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diff --git a/old/55471-0.txt b/old/55471-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 082a25d..0000000 --- a/old/55471-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,9546 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Black Lion Inn, by Alfred Henry Lewis - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: The Black Lion Inn - -Author: Alfred Henry Lewis - -Illustrator: Frederic Remington - -Release Date: August 31, 2017 [EBook #55471] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BLACK LION INN *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - - - - - - - -THE BLACK LION INN - -By Alfred Henry Lewis - -Illustrated By Frederic Remington - -New York: R. H. Russell - -1903 - - -[Illustration: 0001] - - -[Illustration: 0008] - - -[Illustration: 0009] - - - - -CHAPTER I.--HOW I CAME TO THE INN. - -Years ago, I came upon an old and hoary tavern when I as a fashion of -refugee was flying from strong drink. Its name, as shown on the creaking -sign-board, was The Black Lion Inn. My coming was the fruit of no plan; -the hostelry was strange to me, and my arrival, casual and desultory, -one of those accidents which belong with the experiences of folk who, -whipped of a bad appetite and running from rum, are seeking only to be -solitary and win a vacation for their selfrespect. This latter commodity -in my own poor case had been sadly overworked, and called for rest and -an opportunity of recuperation. Wherefore, going quietly and without -word from the great city, I found this ancient inn with a purpose to -turn presently sober. Also by remaining secluded for a space I would -permit the memory of those recent dubious exploits of the cup to become -a bit dimmed in the bosom of my discouraged relatives. - -It turned a most fortunate blunder, this blundering discovery of the -aged inn, for it was here I met the Jolly Doctor who, by saving me from -my fate of a drunkard, a fate to which I was hopelessly surrendered, -will dwell ever in my thoughts as a greatest benefactor. - -There is that about an appetite for alcohol I can not understand. In my -personal instance there is reason to believe it was inherited. And yet -my own father never touched a drop and lived and died the uncompromising -enemy of the bowl. It was from my grandsire, doubtless, I had any -hankering after rum, for I have heard a sigh or two of how that dashing -military gentleman so devoted himself to it that he fairly perished for -very faithfulness as far away as eighty odd long years. - -Once when my father and I were roaming the snow-filled woods with our -guns--I was a lad of twelve--having heard little of that ancestor, I -asked him what malady carried off my grandsire. My father did not reply -at once, but stalked silently ahead, rifle caught under arm, the snow -crunching beneath his heavy boots. Then he flung a sentence over his -shoulder. - -“Poor whiskey more than anything else,” said my father. - -Even at the unripe age of twelve I could tell how the subject was -unpleasant to my parent and did not press it. I saved my curiosity until -evening when my mother and I were alone. My mother, to whom I re-put the -query, informed me in whispers how she had been told--for she never met -him, he being dead and gone before her day--my grandsire threw away his -existence upon the bottle. - -The taste for strong waters so developed in my grandsire would seem like -a quartz-ledge to have “dipped” beneath my father to strike the family -surface with all its old-time richness in myself. I state this the more -secure of its truth because I was instantly and completely a drunkard, -waiving every preliminary stage as a novice, from the moment of my first -glass. - -It was my first day of the tavern when I met the Jolly Doctor. The -tavern was his home--for he lived a perilous bachelor--and had been -many years; and when, being in a shaken state, I sent down from the -apartments I had taken and requested the presence of a physician, he -came up to me. He had me right and on my feet in the course of a -few hours, and then I began to look him in the face and make his -acquaintance. - -As I abode in the tavern for a considerable space, we put in many -friendly hours together. The Jolly Doctor was a round, strong, active -body of a man, virile and with an atmosphere almost hypnotic. His -forehead was good, his jaw hard, his nose arched, while his gray-blue -eyes, half sour, half humorous and deeply wise of the world, gleamed in -his head with the shine of beads. - -One evening while we were together about the fireplace of my parlor, I -was for having up a bottle of sherry. - -“Before you give the order,” said the Jolly Doctor, restraining me with -a friendly yet semiprofessional gesture, “let me say a word. Let me ask -whether you have an intention or even a hope of one day--no matter how -distant--quitting alcohol?” Without pausing for my answer, the Jolly -Doctor went on. “You are yet a young man; I suppose you have seen thirty -years. It has been my experience, albeit I’m but fifteen years your -senior and not therefore as old as a hill, that no man uproots a habit -after he has reached middle age. While climbing, mentally, physically, -nervously, the slope of his years and adding to, not taking from, -his strength, a man may so far re-draw himself as to make or break an -appetite--the appetite of strong drink--if you will. But let him attain -the summit of his strength, reach as it were the crest of his days and -begin to travel down the easy long descent toward the grave, and every -chance of change has perished beyond his reach. You are thirty; and to -make it short, my friend, you must, considering what bottle tendencies -lie latent within you, stop now and stop hard, or you are lost forever.” - -To say I was impressed is not to exaggerate. I was frank enough to -confess, however, that privately I held no hope of change. Several years -before, I had become convinced, after a full survey of myself and the -close study of my inclinations, that I was born to live and die, like my -grandsire, the victim of drink. I was its thrall, bound to it as I -lay in my cradle; there existed no gate of escape. This I told; -not joyously, I promise you, or as one reciting good fortune; not -argumentatively and as reason for the forthcoming of asked-for wine; but -because it was true and made, as I held it, a reason for going in this -matter of tipple with freest rein since dodge or balk my fate I might -not. - -At the close my Jolly Doctor shook his head in negative. - -“No man knows his destiny,” said he, “until the game’s played out. Come, -let me prescribe for you. The drug I have in mind has cured folk; I -should add, too, that for some it carries neither power nor worth. -Still, it will do no harm, and since we may have a test of its virtues -within three days; at the worst you will be called upon to surrender no -more than seventy-two hours to sobriety.” This last was delivered like a -cynic. - -On my side, I not only thanked the Jolly Doctor for his concern, but -hastened to assure him I would willingly make pact to abstain from -alcohol not three days, but three weeks or three months, were it -necessary to pleasure his experiment. My bent for drink was in that -degree peculiar that I was not so much its disciple who must worship -constantly and every day, as one of those who are given to sprees. Often -and of choice I was a stranger to so much as the odor of rum for weeks -on end. Then would come other weeks of tumult and riot and drunkenness. -The terms of trial for his medicine would be easily and comfortably -undergone by me. He had my promise of three days free of rum. - -The Jolly Doctor went to his room; returning, he placed on the table a -little bottle of liquid, reddish in color and bitter of taste. - -“Red cinchona, it is,” said the Jolly Doctor; “cinchona rubra, or -rather the fluid extract of that bark. It is not a tincture; there is no -alcohol about it. The remedy is well known and I oft marvel it has had -no wider vogue. As I’ve told you, and on the principle, probably, -that one man’s poison is another man’s food, it does not always cure. -However, we will give you a teaspoonful once in three hours and observe -the effect in your particular case.” - -There shall be little more related on this point of dypsomania and its -remedy. I took the prescription for a trio of days. At the expiration I -sate me solemnly down and debated within myself whether or no I -craved strong drink, with the full purpose of calling for it if I did. -Absolutely, the anxiety was absent; and since I had resolved not to -force the bottle upon myself, but to give the Jolly Doctor and his drug -all proper show to gain a victory, I made no alcohol demands. All this -was years ago, and from that hour until now, when I write these lines, -I’ve neither taken nor wanted alcohol. I’ve gone freely where it was, -and abode for hours at tables when others poured and tossed it off; for -myself I’ve craved none and taken none. - -Toward the last of my stay, there came to dwell at the hostelry a goodly -circle; one for a most part chance-sown. For days it had been snowing -with a free, persistent hand; softly, industriously, indomitably fell -the flakes, straight down and unflurried of a wind, until the cold light -element lay about the tavern for a level depth of full three feet. It -was the sort of weather in which one should read Whittier’s Snow-Bound. - -Our circle, as snow-pent and held within door we drew about the tavern -fire, offered a chequered citizenry. On the earliest occasion of our -comradeship, while the snow sifted about the old-fashioned panes and -showed through them with the whiteness of milk, I cast my eye over the -group to collect for myself a mental picture of my companions. - -At the right hand of the Jolly Doctor, solid in his arm chair, sat a Red -Nosed Gentleman. He showed prosperous of this world’s goods and owned to -a warm weakness for burgundy. He was particular to keep ever a bottle -at his elbow, and constantly supported his interest in what was current -with a moderate glass. - -In sharpest contrast to the Red Nosed Gentleman there should be -mentioned a gray old gentleman of sour and forbidding eye. The Jolly -Doctor, who had known him for long, gave me in a whisper his story. This -Sour Gentleman, like the Red Nosed Gentleman, had half retired from the -cares of business. The Red Nosed Gentleman in his later days had been -a stock speculator, as in sooth had the Sour Gentleman, and each would -still on occasion carry a few thousand shares for a week or two and then -swoop on a profit with quite the eagerness of any hawk on any hen. - -Not to be overlooked, in a corner nearest the chimney was a seamed white -old figure, tall and spare, yet with vigorous thews still strung in the -teeth of his all but four score years. He was referred to during our -amiable captivity, and while we sate snow-locked about the mighty -fire-place, as the Old Cattleman. - -Half comrade and half ward, our Old Cattleman had with him a taciturn, -grave individual, to whom he gave the title of “Sioux Sam,” and whose -father, he informed us, had been a French trader from St. Louis, while -his mother was a squaw of the tribe that furnished the first portion of -his name. - -As we brought arm chairs about the fire-place on our first snow-bound -evening, moved possibly by the Red Nosed Gentleman’s burgundy, which -that florid person had urged upon his attention, the Jolly Doctor set -the little community a good story-telling example. - -“This story, I should premise,” said the Jolly Doctor, mollifying -certain rawnesses of his throat with a final glass of the Red Nosed -Gentleman’s burgundy, “belongs to no experience of my own. I shall tell -it as it was given me. It speaks broadly of the west and of the folk of -cows and the Indians, and was set uppermost in my memory by the presence -of our western friends.” Here the Jolly Doctor indicated the Old -Cattleman and that product of the French fur trader and his Indian wife, -Sioux Sam, by a polite wave of his glass. Then tossing off the last of -his burgundy he, without tedious preliminary, struck into his little -history. - - - - -CHAPTER II.--THE WINNING OF SAUCY PAOLI. - -Gray Wolf sits within the shadow of the agency cottonwood and puffs -unhappy kinnikinic from his red stone pipe. Heavy, dull and hot lies the -August afternoon; heavy, dull and hot lies the heart of Gray Wolf. There -is a profound grief at his soul’s roots. The Indian’s is not a mobile -face. In full expression it is capable only of apathy or rage. If -your Indian would show you mirth or woe, he must eke out the dim and -half-told story with streaks of paint. But so deep is the present sorrow -of Gray Wolf that, even without the aid of graphic ochre, one reads some -shadow of it in the wrinkled brows and brooding eyes. - -What is this to so beat upon our dismal Osage? There is a dab of mud -in his hair; his blanket is rags, and his moccasins are rusty and worn. -These be weeds of mourning. Death has crept to the tepee of Gray Wolf -and taken a prey. It was Catbird, the squaw of Gray Wolf. - -However, his to-day’s sadness is not for the departed Catbird. He -married her without laughter, and saw her pass without tears, as became -a man and an Osage. When her breath was gone, the women combed her -hair and dressed her in new, gay clothes, and burned the sacred cedar. -Gray Wolf, after the usage of his fathers, seated her--knees to chin--on -yonder hilltop, wrapped her in rawhides, and, as against the curiosity -of coyotes and other prowling vermin of the night, budded her solidly -about and over with heavy stones. You may see the rude mausole, like -some tumbledown chimney, from the agency door. That was a moon ago. -Another will go by; Gray Wolf will lay off his rags and tatters, comb -the clay from his hair, and give a dance to show that he mourns no -more. No, it is not the lost Catbird--good squaw though she was--that -embitters the tobacco and haunts the moods of Gray Wolf. It is something -more awful than death--that merest savage commonplace; something to -touch the important fiber of pride. - -Gray Wolf is proud, as indeed he has concern to be. Not alone is he -eminent as an Osage; he is likewise an eminent Indian. Those two thin -ragged lines of blue tattoo which, on each side from the point of the -jaw, run downward on the neck until they disappear beneath his blanket, -prove Gray Wolf’s elevation. They are the marks of an aboriginal -nobility whereof the paleface in his ignorance knows nothing. Thirty -Indians in all the tribes may wear these marks. And yet, despite such -signs of respect, Gray Wolf has become the subject of acrid tribal -criticism; and he feels it like the edge of a knife. - -Keats was quill-pricked to death by critics. But Keats was an Englishman -and a poet. Petronius Arbiter, Nero’s minion, was also criticised; -despite the faultfinder, however, he lived in cloudless merry luxury, -and died laughing. But Petronius was a Roman and an epicure. Gray Wolf -is to gain nothing by these examples. He would not die like the verse -maker, he could not laugh like the consul; there is a gulf between Gray -Wolf and these as wide as the width of the possible. Gray Wolf is a -stoic, and therefore neither so callous nor so wise as an epicure. -Moreover, he is a savage and not a poet. Petronius came to be nothing -better than an appetite; Gray Wolf rises to the heights of an emotion. -Keats was a radical of sensibility, ransacking a firmament; Gray Wolf is -an earthgoing conservative--a more stupendous Tory than any Bolingbroke. -Of the two, while resembling neither, Gray Wolf comes nearer the poet -than the Sybarite, since he can feel. - -Let it be remarked that Osage criticism is no trivial thing. It is so -far peculiar that never a word or look, or even a detractory shrug is -made to be its evidence. Your Osage tells no evil tales of you to his -neighbor. His conduct goes guiltless of slanderous syllable or gesture. -But he criticises you in his heart; he is strenuous to think ill of you; -and by some fashion of telepathy you know and feel and burn with this -tacit condemnation as much as ever you might from hot irons laid on your -forehead. It is this criticism, as silent as it is general, that gnaws -at Gray Wolf’s heart and makes his somber visage more somber yet. - -It was the week before when Gray Wolf, puffed of a vain conceit, matched -Sundown, his pinto pony--swift as a winter wind, he deemed her--against -a piebald, leggy roan, the property of Dull Ox, the cunning Ponca. The -race had wide advertisement; it took shape between the Osages and -the Poncas as an international event. Gray Wolf assured his tribe of -victory; his Sundown was a shooting star, the roan a turtle; whereupon -the Osages, ever ready as natural patriots to believe the worst Osage -thing to be better than the best thing Ponca, fatuously wagered their -substance on Sundown, even unto the beads on their moccasins. - -The race was run; the ubiquitous roan, fleeter than a shadow, went by -poor Sundown as though she ran with hobbles on. Dull Ox won; the Poncas -won. The believing Osages were stripped of their last blanket; and even -as Gray Wolf sits beneath the agency cottonwood and writhes while he -considers what his pillaged countrymen must think of him, the exultant -Poncas are in the midst of a protracted spree, something in the nature -of a scalp dance, meant to celebrate their triumph and emphasize the -thoroughness wherewith the Osages were routed. Is it marvel, then, that -Osage thought is full of resentment, or that Gray Wolf feels its sting? - -Over across from the moody Gray Wolf, Bill Henry lounges in the -wide doorway of Florer’s agency store. Bill Henry is young, about -twenty-three, in truth. He has a quick, handsome face, with gray eyes -that dance and gleam, and promise explosiveness of temper. The tan that -darkens Bill Henry’s skin wherever the sun may get to it, and which is -comparable to the color of a saddle or a law book, testifies that the -vivacious Bill is no recent importation. Five full years on the plains -would be needed to ripen one to that durable hue. - -Bill gazes out upon Gray Wolf as the latter sticks to the cottonwood’s -shade; a plan is running in the thoughts of Bill. There is call for -change in Bill’s destinies, and he must have the Gray Wolf’s consent to -what he bears in mind. - -Bill has followed cattle since he turned his back on Maryland, a quintet -of years before, and pushed westward two thousand miles to commence a -career. Bill’s family is of that aristocracy which adorns the “Eastern -Shore” of Lord Baltimore’s old domain. His folk are of consequence, and -intended that Bill should take a high position. Bill’s mother, an ardent -church woman, had a pulpit in her thoughts for Bill; his father, more -of the world, urged on his son the law. But Bill’s bent was towards the -laws neither of heaven nor of men. The romantic overgrew the practical -in his nature. He leaned not to labor, whether mental or physical, and -he liked danger and change and careless savageries. - -Civilization is artificial; it is a creature of convention, of clocks, -of hours, of an unending procession of sleep, victuals and work. Bill -distasted such orderly matters and felt instinctive abhorrence therefor. -The day in and day out effort called for to remain civilized terrified -Bill; his soul gave up the task before it was begun. - -But savagery? Ah, that was different! Savagery was natural, easy and -comfortable to the very heart’s blood of Bill, shiftless and wild as it -ran. Bill was an instance of what wise folk term “reversion to type,” -and thus it befell, while his father tugged one way and his mother -another, Bill himself went suddenly from under their hands, fled from -both altar and forum, and never paused until he found