wall isn’t high enough to turn back the flood, all the sting and bitterness comes from knowin’ that we haven’t made use of all the stones which came rollin’ down to our feet.
That night we had an uncommon fine fire in the cave. I used to enjoy these evenin’ fires with the Friar, as much as a dog likes to have his ears pulled by the hand he loves best. He would tell me tales of all the ages ’at man has lived on the face of the whole earth, and I’d sit and smoke my pipe, and make up what I’d ’a’ done, myself, if I’d been one o’ these big fellers. These chummy little fire-talks used to broaden me out and make me feel related to the whole human race, and it was then ’at I came to know the Friar best—though the’ ain’t no way to put this into a story.
Along about nine o’clock the Friar began to lecture me again’ the use o’ violence, pointin’ out that war nor gunfightin’ nor any other sort o’ violence had ever done any good; and endin’ up with the way he had handled Olaf as illustratin’ how much better effects spiritual methods had.
“Humph,” sez I, “so you’re tryin’ to put that over as an ordinary case, are ya? Did you ever before see such eyes in a man’s head as what Olaf has?”
“Now that you mention it,” sez he, “I did notice they were peculiar.”
“I ruhly believe you’re right,” sez I, sarcastic. “When he said he saw light he wasn’t speakin’ in parables. He can see things ’at you nor I can’t see—though I doubt if he understands ’em himself.”
“Still, violence would have spoiled everything,” persisted the Friar, who was as human as a raw bronco when you tried to make him back up.
“Now, don’t forget anything,” sez I. “It wasn’t my face ’at lit up when I said ’at he did his killin’ with bare hands; nor it wasn’t me who gloated over this as furnishin’ an excuse to use my bare hands in defendin’ myself.”
“Oh, Happy, Happy,” sez he, with one o’ the bursts ’at made ya willin’ to go through fire and water for him. “I’m the entire human race: there isn’t a single sin or weakness which hasn’t betrayed me at one time or another, and yet the wicked pride of me persists in stickin’ up its head an’ crowin’ every time I take my eyes off it.”
“Well, I like your pride full as well as any other part o’ ya,” sez I; “and before you wrangle it into its corral again, I want to say ’at no other man in the world could ’a’ told Olaf what you told him this mornin’, and lived to talk it over around this fire to-night—unless, he had used the best and the quickest brand o’ violence the’ is, in the meantime.”
“Now, that you have succeeded in flatterin’ both of us, we’ll go to sleep,” sez the Friar, and the’ was a deep twinkle in his eyes which allus rejoiced me to call up.
Next night soon after dark, we started out with Kit Murray. She rode like a man and could tick out her fifty or sixty a day right along, without worryin’ her pony. As soon as she was safe located in Billings, I turned back to the Dot, while the Friar rounded up some stray sheep he had near the border, and as far as I can recall we didn’t meet again all that summer.
[CHAPTER NINETEEN—OTHER PEOPLE’S BUSINESS]
Olaf’s theories concernin’ violence didn’t harmonize complete with the Friar’s; but his method for discouragin’ scandal was thorough to a degree. He silenced the gossipers all right, though so far as I heard, most of ’em recovered; and the outcome was ’at the Friar stood higher after the scandal ’n he had before.
The Cross brand outfit was a good deal like a pack o’ dogs: they each sought Ty Jones’s favor, and they were all jealous of each other. Olaf stood high on account of his mysterious insight; so Badger-face, the foreman, backed up Bud Fisher to devil Olaf as far as possible without givin’ Olaf what Ty would judge a fit excuse for unscrewin’ the kid’s neck; and from the talk I heard, their outfit trotted along as smooth an’ friendly as seven he bears hitched to a freight wagon; but our trails didn’t cross frequent, so it was all hearsay.