himself within the -generous reaches of the Texas Panhandle. There, as related, and because -savagery cannot mean entire idleness, Bill gave himself to a pursuit of -cows, and soon had moderate fame as a rider, a roper, a gambler, and a -quick, sure hand with a gun, and for whatever was deemed excellent in -those regions wherein he abode. - -Bill’s presence among the Osages is the upcome of a dispute which fell -forth between Bill and a comrade in a barroom of Mobeetie. Bill and the -comrade aforesaid played at a device called “draw poker;” and Bill, -in attempting to supply the deficiencies of a four flush with his six -shooter, managed the other’s serious wounding. This so shook Bill’s -standing in the Panhandle, so marked him to the common eye as a boy of -dangerous petulance, that Bill sagely withdrew between two days; and -now, three hundred miles to the north and east, he seeks among the -Indians for newer pastures more serene. - -When we meet him Bill has been with the Osages the space of six weeks. -And already he begins to doubt his welcome. Not that the Osages object. -Your Indian objects to nothing that does not find shape as an immediate -personal invasion of himself. But the government agent--a stern, -decisive person--likes not the presence of straggling whites among his -copper charges; already has he made intimation to Bill that his Osage -sojourn should be short. Any moment this autocrat may despatch his -marshal to march Bill off the reservation. - -Bill does not enjoy the outlook. Within the brief frontiers of those -six weeks of his visit, Bill has contracted an eager fondness for Osage -life. Your Indian is so far scriptural that he taketh scant heed of the -morrow, and believeth with all his soul that sufficient unto the day -is the evil thereof. Here was a program to dovetail with those natural -moods of Bill. His very being, when once it understood, arose on tiptoe -to embrace it. Bill has become an Osage in his breast; as he poses with -listless grace in Florer’s portals, he is considering means whereby -he may manage a jointure with the tribe, and become in actual truth a -member. - -There is but one door to his coming; Bill must wed his way into Osage -citizenship. He must take a daughter of the tribe to wife; turn “squaw -man,” as it is called. Then will Bill be a fullblown Osage; then may no -agent molest him or make him afraid. - -This amiable plot, as he lounges in Florer’s door, is already decided -upon by Bill. His fancy has even pitched upon the damsel whom he will -honor with the title of “Mrs. Bill.” It is this selection that produces -Gray Wolf as a factor in Bill’s intended happiness, since Gray Wolf is -the parent of the Saucy Paoli, to whom Bill’s hopes are turned. Bill -must meet and treat with Gray Wolf for his daughter, discover her -“price,” and pay it. - -[Illustration: 0027] - -As to the lady herself and her generous consent when once her father is -won, Bill harbors no misgivings. He believes too well of his handsome -person; moreover, has he not demonstrated in friendly bout, on foot and -on horseback, his superiority to the young Osage bucks who would pit -themselves against him? Has he not out-run, out-wrestled and out-ridden -them? And at work with either rifle, six-shooter or knife, has he not -opened their eyes? Also, he has conquered them at cards; and their -money and their ponies and their gewgaws to a healthful value are his as -spoils thereof. - -Bill is all things that a lady of sensibility should love; and for that -on those two or three occasions when he came unexpectedly upon her, -the Saucy Paoli dodged within the ancestral lodge to daub her nose and -cheeks with hurried yet graceful red, thereby to improve and give her -beauties point, Bill knows he has touched her heart. Yes, forsooth! -Bill feels sure of the Saucy Paoli; it is Gray Wolf, somber of his late -defeat by the wily Dull Ox and the evanescent roan, toward whom his -apprehensions turn their face. The more, perhaps, since Bill himself, -not being a blinded Osage, and having besides some certain wit -concerning horses, scrupled not to wager and win on the Ponca entry, -and against the beloved Sundown of his father-in-law to come. It is -the notion that Gray Wolf might resent this apostasy that breeds a half -pause in Bill’s optimism as he loafs in Florer’s door. - -As Bill stands thus musing, the Saucy Paoli goes by. The Saucy Paoli is -light, pretty, round and wholesome, and she glances with shy, engaging -softness on Bill from eyes as dark and big and deep as a deer’s. Is it -not worth while to wed her? The Osages are owners in fee of one million, -five hundred thousand acres of best land; they have eight even millions -of dollars stored in the Great Father’s strong chests in Washington; -they are paid each one hundred and forty dollars by their fostering -Great Father as an annual present; and the head of the house draws all -for himself and his own. Marriage will mean an instant yearly income of -two hundred and eighty dollars; moreover, there may come the profitable -papoose, and with each such a money augmentation of one hundred and -forty dollars. And again, there are but sixteen hundred Osages told and -counted; and so would Bill gain a strong per cent, in the tribal domain -and the tribal treasure. Altogether, a union with the fair, brown Saucy -Paoli is a prospect fraught of sunshine; and so Bill wisely deems it. - -For an hour it has leaped in Bill’s thoughts as an impulse to go across -to the spreading cottonwood, propose himself to the Gray Wolf for the -Saucy Paoli, and elicit reply. It would not be the Osage way, but Bill -is not yet an Osage, and some reasonable allowance should be made by -Gray Wolf for the rudeness of a paleface education. Such step would earn -an answer, certain and complete. Your savage beateth not about the bush. -His diplomacy is Bismarckian; it is direct and proceeds by straight -lines. - -Thus chase Bill’s cogitations when the sudden sight of the Saucy Paoli -and her glances, full of wist and warmth, fasten his gallant fancy and -crystalize a resolution to act at once. - -“How!” observes Bill, by way of salutation, as he stands before Gray -Wolf. - -That warrior grunts swinish, though polite, response. Then Bill goes -directly to the core of his employ; he explains his passion, sets forth -his hopes, and by dashing swoops arrives at the point which, according -to Bill’s blunt theories, should quicken the interest of Gray Wolf, and -says: - -“Now, what price? How many ponies?” - -“How many you give?” retorts the cautious Gray Wolf. - -“Fifteen.” Bill stands ready to go to thirty. - -“Ugh!” observes Gray Wolf, and then he looks out across the prairie -grasses where the thick smoke shows the summer fires to be burning them -far away. - -“Thirty ponies,” says Bill after a pause. - -These or their money equivalent--six hundred dollars--Bill knows to be a -fat figure. He believes Gray Wolf will yield. - -But Bill is in partial error. Gray Wolf is not in any sordid, money -frame. Your savage is a sentimentalist solely on two matters: those to -touch his pride and those to wake his patriotism. And because of the -recent triumph of the Poncas, and the consequent censures upon him now -flaming, though hidden, in the common Osage heart, Gray Wolf’s pride is -raw and throbbing. He looks up at Bill where he waits. - -“One pony!” says Gray Wolf. - -“One?” - -“But it must beat the Ponca’s roan.” - -Four hundred miles to the westward lie the broad ranges of the -Triangle-Dot. Throughout all cow-land the ponies of the Triangle-Dot -have name for speed. As far eastward as the Panhandle and westward -to the Needles, as far southward as Seven Rivers and northward to the -Spanish Peaks, has their fame been flung. About camp fires and among the -boys of cows are tales told of Triangle-Dot ponies that overtake coyotes -and jack-rabbits. More, they are exalted as having on a time raced even -with an antelope. These ponies are children of a blue-grass sire, as -thoroughbred as ever came out of Kentucky. Little in size, yet a -ghost to go; his name was Redemption. These speedy mustang babies of -Redemption have yet to meet their master in the whole southwest. And -Bill knows of them; he has seen them run. - -“In two moons, my father,” says Bill. - -There is much creaking of saddle leathers; there is finally a deep dig -in the flanks by the long spurs, and Bill, mounted on his best, rides -out of Pauhauska. His blankets are strapped behind, his war bags bulge -with provand, he is fully armed; of a verity, Bill meditates a -journey. Four hundred miles--and return--no less, to the ranges of the -Triangle-Dot. - -Gray Wolf watches from beneath the cottonwood that already begins to -throw its shadows long; his eyes follow Bill until the latter’s broad -brimmed, gray sombrero disappears on the hill-crests over beyond Bird -River. - -It skills not to follow Bill in this pilgrimage. He fords rivers; he -sups and sleeps at casual camps; now and again he pauses for the night -at some chance plaza of the Mexicans; but first and last he pushes ever -on and on at a round road gait, and with the end he has success. - -Within his time by full three weeks Bill is again at the agency of the -Osages; and with him comes a pony, lean of muzzle, mild of eye, wide of -forehead, deep of lung, silken of mane, slim of limb, a daughter of -the great Redemption; and so true and beautiful is she in each line she -seems rather for air than earth. And she is named the Spirit. - -Gray Wolf goes over the Spirit with eye and palm. He feels her velvet -coat; picks up one by one her small hoofs, polished and hard as agate. - -The Spirit has private trial with Sundown and leaves that hopeless -cayuse as if the latter were pegged to the prairie. - -“Ugh!” says Gray Wolf, at the finish. “Heap good pony!” - -Your savage is not a personage of stopwatches, weights and records. At -the best, he may only guess concerning a pony’s performance. Also his -vanity has wings, though his pony has none, and once he gets it into his -savage head that his pony can race, it is never long ere he regards -him as invincible. Thus is it with Dull Ox and his precious roan. That -besotted Ponca promptly accepts the Gray Wolf challenge for a second -contest. - -The day arrives. The race is to be run on the Osage course--a quarter of -a mile, straight-away--at the Pauhauska agency. Two thousand Osages and -Poncas are gathered together. There is no laughter, no uproar, no loud -talk; all is gravity, dignity and decorum. The stakes are one thousand -dollars a side, for Gray Wolf and Dull Ox are opulent pagans. - -The ponies are brought up and looked over. The fires of a thousand -racing ancestors burn in the eyes of the Spirit; the Poncas should -take warning. But they do not; wagers run higher. The Osages have by -resolution of their fifteen legislators brought the public money to the -field. Thus they are rich for speculation, where, otherwise, by virtue -of former losses, they would be helpless with empty hands. - -Bet after bet is made. The pool box is a red blanket spread on the -grass. It is presided over by a buck, impecunious but of fine integrity. - -Being moneyless, he will make no bet himself; being honest, he will -faithfully guard the treasure put within his care. A sporting buck -approaches the blanket; he grumbles a word or two in the ear of the -pool master who sits at the blanket’s head; then he searches forth a -hundred-dollar bill from the darker recesses of his blanket and lays it -on the red betting-cloth. Another comes up; the pool master murmurs the -name of the pony on which the hundred is offered; it is covered by the -second speculator; that wager is complete. Others arrive at the betting -blanket; its entire surface becomes dotted with bank notes--two and -two they lie together, each wagered against the other. The blanket is -covered and concealed with the money piled upon it. One begins to wonder -how a winner is to know his wealth. There will be no clash, no dispute. -Savages never cheat; and each will know his own. Besides, there is the -poverty-eaten, honest buck, watching all, to be appealed to should an -accidental confusion of wagers occur. - -On a bright blanket, a trifle to one side--not to be under the moccasins -of commerce, as it were--sits the Saucy Paoli. She is without motion; -and a blanket, covering her from little head to little foot, leaves -not so much as a stray lock or the tip of an ear for one’s gaze to rest -upon. The Saucy Paoli is present dutifully to answer the outcome of the -Gray Wolf’s pact with Bill. One wonders how does her heart beat, and -how roam her hopes? Is she for the roan, or is she for the Glory of the -Triangle-Dot? - -[Illustration: 0041] - -The solemn judges draw their blankets about them and settle to their -places. Three Poncas and three Osages on a side they are; they seat -themselves opposite each other with twenty feet between. A line is drawn -from trio to trio; that will serve as wire. The pony to cross first will -be victor. - -Now all is ready! The rival ponies are at the head of the course; it -will be a standing start. A grave buck sits in the saddle near the two -racers and to their rear. He is the starter. Suddenly he cracks off a -Winchester, skyward. It is the signal. - -The ponies leap like panthers at the sound. There is a swooping rush; -for one hundred yards they run together, then the Spirit takes the lead. -Swifter than the thrown lance, swift as the sped arrow she comes! With -each instant she leaves and still further leaves the roan! What has -such as the mongrel pony of the Poncas to do with the Flower of the -Triangle-Dot? The Spirit flashes between the double triumvirate of -judges, winner by fifty yards! - -And now one expects a shout. There is none. The losing Poncas and the -triumphant Osages alike are stolid and dignified. Only Gray Wolf’s eyes -gleam, and the cords in his neck swell. He has been redeemed with his -people; his honor has been returned; his pride can again hold up its -head. But while his heart may bound, his face must be like iron. Such is -the etiquette of savagery. - -Both Gray Wolf and the Osages will exult later, noisily, vociferously. -There will be feasting and dancing. Now they must be grave and guarded, -both for their own credit and to save their Ponca adversaries from a -wound. - -Bill turns and rides slowly back to the judges. The Spirit, daughter of -Redemption, stands with fire eyes and tiger lily nostrils. Bill swings -from the saddle. Gray Wolf throws off the blanket from the Saucy Paoli, -where she waits, head bowed and silent. Her dress is the climax of Osage -magnificence; the Saucy Paoli glows like a ruby against the dusk green -of the prairie. Bill takes the Saucy Paoli’s hand and raises her to her -feet. - -She lifts her head. Her glance is shy, yet warm and glad. She hesitates. -Then, as one who takes courage--just as might a white girl, though with -less of art--she puts up her lips to be kissed. - -“Now that is what I call a fair story,” commented the Red Nosed -Gentleman approvingly when the Jolly Doctor came to a pause; “only I -don’t like that notion of a white man marrying an Indian. It’s apt to -keep alive in the children the worst characteristics of both races and -none of the virtues of either.” - -“Now I don’t know that,” observed the Sour Gentleman, contentiously. -“In my own state of Virginia many of our best people are proud to trace -their blood to Pocahontas, who was sold for a copper kettle. I, myself, -am supposed to have a spoonful of the blood of that daughter of Powhatan -in my veins; and while it is unpleasant to recall one’s ancestress as -having gone from hand to hand as the subject of barter and sale--and -for no mighty price at that--I cannot say I would wish it otherwise. -My Indian blood fits me very well. Did you say”--turning to the Jolly -Doctor--“did you say, sir, you knew this young man who won the Saucy -Paoli?” - -“No,” returned the Jolly Doctor, “I am guiltless of acquaintance with -him. The story came to me from one of our Indian agents.” - -While this talk went forward, Sioux Sam, who understood English -perfectly and talked it very well, albeit with a guttural Indian effect, -and who had listened to the Jolly Doctor’s story with every mark of -interest, was saying something in a whisper to the Old Cattleman. - -“He tells me,” remarked the Old Cattleman in reply to my look of -curiosity, “that if you-alls don’t mind, he’ll onfold on you a Injun -tale himse’f. It’s one of these yere folk-lore stories, I suppose, as -Doc Peets used to call ’em.” - -The whole company made haste to assure Sioux Sam that his proposal was -deeply the popular one; thus cheered, our dark-skinned raconteur, first -lighting his pipe with a coal from the great fireplace, issued forth -upon his verbal journey. - -“An’ this,” said Sioux Sam, lifting a dark finger to invoke attention -and puffing a cloud the while, “an’ this tale, which shows how Forked -Tongue, the bad medicine man, was burned, must teach how never to let -the heart fill up with hate like a pond with the rains, nor permit the -tongue to go a crooked trail.” - - - - -CHAPTER III.--HOW FORKED TONGUE WAS BURNED. - -The time is long, long ago. Ugly Elk is the great chief of the Sioux, -an’ he’s so ugly an’ his face so hideous, he makes a great laugh -wherever he goes. But the people are careful to laugh when the Ugly -Elk’s back is toward them. If they went in front of him an’ laugh, he’d -go among them with his stone war-axe; for Ugly Elk is sensitive about -his looks. - -Ugly Elk is the warchief of the Sioux an’ keeps his camp on the high -bluffs that mark the southern border of the Sioux country where he can -look out far on the plains an’ see if the Pawnees go into the Sioux -hills to hunt. Should the Pawnees try this, then Ugly Elk calls up his -young men an’ pounces on the Pawnees like a coyote on a sage hen, an’ -when Ugly Elk gets through, the Pawnees are hard to find. - -It turns so, however, that the Pawnees grow tired. Ugly Elk’s war yell -makes their knees weak, an’ when they see the smoke of his fire they -turn an’ run. Then Ugly Elk has peace in his tepees on the bluffs, an’ -eats an’ smokes an’ counts his scalps an’ no Pawnee comes to anger him. -An’ the Sioux look up to him as a mighty fighter, an’ what Ugly Elk says -goes as law from east to west an’ no’th to south throughout the country -of the Sioux. - -Ugly Elk has no sons or daughters an’ all his squaws are old an’ dead -an’ asleep forever in their rawhides, high on pole scaffolds where the -wolves can’t come. An’ because Ugly Elk is lonesome an’ would hear good -words about his lodge an’ feel that truth is near, he asks his nephew, -Running Water, to live with him when now the years grow deep an’ deeper -on his head. The nephew is named Running Water because there is no -muddiness of lies about him, an’ his life runs clear an’ swift an’ -good. Some day Running Water will be chief, an’ then they will call him -Kill-Bear, because he once sat down an’ waited until a grizzly came up; -an’ when he had come up, Running Water offered him the muzzle of his gun -to bite; an’ then as the grizzly took it between his jaws, Running Water -blew off his head. An’ for that he was called Kill-Bear, an’ made chief. -But that is not for a long time, an’ comes after Ugly Elk has died an’ -been given a scaffold of poles with his squaws. - -Ugly Elk has his heart full of love for Running Water an’ wants him ever -in his sight an’ to hear his voice. Also, he declares to the Sioux that -they must make Running Water their chief when he is gone. The Sioux say -that if he will fight the Pawnees, like Ugly Elk, until the smoke of his -camp is the smoke of fear to the Pawnees, he shall be their chief. An’ -because Running Water is as bold as he is true, Ugly Elk accepts the -promise of the Sioux an’ rests content that all will be as he asks when -his eyes close for the long sleep. - -But while Ugly Elk an’ Running Water are happy for each other, there is -one whose heart turns black as he looks upon them. It is Forked Tongue, -the medicine man; he is the cousin of Ugly Elk, an’ full of lies an’ -treachery. Also, he wants to be chief when that day comes for Ugly Elk -to die an’ go away. Forked Tongue feels hate for Running Water, an’ he -plans to kill him. - -Forked Tongue talks with Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, an’ who has once helped -Forked Tongue with his medicine. Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, is very wise; -also he wants revenge on Forked Tongue, who promised him a bowl of -molasses an’ then put a cheat on him. - -When Forked Tongue powwows with Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear thinks now he -will have vengeance on Forked Tongue, who was false about the molasses. -Thereupon, he rests his head on his paw, an’ makes as if he thinks an’ -thinks; an’ after a long while he tells Forked Tongue what to do. - -“Follow my word,” says Moh-Kwa, “an’ it will bring success.” - -But Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, doesn’t say to whom “success” will come; nor -does Forked Tongue notice because liars are ever quickest to believe, -an’ there is no one so easy to deceive as a treacherous man. Forked -Tongue leaves Moh-Kwa an’ turns to carry out his su’gestions. - -Forked Tongue talks to Ugly Elk when they’re alone an’ touches his -feelings where they’re sore. - -“The Running Water laughs at you,” says Forked Tongue to Ugly Elk. “He -says you are more hideous than a gray gaunt old wolf, an’ that he must -hold his head away when you an’ he are together. If he looked at you, he -says, you are so ugly he would laugh till he died.” - -Then the Ugly Elk turned to fire with rage. - -“How will you prove that?” says Ugly Elk to Forked Tongue. - -Forked Tongue is ready, for Moh-Kwa has foreseen the question of Ugly -Elk. - -“You may prove it for yourself,” says Forked Tongue. “When you an’ -Running Water are together, see if he does not turn away his head.” - -That night it is as Forked Tongue said. Running Water looks up at the -top of the lodge, or down at the robes on the ground, or he turns his -back on Ugly Elk; but he never once rests his eyes on Ugly Elk or looks -him in the face. An’ the reason is this: Forked Tongue has told Running -Water that Ugly Elk complained that Running Water’s eye was evil; that -his medicine told him this; an’ that he asked Forked Tongue to command -Running Water not to look on him, the Ugly Elk, for ten wakes an’ ten -sleeps, when the evil would have gone out of his eye. - -“An’ the Ugly Elk,” says Forked Tongue, “would tell you this himse’f, -but he loves you so much it would make his soul sick, an’ so he asks -me.” - -Running Water, who is all truth, does not look for lies in any mouth, -an’ believes Forked Tongue, an’ resolves for ten sleeps an’ ten wakes -not to rest his eyes on Ugly Elk. - -When Ugly Elk notices how Running Water will not look on him, he chokes -with anger, for he remembers he is hideous an’ believes that Running -Water laughs as Forked Tongue has told him. An’ he grows so angry his -mind is darkened an’ his heart made as night. He seeks out the Forked -Tongue an’ says: - -“Because I am weak with love for him, I cannot kill him with my hands. -What shall I do, for he must die?” - -Then Forked Tongue makes a long think an’ as if he is hard at work -inside his head. Then he gives this counsel to Ugly Elk: - -“Send to your hunters where they are camped by the river. Say to them by -your runner to seize on him who comes first to them in the morning, an’ -tie him to the big peeled pine an’ burn him to death with wood. When the -runner is gone, say to Running Water that he must go to the hunters when -the sun wakes up in the east an’ ask them if they have killed an’ cooked -the deer you sent them. Since he will be the first to come, the hunters -will lay hands on Running Water an’ tie him an’ burn him; an’ that will -put an end to his jests an’ laughter over your ugliness.” - -Ugly Elk commands the Antelope, his runner, to hurry with word to -the hunters to burn him to death who shall come first to them in the -morning. Then he makes this word to Running Water that he must go to the -hunters when the sun comes up an’ ask if they have killed an’ cooked -the deer he sent them. Ugly Elk scowls like a cloud while he gives his -directions to Running Water, but the boy does not see since his eyes are -on the ground. - -As the sun comes up, Running Water starts with the word of Ugly Elk to -the hunters. But Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, is before him for his safety. -Moh-Kwa knows that the way to stop a man is with a woman, so he has -brought a young squaw of the lower Yellowstone who is so beautiful that -her people named her the Firelight. Moh-Kwa makes the Firelight pitch -camp where the trail of Running Water will pass as he goes to the -hunters. An’ the Wise Bear tells her what to say; an’ also to have a -turkey roasted, an’ a pipe an’ a soft blanket ready for Running Water. - -When Running Water sees the Firelight, she is so beautiful he thinks it -is a dream. An’ when she asks him to eat, an’ fills the redstone pipe -an’ spreads a blanket for him, the Running Water goes no further. -He smokes an’ rests on the blanket; an’ because the tobacco is big -medicine, Running Water falls asleep with his head in the lap of the -Firelight. - -When Forked Tongue knows that Running Water has started for the hunters, -he waits. Then he thinks: - -“Now the hunters, because I have waited long, have already burned -Running Water. An’ I will go an’ see an’ bring back one of the -shin-bones to show Ugly Elk that he will never return.” - -Forked Tongue travels fast; an’ as he runs by the lodge of the -Firelight, while it is a new lodge to him, he does not pause, for the -lodge is closed so that the light will not trouble Running Water where -he lies asleep with his head in the lap of the Firelight. - -Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, is behind a tree as Forked Tongue trots past, -an’ he laughs deep in his hairy bosom; for Moh-Kwa likes revenge, an’ he -remembers how he was cheated of his bowl of molasses. - -Forked Tongue runs by Moh-Kwa like a shadow an’ never sees him, an’ -cannot hear him laugh. - -When Forked Tongue comes to the hunters, they put their hands on him an’ -tie him to the peeled pine tree. As they dance an’ shout an’ pile the -brush an’ wood about him, Forked Tongue glares with eyes full of fear -an’ asks: “What is this to mean?” The hunters stop dancing an’ say: “It -means that it is time to sing the death song.” With that they bring fire -from their camp an’ make a blaze in the twigs an’ brush about Forked -Tongue; an’ the flames leap up as if eager to be at him--for fire hates -a liar--an’ in a little time Forked Tongue is burned away an’ only the -ashes are left an’ the big bones, which are yet white hot. - -The sun is sinking when Running Water wakes an’ he is much dismayed; -but the Firelight cheers him with her dark eyes, an’ Moh-Kwa comes from -behind the tree an’ gives him good words of wisdom; an’ when he has -once more eaten an’ drunk an’ smoked, he kisses the Firelight an’ goes -forward to the hunters as the Ugly Elk said. - -[Illustration: 0055] - -An’ when he comes to them, he asks: - -“Have you killed an’ cooked the deer which was sent you by the Ugly -Elk?” An’ the hunters laugh an’ say: “Yes; he is killed an’ cooked.” - Then they take him to the peeled pine tree, an’ tell him of Forked -Tongue an’ his fate; an’ after cooling a great shin-bone in the river, -they wrap it in bark an’ grass an’ say: - -“Carry that to the Ugly Elk that he may know his deer is killed an’ -cooked.” - -While he is returning to Ugly Elk much disturbed, Moh-Kwa tells Running -Water how Forked Tongue made his evil plan; an both Running Water when -he hears, an’ Ugly Elk when he hears, can hardly breathe for wonder. An’ -the Ugly Elk cannot speak for his great happiness when now that Running -Water is still alive an’ has not made a joke of his ugliness nor -laughed. Also, Ugly Elk gives Moh-Kwa that bowl of molasses of which -Forked Tongue would cheat him. - -The same day, Moh-Kwa brings the Firelight to the lodge of Ugly Elk, -an’ she an’ Running Water are wed; an’ from that time she dwells in the -tepee of Running Water, even unto the day when he is named Kill-Bear an’ -made chief after Ugly Elk is no more. - -“It is ever,” said the Jolly Doctor, beaming from one to another to -observe if we enjoyed Sioux Sam’s story with as deep a zest as he did, -“it is ever a wondrous pleasure to meet with these tales of a primitive -people. They are as simple as the romaunts invented and told by children -for the amusement of each other, and yet they own something of a plot, -though it be the shallowest.” - -“Commonly, too, they teach a moral lesson,” spoke up the Sour Gentleman, -“albeit from what I know of savage morals they would not seem to have -had impressive effect upon the authors or their Indian listeners. You -should know something of our Indians?” - -Here the Sour Gentleman turned to the Old Cattleman, who was rolling a -fresh cigar in his mouth as though the taste of tobacco were a delight. - -“Me, savey Injuns?” said the Old Cattleman. “Which I knows that much -about Injuns it gets in my way.” - -“What of their morals, then?” asked the Sour Gentleman. - -“Plumb base. That is, they’re plumb base when took from a paleface -standp’int. Lookin’ at ’em with the callous eyes of a savage, I -reckons now they would mighty likely seem bleached a whole lot.” - -Discussion rambled to and fro for a time, and led to a learned -disquisition on fables from the Jolly Doctor, they being, he said, the -original literature of the world. With the end of it, however, there -arose a request that the Sour Gentleman follow the excellent examples of -the Jolly Doctor and Sioux Sam. - -“But I’ve no invention,” complained the Sour Gentleman. “At the best I -could but give you certain personal experiences of my own; and those, -let me tell you, are not always to my credit.” - -“Now I’ll wager,” spoke up the Red Nosed Gentleman, “now I’ll wager a -bottle of burgundy--and that reminds me I must send for another, since -this one by me is empty--that your experiences are quite as glorious as -my own; and yet, sir,”--here the Red Nosed Gentleman looked hard at the -Sour Gentleman as though defying him to the tiltyard--“should you favor -us, I’ll even follow you, and forage in the pages of my own heretofore -and give you a story myself.” - -“That is a frank offer,” chimed in the Jolly Doctor. - -“There is no fault to be found with the offer,” said the Sour Gentleman; -“and yet, I naturally hesitate when those stories of myself, which my -poverty of imagination would compel me to give you, are not likely to -grace or lift me in your esteem.” - -“And what now do you suppose should be the illustrative virtues of what -stories I will offer when I tell you I am a reformed gambler?” - -This query was put by the Red Nosed Gentleman. The information thrown -out would seem to hearten the Sour Gentleman not a little. - -“Then there will be two black sheep at all events,” said the Sour -Gentleman. - -“Gents,” observed the Old Cattleman, decisively, “if it’ll add to the -gen’ral encouragement, I’ll say right yere that in Arizona I was allowed -to be some heinous myse’f. If this is to be a competition in iniquity, I -aims to cut in on the play.” - -“Encouraged,” responded the Sour Gentleman, with just the specter of a -vinegar smile, “by the assurance that I am like to prove no more ebon -than my neighbors, I see nothing for it save to relate of the riches -I made and lost in queer tobacco. I may add, too, that this particular -incident carries no serious elements of wrong; it is one of my cleanest -pages, and displays me as more sinned against than sinning.” - - - - -CHAPTER IV.--THAT TOBACCO UPSET. - -When the war was done and the battle flags of that confederacy which -had been my sweetheart were rolled tight to their staves and laid away -in mournful, dusty corners to moulder and be forgot, I cut those buttons -and gold ends of braid from my uniform, which told of me as a once -captain of rebels, and turned my face towards New York. I was twenty-one -at the time; my majority arrived on the day when Lee piled his arms and -surrendered to Grant at Appomatox. A captain at twenty-one? That was not -strange, my friends, in a time when boys of twenty-two were wearing the -wreath of a brigadier. The war was fought by boys, not men;--like every -other war. Ah! I won my rank fairly, saber in fist; so they all said. - -Those were great days. I was with O’Ferrell. There are one hundred miles -in the Shenandoah, and backwards and forwards I’ve fought on its every -foot. Towards the last, each day we fought, though both armies could -see the end. We, for our side, fought with the wrath of despair; the -Federals, with the glow of triumph in plain sight. Each day we fought; -for if we did not go riding down the valley hunting Sheridan, the sun -was never over-high when he rode up the valley hunting us. Those were -brave days! We fought twice after the war was done. Yes, we knew of -Richmond’s fall and that the end was come. But what then? There was the -eager foe; there were we, sullen and ripe and hot with hate. Why should -we not fight? So it befell that I heard those gay last bugles that -called down the last grim charge; so it came that I, with my comrades, -made the last gray line of battle for a cause already lost, and fought -round the last standards of a confederacy already dead. Those were, -indeed, good days--those last scenes were filled with the best and -bravest of either side. - -No; I neither regret nor repent the rebellion; nor do I grieve for -rebellion’s failure. All’s well that well ends, and that carnage left us -the better for it. For myself, I came honestly by my sentiments of -the South. I was born in Virginia, of Virginians. One of my youthful -recollections is how John Brown struck his blow at Harper’s Ferry; -how Governor Wise called out that company of militia of which I was a -member; and how, as we stood in the lamp-lighted Richmond streets that -night, waiting to take the road for Harper’s Ferry, an old grotesque -farmerish figure rushed excitedly into our midst. How we laughed at the -belligerent agriculturist! No, he was no farmer; he was Wilkes Booth -who, with the first whisper of the news, had come hot foot from the -stage of Ford’s Theater in his costume of that night to have his part -with us. But all these be other stories, and I started to tell, not of -the war nor of days to precede it, but about that small crash in tobacco -wherein I had disastrous part. - -When I arrived in New York my hopes were high, as youth’s hopes commonly -are. But, however high my hope, my pocket was light and my prospects -nothing. Never will I forget how the mere sensation of the great city -acted on me like a stimulant. The crowd and the breezy rush of -things were as wine. Then again, to transplant a man means ever a -multiplication of spirit. It was so with me; the world and the hour and -I were all new together, and never have I felt more fervor of enterprise -than came to me those earliest New York days. But still, I must plan and -do some practical thing, for my dollars, like the hairs of my head, were -numbered. - -It was my seventh New York morning. As I sat in the café of the Astor -House, my eye was caught by a news paragraph. The Internal Revenue -law, with its tax of forty cents a pound on tobacco, had gained a -construction, and the department’s reading of the law at once claimed my -hungriest interest. No tobacco grown prior to the crop of ’66 was to -be affected by the tax; that was the decision. - -Aside from my saber-trade as a cavalryman, tobacco was that thing -whereof I exhaustively knew. I was a tobacco adept from the hour when -the seed went into the ground, down to the perfumed moment when the -perfect leaf exhaled in smoke. Moreover, I was aware of a trade matter -in the nature of a trade secret, which might be made of richest import. - -During those five red years of war, throughout the tobacco regions of -the south, planting and harvesting, though crippled, had still gone -forward. The fires of battle and the moving lines of troops had only -streaked those regions; they never wholly covered or consumed them. And -wherever peace prevailed, the growing of tobacco went on. The harvests -had been stored; there was no market--no method of getting the tobacco -out. To be brief, as I read the internal revenue decision above quoted, -on that Astor House morning, I knew that scattered up and down Virginia -and throughout the rest of the kindom of tobacco, the crops of full five -years were lying housed, mouldy and mildewed, for the most part, and -therefore cheap to whoever came with money in his hands. For an hour I -sat over my coffee and made a plan. - -There was a gentleman, an old college friend of my father. He was rich, -avoided business and cared only for books. I had made myself known to -him on the day of my arrival; he had asked me, over a glass of wine, -to let him hear from me as time and my destinies took unto themselves -direction. For my tobacco plan I must have money; and I could think of -no one save my father’s friend of the books. - -When I was shown into the old gentleman’s library, I found him deeply -held with Moore’s Life of Byron. As he greeted me, he kept the volume in -his left hand with finger shut in the page. Evidently he trusted that I -would not remain long and that he might soon return to his reading. - -The situation chilled me; I began my story with slight belief that its -end would be fortunate. I exposed my tobacco knowledge, laid bare my -scheme of trade, and craved the loan of five thousand dollars on the -personal security--not at all commercial--of an optimist of twenty-one, -whose only employment had been certain boot-and-saddle efforts to -overthrow the nation. I say, I had scant hope of obtaining the aid I -quested. I suffered disappointment. I was dealing with a gentleman who, -however much he might grudge me a few moments taken from Byron, was -willing enough to help me with money. In truth, he seemed relieved -when he had heard me through; and he at once signed a check with a fine -flourish, and I came from his benevolent presence equipped for those -tobacco experiments I contemplated. - -It is not required that I go with filmy detail into a re-count of my -enterprise. I began safely and quietly; with my profits I extended -myself; and at the end of eighteen months, I had so pushed affairs that -I was on the highway to wealth and the firm station of a millionaire. - -I had personally and through my agents bought up those five entire -war-crops of tobacco. Most of it was still in Virginia and the south, -due to my order; much of it had been already brought to New York. By the -simple process of steaming and vaporizing, I removed each trace of mould -and mildew, and under my skillful methods that war tobacco emerged upon -the market almost as sweet and hale as the best of our domestic stock; -and what was vastly in its favor, its flavor was, if anything, a trifle -mild. - -In that day of leaf tobacco, the commodity was marketed in -one-hundred-pound bales. My bales were made with ninety-two pounds of -war tobacco, sweated free of any touch of mildew; and eight pounds of -new tobacco, the latter on the outside for the sake of color and looks. -Thus you may glimpse somewhat the advantage I had. Where, at forty cents -a pound, the others paid on each bale of tobacco a revenue charge of -forty dollars, I, with only eight pounds of new tobacco, paid but three -dollars and twenty cents. And I had cornered the exempted tobacco. Is it -wonder I began to wax rich? - -Often I look over my account books of those brilliant eighteen months. -When I read that news item on the Astor House morning I’ve indicated, -I had carefully modeled existence to a supporting basis of ten dollars a -week. When eighteen months later there came the crash, I was permitting -unto my dainty self a rate of personal expenditure of over thirty -thousand dollars a year. I had apartments up-town; I was a member of -the best clubs; I was each afternoon in the park with my carriage; -incidentally I was languidly looking about among the Vere de Veres of -the old Knickerbockers for that lady who, because of her superlative -beauty and wit and modesty coupled with youth and station, was worthy to -be my wife. Also, I recall at this period how I was conceitedly content -with myself; how I gave way to warmest self-regard; pitied others as -dullards and thriftless blunderers; and privily commended myself as -a very Caesar of Commerce and the one among millions. Alas! “Pride -goeth”--you have read the rest! - -It was a bright October afternoon. My cometlike career had subsisted for -something like a year and a half; and I, the comet, was growing in -size and brilliancy as time fled by. My tobacco works proper were over -towards the East River in a brick warehouse I had leased; to these, -which were under the superintendence of a trusty and expert adherent -whom I had brought north from Richmond, I seldom repaired. My -offices--five rooms, fitted and furnished to the last limit of rosewood -and Russia leather magnificence--were down-town. - -On this particular autumn afternoon, as I went forth to my brougham for -a roll to my apartments, the accountant placed in my hands a statement -which I’d asked for and which with particular exactitude set forth my -business standing. I remember it exceeding well. As I trundled up-town -that golden afternoon, I glanced at those additions and subtractions -which told my opulent story. Briefly, my liabilities were ninety -thousand dollars; and I was rich in assets to a money value of three -hundred and twelve thousand dollars. The ninety thousand was or would -be owing on my tobacco contracts south, and held those tons on tons of -stored, mildewed war tobacco, solid to my command. As I read the totals -and reviewed the items, I would not have paid a penny of premium to -insure my future. There it was in black and white. I knew what I had -done; I knew what I could do. I was master of the tobacco situation for -the next three years to come. By that time, I would have worked up the -entire fragrant stock of leaf exempt from the tax; also by that time, I -would count my personal fortune at a shadow over three millions. There -was nothing surer beneath the sun. At twenty-six I would retire from -trade and its troubles; life would lie at my toe like a kick-ball, and -I would own both the wealth and the supple youth to pursue it into every -nook and corner of pleasurable experience. Thus ran my smug reflections -as I rolled northward along Fifth avenue to dress for dinner on that -bright October day. - -It was the next afternoon, and I had concluded a pleasant lunch in my -private office when Mike, my personal and favorite henchman, announced -a visitor. The caller desired to see me on a subject both important and -urgent. - -“Show him in!” I said. - -There slouched into the room an awkward-seeming man of middle age; -not poor, but roughly dressed. No one would have called him a fop; his -clothes, far astern of the style, fitted vilely; while his head, never -beautiful, was made uglier with a shock of rudely exuberant hair and -a stubby beard like pig’s bristles. It was an hour when there still -remained among us, savages who oiled their hair; this creature was one; -and I remember how the collar of his rusty surtout shone like glass with -the dripped grease. - -My ill-favored visitor accepted the chair Mike placed for him and -perched uneasily on its edge. When we were alone, I brought him and his -business to instant bay. I was anxious to free myself of his presence. -His bear’s grease and jaded appearance bred a distaste of him. - -“What is it you want?” My tones were brittle and sharp. - -The uncouth caller leered at me with a fashion of rancid leer--I -suppose even a leer may have a flavor. Then he opened with obscure -craft--vaguely, foggily. He wanted to purchase half my business. He -would take an account of stock; give me exact money for one-half its -value; besides, he would pay me a bonus of fifty thousand dollars. - -If this unkempt barbarian had come squarely forth and told me his whole -story; if, in short, I had known who he was and whom he came from, there -would have grown no trouble. I would have gulped and swallowed the -pill; we would have dealt; I’d have had a partner and been worth one and -one-half million instead of three millions when my fortune was made. -But he didn’t. He shuffled and hinted and leered, and said over and over -again as he repeated his offer: - -“You need a partner.” - -But beyond this he did not go; and of this I could make nothing, and I -felt nothing save a cumulative resentment that kept growing the larger -the longer he stayed. I told him I desired none of his partnership. I -told him this several divers times; and each time with added vigor and -a rising voice. To the last he persistently and leeringly retorted his -offer; always concluding, like another Cato, with his eternal Delenda -est Carthago. - -“You need a partner!” - -Even my flatterers have never painted me as patient, and at twenty-three -my pulse beat swift and hot. And it came to pass that on the heels of an -acrid ten minutes of my visitor, I brought him bluntly up. - -“Go!” I said. “I’ve heard all I care to hear. Go; or I’ll have you shown -the door!” - -It was of no avail; the besotted creature held his ground. - -I touched a bell; the faithful Mike appeared. It took no more than a -wave of the hand; Mike had studied me and knew my moods. At once he fell -upon the invader and threw him down stairs with all imaginable spirit. - -Thereupon I breathed with vast relief, had the windows lifted because of -bear’s grease that tainted the air, and conferred on the valorous Celt a -reward of two dollars. - -Who was this ill-combed, unctuous, oily, cloudy, would-be partner? He -was but a messenger; two months before he had resigned a desk in the -Washington Treasury--for appearances only--to come to me and make the -proffer. After Mike cast him forth, he brushed the dust from his knees -and returned to Washington and had his treasury desk again. He was -a mere go-between. The one he stood for and whose plans he sought to -transact was a high official of revenue. This latter personage, of whose -plotting identity back in the shadows I became aware only when it was -too late, noting my tobacco operations and their profits and hawk-hungry -for a share, had sent me the offer of partnership. I regret, for my -sake as well as his own, that he did not pitch upon a more sagacious -commissioner. - -Now fell the bolt of destruction. The morning following Mike’s turgid -exploits with my visitor, I was met in the office door by the manager. -His face was white and his eyes seemed goggled and fixed as if their -possessor had been planet-struck. I stared at him. - -“Have you read the news?” he gasped. - -“What news?” - -“Have you not read of the last order?” - -Over night--for my visitor, doubtless, wired his discomfiture--the -Revenue Department had reversed its decision of two years before. The -forty cents per pound of internal revenue would from that moment be -demanded and enforced against every leaf of tobacco then or thereafter -to become extant; and that, too, whether its planting and its reaping -occurred inter arma or took place beneath the pinions of wide-spreading -peace. The revenue office declared that its first ruling, exempting -tobacco grown during the war, had been taken criminal advantage of; and -that thereby the nation in its revenue rights had been sorely defeated -and pillaged by certain able rogues--meaning me. Therefore, this new -rule of revenue right and justice. - -Now the story ends. Under these changed, severe conditions, when I was -made to meet a tax of forty dollars where I’d paid less than a tithe of -it before, I was helpless. I couldn’t, with my inferior tobacco, engage -on even terms against the new tobacco and succeed. My strength had dwelt -in my power to undersell. This power was departed away; my locks as a -Sampson were shorn. - -But why spin out the hideous story? My market was choked up; a cataract -of creditors came upon me; my liabilities seemed to swell while my -assets grew sear and shrunken. Under the shaking jolt of that last new -revenue decision, my fortunes came tumbling like a castle of cards. - -After three months, I dragged myself from beneath the ruin of my affairs -and stood--rather totteringly--on my feet again. I was out of business. -I counted up my treasure and found myself, debtless and unthreatened, -master of some twenty thousand dollars. - -And what then? Twenty thousand dollars is not so bad. It is not three -millions; nor even half of three millions; but when all is said, twenty -thousand is not so bad! I gave up my rich apartments, sold my horses, -looked no more for a female Vere de Vere with intent her to espouse, and -turned to smuggling. I had now a personal as well as a regional grudge -against government. The revenue had cheated me; I would in revenge -cheat the revenue. I became a smuggler. That, however, is a tale to tell -another day. - -***** - -“And now,” observed the Red Nosed Gentleman, dipping deeply into his -burgundy, as if for courage, “I’ll even keep my promise. I’ll tell a -story of superstition and omen; also how I turned in my infancy to cards -as a road to wealth. Cards as a method to arrive by riches is neither -splendid nor respectable, but I shall make no apologies. I give you the -story of The Sign of The Three.” - - - - -CHAPTER V.--THE SIGN OF THREE. - -Such confession may come grotesquely enough from one of education -and substance, yet all the day long I’ve been thinking on omens and on -prophecies. It was my servant who brought it about. He, poor wretch! -appeared in my chamber this morning with brows of terror and eyes of -gloom. He had consulted a gypsy sorceress, whom the storm drove to cover -in this tavern, and crossed the palm of her greed with a silver dollar -to be told that he would die within the year. Information hardly worth -the fee, truly! And the worst is, the shrinking fool believes the -forebode and is already set about mending his lean estates for the -change. What is still more strange, I, too, regard the word of this -snow-blown witch--whoever the hag may be--and can no more eject her -prophecies from my head than can the scared victim of them. - -This business of superstition--a weakness for the supernatural--belongs -with our bone and blood. Reason is no shield from its assaults. Look at -Sir Thomas More; chopped on Tower Hill because he would believe that the -blessed wafers became of the Savior’s actual flesh and blood! And -yet, Sir Thomas wrote that most thoughtful of works, “Utopia,” and -was cunning enough of a hard-headed politics to succeed Wolsey as -Chancellor. - -Doubtless my bent to be superstitious came to me from my father. He -was a miner; worked and lived on Tom’s Run; and being from Wales, and -spending his days in gloomy caverns of coal, held to those fantastic -beliefs of his craft in elves and gnomes and brownies and other -malignant, small folk of Demonland. However, it becomes not me to find -fault with my ancestor nor speak lightly of his foibles. He was a most -excellent parent; and it is one of my comforts, and one which neither my -money nor my ease could bring, that I was ever a good son. - -As I say, my father was a miner of coal. Each morning while the mines -were open, lamp in hat, he repaired deep within the tunneled belly of -the hill across from our cottage and with pick and blast delved the day -long. This mine was what is called a “rail mine,” and closed down its -work each autumn to resume again in the spring. These beginnings and -endings of mine activities depended on the opening and closing of -navigation along the Great Lakes. When the lakes were open, the mines -were open; when November’s ice locked up the lakes, it locked up the -mines as well, and my father and his fellows of the lamp were perforce -idle until the warmth of returning spring again freed the keels and -south breezes refilled the sails of commerce. As this gave my father but -five to six months work a year; and as--at sixty cents a ton and pay for -powder, oil, fuse and blacksmithing--he could make no more than forty -dollars a month, we were poor enough. - -Even the scant money he earned we seldom really fingered. The little -that was not cheated out of my father’s hands by the sins of diamond -screens and untrue weights and other company tricks, was pounced on in -advance by the harpies of “company store” and “company cottage,” and -what coins came to our touch never soared above the mean dignity of -copper. Poor we were! a family of groats and farthings! poor as Lamb’s -“obolary Jew!” - -It is not worth while for what I have in mind to dwell in sad extent on -the struggles of my father or the aching shifts we made in my childhood -to feed and clothe the life within our bodies. And yet, in body at -least, I thrived thereby. I grew up strong and muscular; I boxed, -wrestled and ran; was proficient as an athlete, and among other feats -and for a slight wager--which was not made with my money, I warrant -you!--swam eighteen miles in fresh water one Sunday afternoon. - -While my muscles did well enough, our poverty would have starved my mind -were it not for the parish priest. The question of books and schools for -me was far beyond my father’s solution; he was eager that I be educated, -but the emptiness of the family fisc forbade. It was then the good -parish priest stepped forward and took me in earnest hand. Father -Glennon deemed himself no little of an athlete, and I now believe that -it was my supremacy in muscle among the boys of my age that first drew -his eyes to me. Be that as it may, he took my schooling on himself; -and night and day while I abode on Tom’s Run--say until my seventeenth -year--I was as tightly bound to the priest’s books as ever Prometheus to -his rock. And being a ready lad, I did my preceptor proud. - -The good priest is dead now; I sought to put a tall stone above him but -the bishop refused because it was too rich a mark for the dust of an -humble priest. I had my way in part, however; I bought the plot just -across the narrow gravel walk from the grave that held my earliest, best -friend, and there, registering on its smooth white surface my debt to -Father Glennon, stands the shaft. I carved on it no explanation of the -fact that it is only near and not over my good priest’s bones. Those -who turn curious touching that matter may wend to the bishop or to the -sexton, and I now and then hear that they do. - -No; I did not go into the coal holes. My father forbade it, and I lacked -the inclination as well. By nature I was a speculator, a gambler if you -will. I like uncertainties; I would not lend money at five hundred per -cent., merely because one knows in advance the measure of one’s risks -and profits. I want a chance to win and a chance to lose; for I hold -with the eminent gamester Charles Fox that while to win offers the -finest sensation of which the human soul is capable, the next finest -comes when you lose. Congenitally I was a courtier of Fortune and a -follower of the gospel of chance. And this inborn mood has carried me -through a score of professions until, as I tell you this, I have grown -rich and richer as a stock speculator, and hang over the markets a pure -gambler of the tape. I make no apology; I simply point to the folk who -surround me. - -My vocation of a gambler--for what else shall one call a speculator of -stocks?--has doubtless fattened my tendencies towards the superstitious. -I’ve witnessed much surely, that should go to their strengthening. Let -me tell you a story somewhat in line with the present current of my -thoughts; it may reach some distance to teach you with Horatio that -there be more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our -philosophy. After all, it is the cold record of one of a hundred score -of incidents that encourage my natural belief in the occult. - -***** - -There is a gentleman of stocks--I’ve known him twenty years--and he -has a weakness for the numeral three. Just how far his worship of that -sacred number enters into his business life no one may certainly tell; -he is secretive and cautious and furnishes no evidence on the point that -may be covered up. Yet this weakness, if one will call it so, crops up -in sundry fashions. His offices are suite three, in number thirty-three -Blank street; his telephones are 333 and 3339 respectively; his great -undertakings are invariably deferred in their commencements until the -third of the month. - -His peculiar and particular fetich, however, is a chain of three hundred -and thirty-three gold beads. It is among the wonders of the street. -This was made for him and under his direction by Tiffany, and cost one -workman something over a year of his life in its construction. It is -all hand and hammer work, this chain; and on each bead is drawn with -delicate and finished art a gypsy girl’s head. Under a microscope this -gypsy face is perfect and the entire jewel worthy the boast of the -Tiffany house as a finest piece of goldbeater’s work turned out in -modern times. - -It is a listless, warm evening at the Fifth Avenue Hotel. Our believer -in “Three” is gathered casually with two of his friends. There is no -business abroad; those missions which called our gentleman of the gypsy -chain up-town are all discharged; he is off duty--unbuckled, as it -were, in cheerful, light converse over a bottle of wine. Let us name our -friend of the Three, “James of the Beads;” while his duo of comrades may -be Reed and Rand respectively. - -Such is man’s inconsistency that James of the Beads is railing at Reed -who has told--with airs of veneration if not of faith--of a “system,” - that day laid bare to him, warranted to discover in excellent rich -advance, the names of the winning horses in next day’s races. James of -the Beads laughs, while Reed feebly defends his credulity in lending the -countenance of half belief to the “system” he describes. - -Then a sudden impulse takes James of the Beads. His face grows grave -while his eye shows deepest thought. - -“To-morrow is the third of the month?” observes James of the Beads. Now -with emphasis: “Gentlemen, I’ll show you how to select a horse.” Then -to Reed, who holds in his hands the racing list: “Look for to-morrow’s -third race!” Reed finds it. - -“What is the third horse?” - -“Roysterer.” - -“Roysterer!” repeats James of the Beads. “Good! There are nine letters -in the name; three syllables; three r’s!” - -Then James of the Beads seizes with both hands, in a sort of ecstatic -catch as catch can, on the gypsy chain of magic. He holds a bead between -the thumb and fore-finger of each hand. Softly he counts the little -yellow globes between. - -“Thirty-three!” ejaculates James of the Beads. Deeper lights begin to -shine in his eye. One test of the chain, however, is not enough. He must -make three. A second time he takes a bead between each fore-finger and -thumb; on this trial the two beads are farther apart. Again he counts, -feeling each golden bullet with his finger’s tip as the tally proceeds. - -“Sixty-six!” - -There arrives a glow on the brow of James of the Beads to keep -company with the gathering sparkle of his eye. The questioning of the -witch-chain goes on. Again he seizes the beads; again he tells the -number. - -“Ninety-nine!” - -The prophecy is made; the story of success is foretold. James of the -Beads is on fire; he springs to his feet. Rand and Reed regard him in -silence, curiously. He walks to a window and sharply gazes out on the -lamp-sprinkled evening. - -“Twenty-third street! Fifth avenue! Broadway!” he mutters. “Still -three--always three!” - -Unconsciously James of the Beads seeks the window-shade with his hand. -He would raise it a trifle; it is low and interrupts the eye as he -stands gazing into the trio of thoroughfares. The tassel he grasps is -old and comes off in his fingers. James of the Beads turns his glance on -the tassel. - -“That, too, has its meaning,” says James of the Beads, “if only we might -read it.” - -The tassel is a common, poor creature of worsted yarns and strands -wrapped about a clumsy mold of wood. James of the Beads scans it -narrowly as it lies in his hand. At last he turns it, and the fringe -falls away from the wooden mold. There is a little “3” burned upon the -wood. James of the Beads exhibits this sacred sign to Reed and Rand; -the while his excited interest deepens. Then he counts the strands of -worsted which constitute the fringe. There are eighty-one! - -“Three times three times three times three!” and James of the Beads -draws a deep breath. - -Who might resist these spectral manifestations of “Three!” James of the -Beads turns from the window like one whose decision is made. Without -a word he takes a slip of paper from his pocket book and going to the -table writes his name on its back. It is a pleasant-seeming paper, this -slip; and pleasantly engraved and written upon. No less is it than a New -York draft drawn on the City National Bank by a leading Chicago concern -for an even one hundred thousand dollars. James of the Beads places it -in the hands of Rand. - -“To-morrow should be the luckiest of days,” says James of the Beads. -“I must not lose it. I must consider to-morrow and arrange to set afoot -certain projects which I’ve had in train for some time. As to the races, -Rand, take the draft and put it all on Roysterer.” - -“Man alive!” remonstrates the amazed Rand; “it’s too much on one horse! -Moreover, I won’t have time to get all that money down.” - -“Get down what you can then,” commands James of the Beads. “Plunge! -Have no fears! I tell you, so surely as the sun comes up, Roysterer will -win.” - -“The wise ones don’t think so,” urges Rand, who is not wedded to the -mystic “Three,” and beholds nothing wondrous in that numeral. “This -Roysterer is a seven for one shot.” - -“And the better for us,” retorts James of the Beads. “Roysterer is to -win.” - -“But wouldn’t it be wiser to split this money and play part of it on -Roysterer for a place?” - -“Never!” declares James of the Beads. “Do you suppose I don’t know what -I’m about? I’m worth a million for each year of my life, and I made -every stiver of it by the very method I take to discover this horse. -Can’t you see that I’m not guessing?--that I have reason for what I do? -Roysterer for a place! Never! get down every splinter that Roysterer -finishes first.” - -“Let me ask one question,” observes the cautious Rand. “Do you know the -horse?” - -“Never heard of the animal in my life!” remarks James of the Beads, -pouring himself a complacent glass. This he tastes approvingly. “You -must pardon me, my friends, I’ve got to write a note or two. I’ve not -too much time for a man with twenty things to do, and who must be in the -street when business opens to-morrow. Take my word for it; get all you -can on Roysterer. If we win, we’re partners; if we lose, I’m alone.” - -Rand shakes sage, experienced head, while his face gathers a cynical -look. - -Reed and Rand take James of the Beads by the hand and then withdraw. - -“What do you make of it?” asks Rand. - -“The man’s infatuated!” replies Reed. - -“And yet, you also believe in systems,” remarks Rand. - -It is the next afternoon. The Brighton course is rampant with the usual -jostling, pushing, striving, guessing, knowing, wagering, winning, -losing, ignorant, exulting, deploring, profane crowd. The conservative -Rand has so far obeyed the behest of James of the Beads that he has -fifteen thousand dollars on Roysterer straight. - -“To lose fifteen thousand won’t hurt him,” says Rand, and so consoles -himself for a mad speculation whereof he has no joy. - -Reed and Rand, as taking life easily, are in a box; the race over which -their interest clings and clambers is called. - -The horses are at the post. Roysterer does not act encouragingly; he is -too sleepy--too lethargic! Starlight, the favorite, steps about, alert -and springy as a cat; it should be an easy race for her if looks go for -aught. - -They get the word; they are “off!” The field sweeps ’round the curve. -A tall man in a nearby box follows the race with a glass. - -“At the quarter,” sings the tall man. “Starlight first, Blenheim second, -Roysterer third!” There is a pause. Then the tall man: “At the half! -Starlight first, Blenheim second, Roysterer third!” Rand turns to Reed. -“He must better that,” says Rand, “or he’ll explode the superstition -of our friend.” There is a wait of twenty-five seconds. Again the tall, -binoculared man: “Three-quarter post! Starlight first, Blenheim second, -Roysterer third--and whipping!” - -“It’s as good as over,” observes Rand. “I wonder what James of the Beads -will say to his witch-chain when he hears the finish.” - -“It’s surprising,” remarks Reed peevishly, “that a man of his force -and clear intelligence should own to such a weakness! All his life he’s -followed this marvelous ‘Three’ about; and having had vast success -he attributes it to the ‘Three,’ when he might as well and as wisely -ascribe it to Captain Kidd or Trinity church. To-day’s results may cure -him; and that’s one comfort.” - -There is a sharp click as the tall man in the nearby box shuts up his -glasses. - -“Roysterer wins!” says the tall man. - -“Got down fifteen thousand. Won one hundred and five thousand,” reads -James of the Beads from Rand’s telegram sent from the track. James of -the Beads is in his offices; he has just finished a victorious day, at -once heavy and tumultuous with the buying and the selling of full three -hundred thousand shares of stocks. “They should have wagered the full -one hundred thousand and let the odds look after themselves,” he says. -Then James of the Beads begins to caress the gypsy chain. “You knew,” - he murmurs; “of course, you knew!” There is a note of devotion in the -tones. The bead-worship goes on for a silent moment. “Only one hundred -and five thousand!” ruminates James of the Beads. “I suppose Rand was -afraid!” - -“That is indeed a curious story,” observed the Jolly Doctor, when the -Red Nosed Gentleman, being done with James of the Beads, was returning -to his burgundy; “and did it really happen?” - -“Of a verity, did it,” returned the Red Nosed Gentleman. “I was Rand.” - -Conversation fluttered from one topic to another for a brief space, -but dealt mainly with those divers superstitions that folk affect. When -signs and omens were worn out, the Jolly Doctor turned upon the Old -Cattleman as though to remind that ancient practitioner of cows how it -would be now his right to uplift us with a reminiscence. - -“No, I don’t need to be told it none,” said the Old Cattleman. “On the -principle of freeze-out, it’s shore got down to me. Seein’ how this yere -snow reminds me a heap of Christmas, I’ll onload on you-all how we’re -aroused an’ brought to a realisin’ sense of that season of gifts once -upon a time in Wolfville.” - - - - -CHAPTER VI.--THAT WOLFVILLE CHRISTMAS. - -This yere can’t be called a story; which it can’t even be described -none as a sketch. Accordin’ to the critics, who, bein’ plumb onable -to write one themse’fs, nacherally knows what a story ought to be, no -story’s a story onless she’s built up like one of these one-sided hills. -Reelation must climb painfully from base to peak, on the slope side, -with interest on a up-grade, say, of one foot in ten; an’ then when -you-all arrives safely at the summit, the same bein’ the climax, you’re -to pitch headlong over the precipice on the sheer an’ other side, an’ -in the space of not more’n a brace of sentences, land, bing! bang! -smash!--all broke up at the bottom. That, by what you-all might call -“Our best literary lights,” would be a story, an’ since what I’m about -to onfold don’t own no sech brands nor y’ear-marks, it can’t come onder -that head. - -This partic’lar o’casion is when little Enright Peets Tutt--said blessed -infant, as I sets forth former, bein’ the conj’int production of Dave -Tutt an’ his esteemable wife, Tucson Jennie--is comin’ eight years old -next spring round-up. Little Enright Peets is growin’ strong an’ husky -now, an’ is the pride of the Wolfville heart. He’s shed his milk teeth -an’ is sproutin’ a second mouthful, white an’ clean as a coyote’s. Also, -his cur’osity is deeveloped powerful an’ he’s in the habit of pervadin’ -about from the Red Light to the New York Store, askin’ questions; an’ he -is as familiar in the local landscape as either the Tucson stage or Old -Monte, the drunkard who drives it. - -One afternoon, about first drink time, little Enright Peets comes -waddlin’ up to Old Man Enright on them short reedic’lous black-b’ar -laigs of his, an’ says: - -“Say, gran’dad Enright, don’t you-all cim-marons never have no Christmas -in this camp? Which if you does, all I got to say is I don’t notice no -Christmas none since I’ve been yere, an’ that’s whatever!” - -[Illustration: 0091] - -“Will you-all listen to this preecocious child!” observes Enright to -Doc Peets, with whom he’s in talk. “Wherever now do you reckon, Doc, he -hears tell of Christmas?” - -“How about it, Uncle Doc?” asks little Enright Peets, turnin’ his eyes -up to Peets when he notices Enright don’t reply. - -At this Enright an’ Peets makes a disparin’ gesture an’ wheels into the -Red Light for a drink, leavin’ pore little Enright Peets standin’ in the -street. - -“That baby puts us to shame, Doc,” says Enright, as he signs up to Black -Jack, the barkeep, for the Valley Tan; “he shows us in one word how -we neglects his eddication. The idee of that child never havin’ had -no Christmas! It’s more of a stain on this commoonity than not hangin’ -Navajo Joe that time.” - -“That’s whatever!” assents Peets, reachin’ for the nose-paint in his -turn. “‘Out of the mouths of babes an’ sucklin’s,’ as the good book -says.” This infantile bluff of little Enright Peets goes a long way -to stir up the sensibilities of the public. As for Enright, he don’t -scroople to take Dave Tutt to task. - -“The thought that you, Dave,” says Enright, “you, a gent I yeretofore -regyards as distinguished for every paternal virchoo, would go romancin’ -along, lettin’ that boy grow up in darkness of Christmas, an’ it one of -the first festivals of the Christian world! As a play, I says freely, -that sech neglect is plumb too many for me!” - -“She’s shore a shame,” adds Dan Boggs, who’s also shocked a heap, and -stands in with Enright to crawl Dave’s hump, “she’s shore a shame, never -to provide no Christmas for that offspring of yours, an’ leave him to go -knockin’ about in his ignorance like a blind dog in a meat shop. That’s -what I states; she’s a shame!” - -“Now gents,” reemonstrates Dave, “don’t press the limit in these yere -reecrim’nations, don’t crowd me too hard. I asks you, whatever could I -do? If you-all enthoosiasts will look this yere Christmas proposition -ca’mly in the face, you’ll begin to notice that sech cel’brations ain’t -feasible in Arizona. Christmas in its very beginnin’ is based on snow. -Who’s the reg’lar round-up boss for Christmas? Ain’t he a disrepootable -Dutchman named Santa Claus? Don’t he show up wrapped in furs, an’ with -reindeer an’ sleigh an’ hock deep in a snowstorm? Answer me that? Also -show me where’s your snow an’ where’s your sleigh an’ where’s your -reindeer an’ where’s your Dutchman in Wolfville? You-all better go -about Jixin’ up your camp an’ your climate so as to make one of these -Christmases possible before ever you come buttin’ in, cavilin’ an’ -criticisin’ ag’in me as a parent.” - -“Which jest the same, Dave,” contends Dan, who takes the eepisode mighty -sour, “it looks like you-all could have made some sort o’ play.” - -About this time, as addin’ itse’f to the gen’ral jolt given the -Wolfville nerve by them Christmas questions put aforesaid by little -Enright Peets, news comes floatin’ over from Red Dog of a awful -spree that low-flung outfit enjoys. It’s a Six Shooter Weddin’; so -deenominated because Pete Bland, the outlaw for whom the party is made, -an’ his wife, The Duchess, has been married six years an’ ain’t -done nothin’ but fight. Wherefore, on the sixth anniversary of their -nuptials, Red Dog resolves on a Six Shooter Weddin’; an’ tharupon -descends on those two wedded warriors, Pete an’ The Duchess, in a body, -packin’ fiddles, nose-paint, an’ the complete regalia of a frantic -shindig. An’ you hear me, gents, them Red Dog tarrapins shore throws -themse’fs loose! You-all could hear their happy howls in Wolfville. - -As a reason for the outburst, an’ one consistent with its name, the -guests endows Pete an’ The Duchess each with belts an’ a brace of guns. - -“To the end,” says the Red Dog cha’rman when he makes the presentation -speech, “that, as between Pete an’ The Duchess, we as a commoonity -promotes a even break, and clothes both parties in interest with equal -powers to preserve the peace.” - -As I observes, it’s the story of these proud doin’s on the locoed part -of our rival, that ondoubted goes some distance to decide us Wolves of -Wolfville on pullin’ off a Christmas warjig for little Enright Peets. We -ain’t goin’ to be outdone none in this business of being fervid. - -It’s mebby a month prior to Christmas when we resolves on this yere -racket, an’ so we has ample time to prepare. Almost every afternoon an’ -evenin’ over our Valley Tan, we discusses an’ does our wisest to -evolve a programme. It’s then we begins to grasp the wisdom of Dave’s -observations touchin’ how onfeasible it is to go talkin’ of Christmas in -southern Arizona. - -“Nacherally,” remarks Enright, as we sits about the Red Light, turnin’ -the game in our minds, “nacherally, we ups an’ gives little Enright -Peets presents. Which brings us within ropin’ distance of the inquiry, -‘Whatever will we give him?’” - -“We-all can’t give him fish-lines, an’ sech,” says Doc Peets, takin’ up -Enright’s argument, “for thar ain’t no fish. Skates is likewise barred, -thar bein’ no ice; an’ sleds an’ mittens an’ worsted comforters an’ fur -caps fails us for causes sim’lar. Little Enright Peets is too young to -smoke; Tucson Jennie won’t let him drink licker; thar, with one word, is -them two important sources closed ag’in us. Gents, Pm inclined to string -my bets with Dave; I offers two for one as we sets yere, that this -framin’ up a Christmas play in Arizona as a problem ain’t no slouch.” - -“Thar’s picture books,” says Faro Nell. - -“Shore!” assents Cherokee Hall, where he’s planted back of his faro box. - -“An’ painted blocks!” - -“Good!” says Cherokee. - -“An’ candy!” - -“Nell’s right!” an’ Cherokee coincides plumb through, “Books, blocks, -an’ candy, is what I calls startin’ on velvet.” - -“Whatever’s the matter,” says Dan Boggs, who’s been rackin’ his -intellects a heap, “of givin’ little Enright Peets a faro layout, -or mebby now, a roolette wheel? Some of them wheels is mighty gaudy -furniture!” - -“Dan,” says Enright, an’ his tones is severe; “Dan, be you-all aimin’ to -corrupt this child?” Dan subsides a whole lot after this yere reproof. - -“I don’t reckon now,” observes Jack Moore, an’ his manner is as one -ropin’ for information; “I don’t reckon now a nice, wholesome Colt’s-44, -ivory butt, stamped leather belts, an’ all that, would be a proper thing -to put in play. Of course, a 8-inch gun is some heavy as a plaything for -a infant only seven; but he’d grow to it, gents, he’d grow to it.” - -“Don’t alloode to sech a thing, Jack,” says Dan, with a shudder; “don’t -alloode to it. Little Enright Peets would up an’ blow his yoothful light -out; an’ then Tucson Jennie would camp on our trails forevermore as the -deestroyers of her child. The mere idee gives me the fantods!” An’ Dan, -who’s a nervous party, shudders ag’in. - -“Gents,” says Texas Thompson, “I ain’t cut in on this talk for two -reasons: one is I ain’t had nothin’ to say; an’ ag’in, it was Christmas -Day when my Laredo wife--who I once or twice adverts to as gettin’ a -divorce--ups an’ quits me for good. For which causes it has been my -habit to pass up all mention an’ mem’ry of this sacred season in a -sperit of silent pra’r. But time has so far modified my feelin’s that, -considerin’ the present purposes of the camp, I’m willin’ to be heard. -Thar’s nothin’ that should be looked to more jealously than this ye re -givin’ of presents. It’s grown so that as a roole the business of makin’ -presents degen’rates to this: Some sport who can’t afford to, gives some -sport something he don’t need. Thar’s no fear of the first, since we -gents can afford anything we likes. As to the second prop’sition, we -should skin our kyards some sharp. We-all ought to lavish on little -Enright Peets a present which, while safegyardin’ his life an’ his -morals, is calc’lated to teach him some useful accomplishments. Books, -blocks, an sweetmeats, as proposed by our fac’natin’ townswoman, Miss -Faro Nell”--Nell tosses Texas a kiss--“is in admir’ble p’int as -coverin’ a question of amooze-ments. For the rest, an’ as makin’ for the -deevel-opment of what will be best in the character of little Enright -Peets, I moves you we-all turns in an’ buys that baby the best -bronco--saddle, bridle, rope an’ spurs, complete--that the southwest -affords.” - -Texas, who’s done stood up to make this yere oration, camps down ag’in -in the midst of a storm of applause. The su’gestion has immediate -adoption. - -We-all gives a cold thousand for the little boss. We gets him of the -sharp who--it bein’ in the old day before railroads--is slammin’ through -the mails from Chihuahua to El Paso, three hundred miles in three -nights. This bronco--he’s a deep bay, shadin’ off into black like one -of them overripe violins, an’ with nostrils like red expandin’ -hollyhocks--can go a hundred miles between dark an’ dark, an’ do it -three days in a week. Which lie’s shore a wonder, is that little hoss; -an’ the saddle an’ upholstery that goes with him, Spanish leather an’ -gold, is fit for his company. - -As Dan leads him up in front of the Red Light Christmas Eve for us to -look at, he says: - -“Gents, if he ain’t a swallow-bird on four legs, then I never sees no -sech fowl; an’ the only drawback is that, considerin’ the season, we -can’t hang him on no tree.” - -An’ y ere, now, is where we-all gets scared up. It spoils the symmetry -of this story to chunk it in this a-way; but I can’t he’p myse’f, for -this story, like that tale of James of the Beads, is troo. - -Jest as we-all is about to prounce down with our gifts on Dave’s -wickeyup like a mink on a settin’ hen--Dan bein’ all framed an’ frazzled -up in cow-tails an’ buffalo horns like a Injun medicine man, thinkin’ to -make the deal as Santa Claus--Tucson Jennie comes surgin’ up, wild an’ -frantic, an’ allows little Enright Peets is lost. Dave, she says, is -chargin’ about, tryin’ to round him up. - -“Which I knows he’s done been chewed up by wolves,” says Tucson Jennie, -wringin’ her hands an’ throwin’ her apron over her head. “He’d shore -showed up for supper if he’s alive.” - -It’s obvious that before that Christmas can proceed, we-all has got to -recover the beneficiary. Thar’s a gen’ral saddlin’ up, an’ in no time -Wolf-ville’s population is spraddlin’ about the surroundin’ scenery. - -It comes right though, an’ it’s Dan who makes the turn. Dan discovers -little Enright Peets camped down in the lee of a mesquite bush, seven -miles out on his way to the Floridas mountains. He puts it up he’s goin’ -over to the hills to have a big talk an’ make medicine with Moh-Kwa, the -wise medicine b’ar that Sioux Sam yere has been reelatin’ to him about. - -No, that child ain’t scared none; he’s takin’ it cool an’ contented, -with twenty coyotes settin’ about, blinkin’ an’ silent on their tails, -an’ lookin’ like they’re sort o’ thinkin’ little Enright Peets over an’ -tryin’ to figger out his system. Them little wolves don’t onderstand -what brings that infant out alone on the plains, that a-way; an’ they’re -cogitatin’ about it when Dan disperses ’em to the four winds. - -That’s all thar is to the yarn. Little Enright Peets is packed into camp -an’ planted in the midst of them books an’ blocks an’ candies which Faro -Nell su’gests; also, he’s made happy with the little hoss. Dan, in his -medicine mask an’ paint, does a skelp dance, an’ is the soul of the -hour. - -Little Enright Peets’ joy is as wide as the territory. Despite -reemonstrance, he insists on get-tin’ into that gold-embossed saddle an’ -givin’ his little hoss a whirl ‘round the camp. Dan rides along to head -off stampedes. - -On the return, little Enright Peets comes down the street like an arrow -an’ pulls up short. As Dave searches him out of the saddle, he says: - -“Paw, that cayouse could beat four kings an’ a ace.” - -That’s reward enough; Wolfville is never more pleased than the night -it opens up to little Enright Peets the beauties which lies hid in -Christmas. An’ the feelin’ that we-all has done this, sort o’ glorifies -an’ gilds the profound deebauch that en-soos. Tucson Jennie lays it down -that it’s shore the star Christmas, since it’s the one when her lost is -found an’ the Fates in the guise of Dan presents her with her boy ag’in. -I knows of myse’f, gents, that Jennie is shore moved, for she omits -utter to lay for Dave with reproaches when, givin’ way to a gen’rous -impulse, he issues forth with the rest of the band, an’ relaxes into a -picnic that savors of old days. - -“My friends,” observed the Jolly Doctor, as we were taking our candles -preparatory for bed, the hour having turned towards the late, “I shall -think on this as an occasion of good company. And to-morrow evening--for -this storm will continue to hold us prisoners--you will find unless -better offer, I shall recognize my debt to you by attempting a Christmas -story myself. I cannot stir your interest as has our friend of camps and -trails with his Wolfville chapter, but I shall do what lies in me.” - -“You will tell us of some Christmas,” hazarded the Sour Gentleman, “that -came beneath your notice as a professional man.” - -“Oh, no; not that,” returned the Jolly Doctor. “This is rather a story -of health and robust strength than any sick-bed tale. It is of gloves -and fighting men who never saw a doctor. I shall call it ‘The Pitt -Street Stringency.’” - -It was eight of the clock on the second evening when we gathered about -the fire-place. The snow was still falling and roads were reported -blocked beyond any thought of passage. We were snowbound; folk who -should know declared that if a road were broken for our getting out -within a week, it was the best we might look for. - -No one seemed stricken of grief at this prison prospect. As we came -about the cheery blaze, every face was easy and content. The Jolly -Doctor joined the Red Nosed Gentleman in his burgundy, while the Sour -Gentleman and the Old Cattleman qualified for the occasion with -a copious account of whiskey, which the aged man of cows called -“Nose-paint.” Sioux Sam and I were the only “abstainers”--I had ceased -and he had never commenced--but as if to make up, we smoked a double -number of cigars. - -The Jolly Doctor began with the explanation that the incidents he would -relate had fallen beneath his notice when as a student he walked the -New York hospitals; then, glass in hand, he told us the tale of The Pitt -Street Stringency. - - - - -CHAPTER VII.--THE PITT STREET STRINGENCY. - -Another would-be sooicide, eh! Here, Kid,” to a sharp gamin who does -errands and odd commissions for the house; “take this mut in where dey -kills ’em.” - -The speaker is a loud young man, clad in garments of violence. The derby -tilted over eye, the black cigar jutting ceilingward at an agle of sixty -degrees, the figured shirt whereof a dominating dye is angry red, the -high collar and flash tie, with its cheap stone, all declare the Bowery. -As if to prove the proposition announced of his costume, the young man -is perched on a stool, the official ticket-seller of a Bowery theatre. - -Mike Menares, whom the Bowery person alludes to as the “mut,” is a -square-shouldered boy of eighteen; handsome he is as Apollo, yet with a -slow, good-humored guilelessness of face. He has come on business -bent. That mighty pugilist, the Dublin Terror, is nightly on the stage, -offering two hundred dollars to any amateur among boxers who shall -remain before him four Queensberry rounds. Mike Menares, he of -the candidly innocent countenance, desires to proffer himself as a -sacrifice. - -“Youse is just in time, sport,” remarks the brisk gamin to whom Mike has -been committed, as he pilots the guileless one to the stage door. “It’s -nine o’clock now, an’ d’ Terror goes on to do his bag-t’umpin’ turn at -ten. After that comes d’ knockin’ out, see! But say! if youse was tired -of livin’, why didn’t you jump in d’ East river? I’d try d’ river an’d’ -morgue before I’d come here to be murdered be d’ Terror.” - -Mike makes no retort to this, lacking lightness of temper. His gamin -conductor throws open the stage door and signals Mike to enter. - -“Tell d’ butcher here’s another calf for him,” vouchsafes the gamin to -the stage-hands inside the door. - -Let us go back four hours to a three-room tenement in Pitt Street. There -are two rooms and a little kennel of a kitchen. The furnishings are -rough and cheap and clean. The lady of the tenement, as the floors -declare, is a miracle of soap and water. And the lady is little Mollie -Lacy, aged eleven years. - -The family of the Pitt Street tenement is made up of three. There is -Mike Menares, our hero; little Mollie; and, lastly, her brother Davy, -aged nine. Little Davy is lame. He fell on the tenement stairs four -years before and injured his hip. The hospital doctors took up the work -where the tenement stairs left off, and Davy came from his sick-bed -doomed to a crutch for life. - -Mike Menares is half-brother of the younger ones. Nineteen years before, -Mike’s mother, Irish, with straw-colored hair and blue eyes, wedded one -Menares, a Spanish Jew. This fortunate Menares was a well-looking, tall -man; with hair black and stiffening in a natural pompadour. He kept a -tobacco stall underneath a stair in Park Row, and was accounted rich by -the awfully poor about him. He died, however, within the year following -Mike’s birth; and thus there was an end to the rather thoroughbred dark -Spanish Jew. - -Mike’s mother essayed matrimony a second time. She selected as a partner -in this experiment a shiftless, idle, easy creature named David Lacy, -who would have been a plasterer had not his indolence defeated his -craft. Little Mollie, and Davy of the clattering crutch, occurred as a -kind of penalty of the nuptials. - -Three years and a half before we encounter this mixed household, Lacy, -the worthless, sailed away on a China ship without notice or farewell. -Some say he was “shanghaied,” and some that he went of free will. Mrs. -Lacy adopted the former of the two theories. - -“David Lacy, too idle to work ashore, assuredly would not go to sea -where work and fare are tenfold harder.” - -Thus argued Mrs. Lacy. Still, a solution of Lacy’s reasons for becoming -a mariner late in life is not here important. He sailed and he never -returned; and as Mrs. Lacy perished of pneumonia the following winter, -they both may be permitted to quit this chronicle to be meddled with by -us no further. - -Mike Menares had witnessed fifteen years when his mother died. As -suggested, he is a singularly handsome boy, and of an appearance likely -to impress. From his Conemara mother, he received a yellow head of hair. -Underneath are a pair of jet black brows, a hawkish nose, double rows -of strong white teeth, and deep soft black eyes, as honest as a hound’s, -the plain bestowal of his Jewish father. - -Mike was driving a delivery wagon for the great grocers, Mark & Milford, -when his mother died. This brought six dollars a week. After the sad -going of his mother, Mike found a second situation where he might work -evenings, and thereby add six further dollars to that stipend from Mark -& Milford. This until the other day continued. On twelve dollars a week, -and with little Mollie--a notable housekeeper--to manage for the Pitt -Street tenement, the composite house of Menares and Lacy fared well. - -Mike’s evening labors require a description. One Sarsfield O’Punch, an -expert of boxing and an athlete of some eminence, maintains a private -gymnasium on Fifty-ninth street. This personage is known to his patrons -as “Professor O’Punch.” Mike, well-builded and lithe, broad of shoulder, -deep of lung, lean of flank, a sort of half-grown Hercules, finds -congenial employ as aid to Professor O’Punch. Mike’s primal duty is to -box with those amateurs of the game who seek fistic enlightenment of -his patron, and who have been carried by that scientist into regions of -half-wisdom concerning the bruising art for which they moil. From eight -o’clock until eleven, Mike’s destiny sets him, one after the other, -before a full score of these would-be boxers, some small and some big, -some good and some bad, some weak and some strong, but all zealous to a -perspiring degree. These novices smite and spare not, and move with -all their skill and strength to pummel Mike. They have, be it said, but -indifferent success; for Mike, waxing expert among experts, side-steps -and blocks and stops and ducks and gets away; and his performances in -these defensive directions are the whisper of the school. - -Now and then he softly puts a glove on some eager face, or over some -unguarded heart, or feather-like left-hooks some careless jaw, to the -end that the other understand a peril and fend against it. But Mike, -working lightly as a kitten, hurts no one; such being the private -commands of Professor O’Punch who knows that to pound a pupil is to lose -a pupil. - -It is to be doubted if the easy-natured Mike is aware of his wonderful -strength of arm and body, or the cat-like quickness and certainty of -his blows. During these three years wherein he has been underling to -Professor O’Punch, Mike strikes but two hard blows. One evening several -of the followers of Professor O’Punch are determining their prowess on -a machine intended to register the force of a blow. Following each other -in a fashion of punching procession, these aspiring gymnasts, putting -their utmost into the swings, strike with all steam. Four hundred to -five hundred pounds says the register; this is vaunted as a vastly good -account. - -Mike, with folded arms and stripped to ring costume--his official -robes--is looking on, a smile lighting his pleasant face. Mike is ever -interested and ever silent. - -As the others smite, Mike beams with approval, but makes no comment. At -last one observes: - -“Menares, how many pounds can you strike?” - -“I don’t know,” replies Mike, in a surprised way, “I never tried.” - -“Try now,” says the other; “I’ve a notion you could hit hard enough if -you cared to.” - -The others second the speaker. Much and instant curiosity grows up as -to what Mike can do with his hands if he puts his soul into it. There -is not an amateur about but knows more of Mike than does the latter of -himself. They know him as one perfect of defensive boxing; also, they -recall the precise feather-like taps which Mike confers on the best of -their muster whenever he chooses; but none has a least of knowledge of -how bitterly hard Mike’s glove might be sent home should ever his heart -be given to the trial. - -Being urged, Mike begins to rouse; he himself grows curious. It has -never come to him as a thought to make the experiment. The “punching -machine” has stood there as part of the paraphernalia of the gymnasium. -But to the fog-witted Mike, who comes to work for so many dollars a week -and who has not once considered himself in the light of a boxer, whether -excellent or the reverse, it held no particular attraction. It could -tell him no secrets he cares a stiver to hear. - -Now, Mike for a first time feels moved to a bit of self-enlightenment. -Poising himself for the effort, Mike, with the quickness of light, sends -in a right-hand smash that all but topples the contrivance from its -base. For the moment the muscles of his back and leg knot and leap -in ropelike ridges; and then they as instantly sink away. The machine -registers eight hundred and ninety-one pounds. - -The on-gazers draw a long breath. Then they turn their eyes on Mike, -whose regular outlines, with muscles retreated again into curves and -slopes and shimmering ripples, have no taint of the bruiser, and -whose handsome features, innocent of a faintest ferocity, recall some -beautiful statue rather than anything more viciously hard. - -Mike’s second earnest blow comes off in this sort. He is homeward bound -from gymnasium work one frosty midnight. Not a block from his home, -three evil folk of the night are standing beneath an electric light. -Mike, unsuspicious, passes them. Instantly, one delivers a cut at Mike’s -head with a sandbag. Mike, warned by the shadow of uplifted arm, springs -forward out of reach, wheels, and then as the footpad blunders towards -him, Mike’s left hand, clenched and hammerlike, goes straight to his -face. Bone and teeth are broken with the shock of it; blood spurts, and -the footpad comes senseless to the pave. His ally, one of the other two, -grasps at Mike’s throat. His clutch slips on the stern muscles of the -athlete’s neck as if the neck were a column of brass. Mike seizes his -assailant’s arm with his right hand; there is a twist and a shriek; -the second robber rolls about with a dislocated fore-arm. The third, -unharmed, flies screeching with the fear of death upon him. - -At full speed comes a policeman, warned of his duty by the howls of -anguish. He surveys the two on the ground; one still and quiet, the -other groaning and cursing with his twisted arm. The officer sends in an -ambulance call. Then he surveys with pleased intentness the regular face -of Mike, cool and unperturbed. - -“An Irish Sheeny!” softly comments the officer to himself. - -He is expert of faces, is the officer, and deduces Mike’s two-ply origin -from his yellow hair, dark eye and curved nose. - -“You’re part Irish and part Jew,” observes the policeman. - -“My mother was from Ireland,” answers Mike; “my father was a Spanish Jew -from Salamanca. I think that’s what they call it, although I was not old -enough when he died to remember much about him.” - -“Irish crossed on Jew!” comments the officer, still in a mood of -thoughtful admiration. “It’s the best prize-ring strain in the world!” - The officer is in his dim way a patron of sport. - -Mike thanks the other; for, while by no means clearly understanding, he -feels that a compliment is meant. Then Mike goes homeward to Mollie and -little Davy. - -It is the twenty-third of December--two days before Christmas--when we -are first made friends of Mike Menares. About a month before, the little -family of three fell upon bad days. Mike was dismissed by the great -grocers, and the six dollars weekly from that quarter came to an end. -Mike’s delivery wagon was run down and crushed by a car; and, while Mike -was not to blame, the grocers have no time to discover a justice, and -Mike was told to go. - -For mere food and light and fire, Mike’s other six Saturday dollars from -Professor O’Punch would with economy provide. But there is the rent on -New Year’s day! Also, and more near, is Christmas, with not a penny to -spare. It must perforce be a bare festival, this Christmas. It will be a -blow to little Davy of the crutch, who has talked only of Christmas for -two months past and gone. - -Mike, as has been intimated, is dull and slow of brain. He has just -enough of education to be able to read and write. He owns no bad -habits--no habits at all, in fact; and the one great passion of his -simple heart is love without a limit for Mollie and little Davy. He -lives for them; the least of their desires is the great concern of -Mike’s life. Therefore, when his income shrinks from twelve dollars to -six, it creeps up on him and chills him as a loss to Mollie and Davy. -And peculiarly does this sorrowful business of a ruined Christmas for -Davy prey on poor Mike. - -“You and I won’t mind,” says housewife Mollie, looking up in Mike’s face -with the sage dignity of her eleven years, “because we’re old enough to -understand; but I feel bad about little Davy. It’s the first real awful -Christmas we’ve ever had.” - -Mollie is as bright and wise as Mike is dull. Seven years her senior, -still Mike has grown to believe in and rely altogether on Mollie as a -guide. He takes her commands without question, and does her will like -a slave. To Mollie goes every one of Mike’s dollars; it is Mollie who -disposes of them, while Mike never gives them a thought. They have been -devoted to the one purpose of Mike’s labors; they have gone to Mollie -and little Davy of the crutch; why, then, should Mike pursue them -further? - -Following housewife Mollie’s regrets over a sad Christmas that was not -because of their poverty to be a Christmas, Mike sits solemnly by the -window looking out on the gathering gloom and hurrying holiday crowds of -Pitt Street. The folk are all poor; yet each seems able to do a bit for -Christmas. As they hurry by, with small bundles and parcels, and now -and then a basket from which protrude mayhap a turkey’s legs or other -symptom of the victory of Christmas, Mike, in the midst of his sluggish -amiabilities, discovers a sense of pain--a darkish thought of trouble. - -And as if grief were to sharpen his wits, Mike has for almost a first -and last time an original idea. It is the thought natural enough, when -one reflects on Mike’s engagements, evening in and evening out, with -Professor O’Punch. - -[Illustration: 0115] - -That day Mike, in passing through the Bowery, read the two hundred -dollars offer of the selfconfident Terror. At that time Mike felt -nothing save wonder that so great a fortune might be the reward of so -small an effort. But it did not occur to him that he should try a tilt -with the Terror. In his present stress, however, and with the woe upon -him of a bad Christmas to dawn for little Davy, the notion marches -slowly into Mike’s intelligence. And it seems simple enough, too, now -Mike has thought of it; and with nothing further of pro or con, he -prepares himself for the enterprise. - -For causes not clear to himself he says nothing to housewife Mollie of -his plans. But he alarms that little lady of the establishment’s few -sparse pots and kettles by declining to eat his supper. Mollie fears -Mike is ill. The latter, knowing by experience just as any animal might, -that with twelve minutes of violent exercise before him, he is better -without, while denying the imputation of illness, sticks to his -supperless resolve. - -Then Mike goes into the rear room and dons blue tights, blue sleeveless -shirt, canvas trunks, and light shoes; his working costume. Over -these he draws trousers and a blue sweater; on top of all a heavy -double-breasted jacket. Thrusting his feet, light shoes and all, into -heavy snow-proof overshoes, and pulling on a bicycle cap, Mike is -arrayed for the street. Mollie knows of these several preparations, the -ring costume under the street clothes, but thinks naught of it, such -being Mike’s nightly custom as he departs for the academy of Professor -O’Punch. At the last moment, Mike kisses both Mollie and little Davy; -and then, with a sudden original enthusiasm, he says: - -“I’ve been thinkin’, Mollie; mebby I can get some money. Mebby we’ll see -a good Christmas, after all.” - -Mollie is dazed by the notion of Mike thinking; but she looks in -his face, with its honest eyes full of love for her and Davy, and as -beautiful as a god’s and as unsophisticated, and in spite of herself a -hope begins to live and lift up its head. Possibly Mike may get money; -and Christmas, and the rent, and many another matter then pinching the -baby housekeeper and of which she has made no mention to Mike, will be -met and considered. - -“It’ll be nice if you should get money, Mike,” is all Mollie trusts -herself to say, as she returns Mike’s good-bye kiss. - -When Mike gets into Pitt Street he moves slowly. There’s the crowd, for -one thing. Then, too, it’s over early for his contest with the Terror. -Mike prefers to arrive at the theatre just in time to strip and make -the required application for those two hundred dollars. It may appear -strange, but it never once occurs to Mike that he will not last the -demanded four rounds. But it seems such a weighty sum! Mike doubts if -the offer be earnest; hesitates with the fear that the management will -refuse to give him the money at the end. - -“But surely,” decides Mike, “they will feel as though they ought to give -me something. I lose a dollar by not going to Professor O’Punch’s; they -must take account of that.” - -Mike loiters along with much inborn ease of heart. Occasionally he -pauses to gaze into one of the cheap shop windows, ablaze and garish of -the season’s wares. There is no wind; the air has no point; but it is -snowing softly, persistently, flakes of a mighty size and softness. - -Ten minutes before he arrives at that theatre which has been the scene -of the Terror’s triumphs, Mike enters a bakery whereof the proprietor, a -German, is known to him. Mike has no money but he feels no confusion for -that. - -“John,” says Mike to the German; “I’ve got to spar a little to-night and -I want a big plate of soup.” - -“Sure!” says John, leading the way to a rear room which thrives greasily -as a kind of restaurant. “And here, Mike,” goes on John, as the soup -arrives, “I’ll put a big drink of sherry in it. You will feel good -because of it, and the sherry and the hot soup will make you quick and -strong already.” - -At the finish, Mike, with an eye of bland innocence--for he is certain -the theatre will give him something, even if it withhold the full two -hundred--tells John he will pay for the soup within the hour, when he -returns. - -“That’s all right, Mike,” cries the good-natured baker, “any time will -do.” - -“This w’y, me cove,” observes a person with a cockney accent, as the -sharp gamin delivers Mike, together with the message to the Terror, at -the stage door; “this w’y; ’ere’s a dressin’ room for you to shift -your togs.” - -Later, when Mike’s outer husks are off and he stands arrayed for the -ring, this person, who is old and gray and wears a scarred and battered -visage, looks Mike over in approval: - -“You seems an amazin’ bit of stuff, lad,” says this worthy man; “the -build of Tom Sayres at his best, but’eavier. I ’opes you’ll do this -Mick, but I’m afeared on it. You looks too pretty; an’ you ain’t got a -fightin’ face. How ’eavy be you, lad?” - -“One hundred and eighty-one,” replies Mike, smiling on the Englishman -with his boy’s eyes. - -“Can you spar a bit?” asks the other. - -“Why, of course I can!” and Mike’s tones exhibit surprise. - -“Well, laddy,” says the other; “don’t let this Dublin bloke rattle you. -’E’s a great blow’ard, I takes it, an’ will quit if he runs ag’in two -or three stiff ’uns. A score of years ago, I’d a-give ’im a stone -an’ done for ’im myself. I’m to be in your corner, laddy, an’ I trusts -you’ll not disgrace me.” - -“Who are you?” asks Mike. - -“Oh, me?” says the other; “I works for the theayter, laddy, an’, bein’ -as ’ow I’m used to fightin’, I goes on to ’eel an’ ’andle the -amatoors as goes arter the Terror. It’s all square, laddy; I’ll be -be’ind you; an’ I’ll ’elp you to win those pennies if I sees a w’y.” - -“I have also the honor,” shouts the loud master of ceremonies, “to -introduce to you Mike Men-ares, who will contend with the Dublin -Terror. Should he stay four rounds, Marquis of Queens-berry rules, the -management forfeits two hundred dollars to the said Menares.” - -“What a model for my Jason,” says a thin shaving of a man who stands -as a spectator in the wings. He is an artist of note, and speaks to a -friend at his elbow. “What a model for my Jason! I will give him five -dollars an hour for three hours a day. What’s his name? Mike what?” The -battle is about to commence; the friend, tongue-tied of interest, makes -no reply. - -The Dublin Terror is a rugged, powerful ruffian, with lumpy shoulders, -thick short neck, and a shock gorilla head. His little gray eyes are -lighted fiercely. His expression is as savagely bitter as Mike’s is -gentle. The creature, a fighter by nature, was born meaning harm to -other men. - -There is a roped square, about eighteen feet each way, on the stage, in -which the gladiators will box. The floor is canvas made safe with rosin. -The master of cermonies, himself a pugilist of celebration, will act as -referee. The old battered man of White Chapel is in Mike’s corner. - -Another gentleman, with face similarly marred, but with Seven Dials as -his nesting place, is posted opposite to befriend the Terror. There -is much buzz in the audience--a rude gathering, it is--and a deal of -sympathetic admiration and not a ray of hope for Mike in the eyes of -those present. - -The Terror is replete of a riotous confidence and savage to begin. For -two nights, such is the awe of him engendered among local bruisers, no -one has presented himself for a meeting. This has made the Terror hungry -for a battle; he feels like a bear unfed. As he stands over from Mike -awaiting the call of “Time,” he looks formidable and forbidding, with -his knotted arms and mighty hands. - -Mike lounges in his place, the perfection of the athlete and picture of -grace with power. His face, full of vacant amiability, shows pleased -and interested as he looks out on the crowded, rampant house. Mike has -rather the air of a spectator than a principal. The crowd does not shake -him; he is not disturbed by the situation. In a fashion, he has been -through the same thing every night, save Sunday, for three years. It -comes commonplace enough to Mike. - -In a blurred way Mike resents the blood-eagerness which glows in the -eyes of his enemy; but he knows no fear. It serves to remind him, -however, that no restraints are laid upon him in favor of the brute -across the ring, and that he is at liberty to hit with what lust he -will. - -“Time!” suddenly calls the referee. - -Those who entertained a forbode of trouble ahead for Mike are agreeably -surprised. With the word “Time!” Mike springs into tremendous life like -a panther aroused. His dark eyes glow and gleam in a manner to daunt. - -The Terror, a gallant headlong ruffian, throws himself upon Mike like a -tornado. For full two minutes his blows fall like a storm. It does not -seem of things possible that man could last through such a tempest. -But Mike lasts; more than that, every blow of the Terror is stopped or -avoided. - -It runs off like a miracle to the onlookers, most of whom know somewhat -of self-defensive arts. That Mike makes no reprisals, essays no -counterhits, does not surprise. A cautious wisdom would teach him to -feel out and learn his man. Moreover, Mike is not there to attack; his -mere mission is to stay four rounds. - -While spectators, with approving comment on Mike’s skill and quickness, -are reminding one another that Mike’s business is “simply to stay,” Mike -himself is coming to a different thought. He has grown disgusted rather -than enraged by the attacks of the Terror. His thrice-trained eye notes -each detail of what moves as a whirlwind to folk looking on; his arm and -foot provide automatically for his defense and without direct effort -of the brain. This leaves Mike’s mind, dull as it is, with nothing to -engage itself about save a contemplation of the Terror. In sluggish sort -Mike begins to hold a vast dislike for that furious person. - -As this dislike commences to fire incipiently, he recalls the picture -of Mollie and little Davy of the crutch. Mike remembers that it is -after ten o’clock, and his two treasures must be deep in sleep. Then -he considers of Christmas, now but a day away; and of the money so -necessary to the full pleasure of his sleeping Mollie and little Davy. - -As those home-visions come to Mike, and his antipathy to the Terror -mounting to its height, the grim impulse claims him to attack. Tigerlike -he steps back to get his distance; then he springs forward. It is too -quickly done for eye to follow. The Terror’s guard is opened by a feint; -and next like a flash Mike’s left shoots cleanly in. There is a sharp -“spank!” as the six-ounce glove finds the Terror’s jaw; that person goes -down like an oak that is felled. As he falls, Mike’s right starts with -a crash for the heart. But there is no need: Mike stops the full blow -midway--a feat without a mate in boxing. The Terror lies as one without -life. - -“W’y didn’t you let ’im ’ave your right like you started, laddy?” - screams the old Cockney, as Mike walks towards his corner. - -Mike laughs in his way of gentle, soft goodnature, and points where the -Terror, white and senseless, bleeds thinly at nose and ear. - -“The left did it,” Mike replies. - -Out of his eyes the hot light is already dying. He takes a deep, deep -breath, that arches his great breast and makes the muscles clutch and -climb like serpents; he stretches himself by extending his arms and -standing high on his toes. Meanwhile he beams pleasantly on his grizzled -adherent. - -“It wasn’t much,” says Mike. - -“You be the coolest cove, laddy!” retorts the other in a rapt whisper. -Then he towels deftly at the sweat on Mike’s forehead. - -The decision has been given in Mike’s favor. And to his delight, without -argument or hesitation, the loud young man of the vociferous garb comes -behind the scenes and endows him with two hundred dollars. - -“Say,” observes the loud young man, admiringly, “you ain’t no wonder, I -don’t t’ink!” - -“But how did you come to do it, Mike?” asks the good-natured baker, as -Mike lingers over a midnight porterhouse at the latter’s restaurant. - -“I had to, John,” says Mike, turning his innocent face on the other; “I -had to win Christmas money for Mollie and little Davy.” - -“And what,” said the Sour Gentleman, “became of this Mike Menares?” - -“I should suppose,” broke in the Red Nosed Gentleman, who had followed -the Jolly Doctor’s narrative with relish, “I should suppose now he posed -for the little sculptor’s Jason.” - -“It is my belief he did,” observed the Jolly Doctor, with a twinkle, -“and in the end he became full partner of the bruiser, O’Punch, and -shared the profits of the gymnasium instead of taking a dollar a night -for his labors. His sister grew up and married, which, when one reflects -on the experience of her mother, shows she owned no little of her -brother’s courage.” - -“Your story,” remarked the Red Nosed Gentleman to the Jolly Doctor, “and -the terrific blow which this Menares dealt the Dublin Terror brings to -mv mind a blow my father once struck.” This was a cue to the others and -one quickly seized on; the Red Nosed Gentleman was urged to give the -story of that paternal blow. First seeing to it that the stock of -burgundy at his elbow was ample, and freighting his own and the Jolly -Doctor’s glasses to the brim, the Red Nosed Gentleman coughed, cleared -his throat, and then gave us the tale of That Stolen Ace of Hearts. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII.--THAT STOLEN ACE OF HEARTS. - -When I, at the unripe age of seventeen, left my father’s poor -cottage-house on Tom’s Run and threw myself into life’s struggle, I -sought Pittsburg as a nearest promising arena of effort. I had a -small place at a smaller wage as a sort of office boy and porter for -a down-town establishment devoted to a commerce of iron; but as I came -early to cut my connection with that hard emporium we will not dwell -thereon. - -I have already told you how by nature I was a gambler. I had inborn -hankerings after games of chance, and it was scant time, indeed, before -I found myself on terms of more or less near acquaintance with every -card sharper of the city. And I became under their improper tutelage -an expert cheat myself. At short cards and such devices as faro -and roulette, I soon knew each devious turn and was in excellent -qualification to pillage my way to eminence if not to riches among the -nimble-fingered nobility of the green tables into whose midst I had -coaxed or crowded my way. Vast was my ambition to soar as a blackleg, -and no student at his honest books burned with more fire to succeed. -I became initiate into such mysteries as the “bug,” the “punch,” the -“hold-out”; I could deal “double” or “from the bottom;” was a past -master of those dubious faro inventions, the “snake,” the “end squeeze,” - and the “balance top;” could “put back” with a clean deftness that might -deceive even my masters in evil doing, and with an eye like a hawk read -a deck of marked cards with the same easy certainty that I read the -alphabet. It was a common compliment to my guilty merit that no better -craftsman at crooked play ever walked in Diamond Alley. - -No, as I’ve heretofore explained, there dawned a day when I gave up card -gambling and played no more. It is now twenty years since I wagered so -much as a two-bit piece in any game other than the Wall Street game of -stocks. And yet it was no moral arousal that drew me from roulette, -from farobank and from draw poker. I merely awoke to the truth that the -greatest simpleton of cards is the professional gambler himself; and -with that I turned my back on the whole scurvy business and quit the -dens for the exchange. And with no purpose to preach, I say openly and -with a fullest freedom that the game of stock speculation is as replete -of traps and pitfalls, and of as false and blackleg character as any -worst game of iniquitous faro that is dealt with trimmed and sanded deck -from a dishonest box. As an arena of morals the stock exchange presents -no conscious improvement beyond what is offered by the veriest dead-fall -ever made elate with those two rings at the bell which tell the waiting -inmates that some “steerer” is on the threshold with rustic victim to -be fleeced. I once read that the homestead of Captain Kidd, the pirate, -stood two centuries ago on that plot of ground now covered by the New -York Stock Exchange; and I confess to a smile when I reflected how -the spirit of immortal rapine would seem to hover over the place. The -exchange is a fit successor to the habitat of that wild freebooter -who died and dried in execution dock when long ago the Stuart Anne was -queen. - -During those earlier months in Pittsburg, I was not permitted by my -father--who had much control of me, even unto the day of his death--to -altogether abandon Tom’s Run, and the good, grimy miner folk, its -inhabitants. My week’s holiday began with each Saturday’s noon; from -that hour until Monday morning I was free; and thus, obeying my father’s -behests, Saturday evening and Sunday, I was bound to pass beneath my -parents’ roof. - -It was during one of these visits home when I first cheated at -cards--memorable event!--and it was on another that my roguery was -discovered and my father struck that blow. - -As already stated, my father was of Welsh extraction. It was no less -the fact, however, that his original stock was Irish; his grandfather--I -believe it to have been that venerable and I trust respected -gentleman--coming to Wales from somewhere on the banks of the -Blackwater. And my father, excellent man! had vast pride in his Irish -lineage and grew never so angry, particularly if a bit heated of his -Saturday evening cups, as when one spoke of him as offshoot of the rocky -land of leeks and saintly David. - -“What!” he would cry; “because I was born in Wales, do you take me for -an onion-eating Welshman? Man, I’m Irish and don’t make that mistake -again!” - -The vigor wherewith his mine-hardened fist smote the table as conclusion -to this, carried such weight of emphasis that no man was ever found to -fall a second time into the error. - -For myself, the question whether my ancestors were Welsh or Irish held -little interest. I was looking forward not backward, and a hot avarice -to hunt dollars drove from my bosom the last trace of concern touching a -genealogy. I would sooner have one year’s run of uninterrupted luck at -a gambling table than to know myself a direct descendant of the -Plantagenets. Not so my dear old father; to the hour when death closed -his eyes--already sightless for ten years--burned out with a blast, -they were--he ceased not to regale me with tales of that noble line of -dauntless Irish from whom we drew our blood. For the ten years following -the destruction of his eyes by powder, I saw much of my father, for I -established him at a little country tavern near enough to the ocean to -hear the surf and smell the salt breath of it, and two or three times a -week I made shift to get down where he was. And whether my stay was for -an hour or for a night--as on Sunday this latter came often to be the -chance--he made his pedigree, or what he dreamed was such, the proud -burden of his conversation. - -Brian Boru, I remember, was an original wellhead of our family. My -father was tireless in his settings forth of this hero king of Munster; -nor did he fail at the close of his story to curse the assassin who -struck down Boru at Clontarf. Sometimes to tease him, I’d argue what -must have been the weak and primitive inconsequence of the royal Boru. -I’d suggest that by the sheer narrowness and savagery of the hour -wherein that monarch lived, he could have been nothing more royal than -the mere king of a kale patch, and probably wore less of authority -with still less of revenue and reverence than belong commonly with any -district leader of Tammany Hall. - -At these base doubtings my parent’s wrath would mount. He would wax -vivid with a picture of the majesty and grandeur of the great Boru; and -of the halls wherein he fed and housed a thousand knights compared with -whom in riches, magnificence, and chivalrous feats those warriors who -came about King Arthur’s round table showed paltry, mean and low. To -crown narration he would ascribe to Boru credit as a world’s first law -giver and hail him author of the “Code Brian.” - -“Shure!” he would say; “he called his scholars and his penmen about him -and he made them write down as the wor-rds fell from th’ mouth av him -th’ whole of th’ Code Brian; an’ this in tur-rn was a model of th’ Code -Napoleon that makes th’ law av Fr-rance to-day.” - -It was in vain I pointed out that Napoleon’s Code found its roots and -as well, its models, in the Corpus Juris Civilis of Justinian--I had -learned so much Latin from Father Glennon--and that nowhere in the -English law was the Code Brian, as he called it, so much as adverted to. - -“An’ that’s th’ Sassenach jealousy av thim!” he would say. “An’ who was -this Justinian? Who, indade, but a thievin’ Roman imp’ror who shtole his -laws from King Boru just as th’ Dagoes now are shtealin’ th’ jobs at th’ -mines from th’ Irish an’ Welsh lads to whom they belong av r-rights.” - -After this I said no more; I did not explain that Justinian and his -Pandects and the others of his grand body of civil law were in existence -five centuries before the martyred Boru was born. That discovery would -have served no purpose beyond my parent’s exasperation and earned for -myself as well as the world’s historians naught save a cataract of hard -words. - -You marvel, perhaps, why I dwell with such length on the memory of my -father--a poor, blind, ignorant miner of coal! I loved the old man; and -to this day when my hair, too, is gray and when I may win my wealth and -count my wealth and keep my wealth with any of the land, I recall him -as the only man for whom I ever felt either love or confidence or real -respect. - -Yes; I heard much of the blood of the truculent yet wise Boru; also of -younger ancestors who fought for the Stuarts against Cromwell, against -Monmouth, against William; and later in both the “Fifteen” and in -the “Forty-five.” Peculiarly was I made to know of my mother’s close -connection by blood with the house of that brave Sarsfield “who,” as my -father explained, “fairly withstud th’ Dootchman at th’ Boyne; an’ later -made him quit befure th’ walls av Limerick.” There was one tradition of -the renowned Sarsfield which the old gentleman was peculiarly prone to -relate, and on the head of him who distrusted the legend there was sure -to fall a storm. That particular tale concerned the Irish soldier and -the sword of Wallace wight. - -“Thish William Wallace,” my father was wont to say as he approached the -myth, “was a joint (giant), no less. He was nine fut ’leven inches -tall an’ his soord was eight fut foore inches long. It’s in Stirlin’ -Cashtle now, an’ there niver was but one man besides Wallace who cud -handle it. Th’ Black Douglas an’ all av thim Scotchmen thried it an’ -failed. Whin, one day, along comes Gin’ral Patrick Sarsfield--a little -bit av a felly, only five fut siven inches tall--an’ he tuk that soord -av William Wallace in one hand an’, me son, he made it whishtle.” - -But I must press to my first crime of cards or your patience will -desert. During those summer months on Tom’s Run when the mines were open -and my father and his mates of the pick and blast were earning their -narrow pay, it was the habit of himself and four or five other gentlemen -of coal to gather in the Toni’s Run Arms when Saturday evening came on, -and relax into that amusement dear to Ireland as “forty-five.” Usually -they played for a dime a corner; on occasional rich evenings the stakes -mounted dizzily to two-bits, though this last was not often. - -Now I was preyed on by a desire to make one at this Saturday contention, -but my father would never consent. - -“Jack,” he’d say; “you’d only lose your money. Shure! you’re nawthin’ -but a boy an’ not fit to pla-ay cards with th’ loikes av grown-up -men.” - -But I persisted; I argued--to myself, you may be certain--while I might -be no match for these old professors of forty-five who played the game -with never a mistake, if I, like them, played honestly, that the cunning -work I meditated could not fail to bring me in the wealth. - -At last one of the others came to my rescue. - -“Let him pla-ay, Mishter Roche,” he said. “Let’s win his money fr-rom -him an’ it’ll be a lesson. He’ll not lose much befure he’ll be gla-ad to -quit.” - -“All right, thin,” replied my father; “you can pla-ay, Jack, till you -lose fifty cints; an’ that’ll do ye. Moind now! whin you lose fifty -cints you shtop.” And so I was made one of the circle. - -As I foresaw, I did not lose the four-bits which my indulgent parent had -marked as the limits of farthest sacrifice to my ambitious innocence. -Already I had brought back to Tom’s Run a curious trick or two from -Pittsburg. It soon came to be my “deal,” and the moment I got the cards -in my hands I abstracted the ace of hearts--a most doughty creature in -this game of forty-five!--and dropped it in my lap, covering the fact -from vulgar eyes with a fold of my handkerchief. That was all the -chicane I practiced; I kept myself in constant possession of the ace of -hearts and played it at a crisis; and at once the wagered dimes of the -others began to travel into my illicit pockets where they made a merry -jingle, I warrant you! - -The honest Irish from whom I was filching these small tributes never -once bethought that I might play them sharp; they attributed my gains to -luck and loud was exclamation over my good fortune. Time and again, for -I was not their equal as a mere player, I’d board the wrong card. When -I’d make such a mistake, one of them would cry: “D’ye moind that now! -D’ye moind how ba-ad he plays!” - -“An’ yet,” another would add, “an’ yet he rakes th’ money!” - -Altogether I regarded my entrance into this ten-cent game of forty-five -a most felicitous affair. I won at every sitting; getting up on some -occasions with as much as eight dollars of profit for my evening’s work. -In those days I went willingly to Tom’s Run, quitting Pittsburg without -a sigh; and such was my ardor to fleece these coaldigging comrades of -my father--and for that matter, my father, also; for like your true -gambler, I played no favorites and was as warm to gather in the dimes of -my parent as any--that I was usually found waiting about the forty-five -table when, following supper, they appeared. And it all went favorably -with me for perhaps a dozen sittings; my aggregate gains must have -reached the mighty sum of sixty dollars. Of a merry verity! silver was -at high tide in my hands! - -One evening as the half dozen devoted to the science of forty-five -drew up to the table--myself a stripling boy, the others bearded miner -men--my father complained of an ache in his head or an ache in his -stomach or some malady equally cogent, and said he would not play. - -“I’ll have me poipe an’ me mug av beer,” he said, “an’ resht mesilf a -bit. It’s loike I’ll feel betther afther a whoile an’ then I’ll take a -haand.” - -Play began, while my suffering father with his aches, his tobacco and -his beer, sat nursing himself at a near-by table. I lost no time in -acquiring my magic ace of hearts and at once the stream of usual fortune -set in to flow my way. - -Ten years, yes, one year later, my suspicions touching my father’s -illness and his reasons for this unprecedented respite from the cares of -forty-five would have stood more on tiptoe. As it was, however, it never -assailed me as a thought that I had become the subject of ancestral -doubts. I cheated on and on, and made hay while the sun shone with never -a cloud in the sky. - -It was not noticed by me, but following a halfhour’s play and while I -was shuffling the cards for a deal, my parent stole noiselessly -behind my chair. He reached under my arm and lifted the corner of the -concealing handkerchief which filled my lap. Horrors! there lay the -tell-tale ace of hearts! - -Even then I realized nothing and knew not that my villainy was made -bare. This news, however, was not long in its arrival. - -“Niver did I r-raise a boy to be a r-robber!” roared my father. - -Coincident with this remark, the paternal hand--not the lightest nor -least formidable on Tom’s Run--dealt me a buffet on the head that lifted -me from my sinful chair and hurled me across the room and against the -wall full fifteen feet away. My teeth clattered, my wits reeled, while -my ill-gotten silver danced blithely to metallic music of its own. - -“Niver did I r-raise a boy to be a r-robber!” again shouted my father. -Then seizing me by the collar, he lifted me to my feet. “Put all your -money on the ta-able!” he cried; “put ivry groat av it!” - -There was no escape; I was powerless in the talons of an inexorable -fate. My pockets yielded a harvest of hardby seventy-five -dollars--something more than the total of my winnings--and this was -placed in the center of the table which had so lately witnessed my -skill. An even distribution was then made by my father among the -victims, each getting his share of the recovered treasure; my father -keeping none for himself though urged by the others to that end. - -“No,” said my father; “I’ll touch niver a penny av it. You take th’ -money; I’ll make shift that the dishgrace of bein’ fa-ather to a -rapparee shall do for me share!” - -With that, he withdrew from the scene of my downfall, carrying me fast -in his clutch; and later--bathed in tears of pain and shame--I was -dragged into the presence of my mother and Father Glennon by the -ignominious ear. - -It did not cure me of cards, however; I ran the whole gamut of gambling -and won dangerous prominence as a sharper of elevation and rank. -To-morrow evening, should you care to listen, I may unfold concerning -other of my adventures; I may even relate--as a tale most to my -diplomatic glory, perhaps--how I brought Casino Joe to endow me with -that great secret, richer, in truth! than the mines of Peru! of “How to -Tell the Last Four.” - -***** - -“Speakin’ of gamblin’,” observed the Old Cattleman when the Red Nosed -Gentleman had come to a full stop, “I’ll bet a bloo stack that -as we-alls sets yere talkin’, the games is goin’ brisk an’ hot in -Wolfville. Thar won’t be no three foot of snow to put a damper on trade -an’ hobble a gent’s energies in Arizona.” This last with a flush of -pride. - -“Does everybody gamble in the West?” asked the Sour Gentleman. - -“Every sport who’s got the dinero does,” responded the Old Cattleman. -“White folks, Injuns an’ Mexicans is right now at roulette an’ faro bank -an’ monte as though they ain’t got a minute to live. I hates to -concede ’em so much darin’, but the Mexicans, speshul, is zealous for -specyoolations. Which they’d shore wager their immortal souls on the -turn of a kyard, only a Greaser’s soul don’t own no market valyoo.” - -“If you will,” said the Jolly Doctor, “you might tell us something of -Mexicans and their ways, their labors and relaxations--their loves and -their hates. I’d be pleased to hear of those interesting people from one -who knows them so thoroughly.” - -“Which I shore knows ’em,” returned the Old Cattleman, “an’ as -I concedes how each gent present oughter b’ar his share of the -entertainment, I’ll tell you of Chiquita of Chaparita.” - - - - -CHAPTER IX.--CHIQUITA OF CHAPARITA. - -Which I doubts some if I’m a proper party to be a historian of -Mexicans. Nacherally I abhors ’em; an’ when a gent abhors anything, -that is a Caucasian gent, you-all can gamble the limit he won’t do it -jestice. His prejudices is bound to hit the surface like one of these -yere rock ledges in the mountains. Be white folks ag’in Mexicans? Gents, -the paleface is ag’in everybody but himse’f; ag’in Mexicans, niggers, -Injuns, Chinks--he’s ag’in ’em all; the paleface is overbearin’ an’ -insolent, an’ because he’s the gamest fighter he allows he’s app’inted -of Providence to prance ‘round, tyrannizin’ an’ makin’ trouble for -everybody whose color don’t match his own. Shore, I’m as bad as others; -only I ain’t so bigoted I don’t savey the fact. - -Doc Peets is the one white gent I encounters who’s willin’ to mete out -to Mexicans a squar’ deal from a squar’ deck. I allers reckons these -yere equities on Peets’ part arises a heap from his bein’ a scientist. -You take a scientist like Peets an’ the science in him sort o’ submerges -an’ drowns out what you-all might term the racial notions native to -the hooman soil. They comes to concloosions dispassionate, that a-way, -scientists does; an’ Mexicans an’ Injuns reaps a milder racket at their -hands. With sech folks as Old Man Enright an’ me, who’s more indoorated -an’ acts on that arrogance which belongs with white folks at birth, -inferior races don’t stand no dazzlin’ show. - -Mexicans, as a herd, is stunted an’ ondeveloped both mental an’ -physical. They bears the same compar’son to white folks that these yere -little broncos does to the big hosses of the States. In intellects, -Mexicans is about ’leven hands high. To go into one of their jimcrow -plazas is like retreatin’ back’ard three hundred years. Their idees of -agriculture is plenty primitive. An’ their minds is that bogged down -in ignorance you-all can’t teach ’em nothin’. They clings to their -worm-eaten customs like a miser to his money. Their plow is a wedge -of wood; they hooks on about three yoke of bulls--measley, locoed -critters--an’ with four or five Greasers to screech an’ herd an’ chunk -up the anamiles they goes stampedin’ back’ard an’ for’ard on their -sandy river-bottom fields--the same bein’ about as big as a saddle -blanket--an’ they calls that plowin’. They sows the grain as they plows, -sort o’ scratches it in; an’ when it comes up they don’t cut it none -same as we-all harvests a crop. No; they ain’t capable of sech wisdom. -They pulls it up by the roots an’ ties it in bundles. Then they sweeps -off a clean spot of earth like the floor of one of these yere brickyards -an’ covers it with the grain same as if it’s a big mat. Thar’s a corral -constructed ‘round it of posts an’ lariats; an’ next, on top of the mat -of grain, they drives in the loose burros, cattle, goats, an’ all things -else that’s got a hoof; an’ tharupon they jams this menagerie about -ontil the grain is trodden out. That’s what a Greaser regyards as -threshin’ grain, so you can estimate how ediotic he is. When it’s -trompled sufficient, he packs off the stalks an’ straw to make mats an’ -thatches for the ’dobies; while he scrapes up the dust an’ wheat into a -blanket an’ climbs onto the roof of his _casa_ an’ pours it down slow -onto the ground, an’ all so it gives the wind a openin’ to get action -an’ blow away the chaff an’ dust. - -But what’s the use of dilatin’ on savageries like that? I could push -for’ard an’ relate how they makes flour with a stone rollin’-pin in a -stone trough; how they grinds coffee by wroppin’ it in a gunny sack an’ -beatin’ it with a rock; but where’s the good? It would only go lowerin’ -your estimates of hooman nature to no end. - -Whatever be their amoosements? Everything on earth amooses ’em. They -has so many holidays, Mexicans does, they ain’t hardly left no time for -work. They’re pirootin’ about constant, grinnin’ an’ chatterin’ like a -outfit of bloo-jays. - -No; they ain’t singers none. Takin’ feet an’ fingers, that a-way, a -Mexican is moosical. They emerges a heap strong at dancin’, an’ when -it conies to a fandango, hens on hot griddles is examples of listless -abstraction to ’em. With sech weepons, too, as guitars an’ fiddles -an’ a gourd half-full of gravel to shake an’ beat out the time, they -can make the scenery ring. Thar they stops, however; a Greaser’s -moosic never mounts higher than the hands. At singin’, crows an’ guinea -chickens lays over ’em like a spade flush over nines-up. - -Most likely if I reelates to you-all the story of a day among the -Mexicans you comes to a cl’arer glimpse of their loves an’ hates an’ -wars an’ merry-makin’s. Mexicans, like Injuns when a paleface is about, -lapses into shyness an’ timidity same as one of these yere cottontail -rabbits. But among themse’fs, when they feels onbuckled an’ at home, -their play runs off plenty different. Tharfore a gent’s got to study -Mexicans onder friendly auspices, an’ from the angle of their own -home-life, if he’s out to rope onto concloosions concernin’ them that’ll -stand the tests of trooth. - -It’s one time when I’m camped in the Plaza Chaparita. It’s doorin’ the -eepock when I freights from Vegas to the Canadian over the old Fort -Bascom trail. One of the mules--the nigh swing mule, he is--quits on me, -an’ I has to lay by ontil that mule recovers his sperits. - -It’s a _fieste_ or holiday at the Plaza Chaparita. The first local sport -I connects with is the padre. He’s little, brown, an’ friendly; an’ has -twinklin’ beady eyes like a rattlesnake; the big difference bein’ that -the padre’s eyes is full of fun, whereas the optics of rattlesnakes is -deevoid of humor utter. Shore; rattlesnakes wouldn’t know a joke from -the ace of clubs. - -The padre’s on his way to the ’dobe church; an’ what do you-all figger -now that divine’s got onder his arm? Hymn books, says you? That’s where -you’re barkin’ at a knot. The padre’s packin’ a game chicken--which -the steel gaffs, drop-socket they be an’ of latest sort, is in his -pocket--an’ as I goes squanderin’ along in his company, he informs me -that followin’ the services thar’ll be a fight between his chicken an’ -a rival brass-back belongin’ to a commoonicant named Romero. The padre -desires my presence, an’ in a sperit of p’liteness I allows I’ll come -idlein’ over onless otherwise engaged, the same bein’ onlikely. - -Gents, you should have witnessed that battle! It’s shore lively carnage; -yes, the padre’s bird wins an’ downs Romero’s entry the second buckle. - -On the tail of the padre’s triumph, one of his parishioners gets locoed, -shakes a chicken outen a bag an’ proclaims that he’ll fight him ag’in -the world for two dollars a side. At that another enthoosiast gives -notice that if the first parishioner will pinch down his bluff to one -dollar--he says he don’t believe in losin’ an’ winnin’ fortunes on a -chicken--he’ll prodooce a bird an’ go him once. - -The match is made, an’ while the chickens is facin’ each other a heap -feverish an’ fretful, peckin’ an’ see-sawin’ for a openin’, the various -Greasers who’s bet money on ’em lugs out their beads an’ begins -to pray to beat four of a kind. Shore, they’re prayin’ that their -partic’lar chicken ’ll win. Still, when I considers that about as many -Greasers is throwin’ themse’fs at the throne of grace for one as for the -other, if Providence is payin’ any attention to ’em--an’ I deems it -doubtful--I estimates that them orisons is a stand-off. - -As the birds goes to the center, one party sprinkles something on his -chicken. At that the opposition grabs up his bird an’ appeals to -the padre. He challenges the other’s bird because he says he’s been -sprinkled with holy-water. - -The padre inquires, an’ the holy-water sharp confesses his guilt. Also, -he admits that he hides the gaffs onder the altar cloth doorin’ the -recent services so they’ll acquire extra grace an’ power. - -The padre turns severe at this an’ declar’s the fight off; an’ he -forfeits the doctored chicken an’ the gaffs to himse’f a whole lot--he -representin’ the church--to teach the holy-water sharp that yereafter -he’s not to go seizin’ onfair advantages, an’ to lead a happier an’ a -better life. That culprit don’t say a word but passes over his chicken -an’ the steel regalia for its heels. You can bet that padre’s word is -law in the Plaza Chaparita! - -Followin’ this fiasco of the holy-water chicken the Mexicans disperses -themse’fs to pulque an’ monte an’ the dance. The padre an’ me sa’nters -about; me bein’ a Americano, an’ him what you might call professionally -sedate, we-all don’t go buttin’ into the _baile_ nor the pulque nor the -gamblin’. The padre su’gests that we go a-weavin’ over to his own camp, -which he refers to as Casa Dolores--though thar’s nothin’ dolorous about -it, the same bein’ the home of mirth an’ hilarity, that a-way--an’ -he allows he’s got some Valley Tan hived up that’ll make me forget my -nationality if stoodiously adhered to. It’s needless to observe that I -accompanies the beady-eyed padre without a struggle. An’ I admits, -free an’ without limitation, that said Valley Tan merits the padre’s -encomiums an’ fixes me in my fav’rite theery that no matter what -happens, the best happens to the church. - -As we crosses the little Plaza on our way to Casa Dolores we passes -in front of the church. Thar on the grass lays the wooden image of the -patron saint of the Plaza Chaparita. This figger is about four foot -long, an’ thar’s a hossha’r lariat looped onto it where them Mexicans -who gets malcontent with the saint ropes him off his perch from up in -front of the church. They’ve been haulin’ the image about an’ beatin’ it -with cactus sticks an’ all expressive of disdain. - -I asks the padre why his congregation engages itse’f in studied -contoomely towards the Plaza’s saint. He shrugs his shoulders, spreads -his hands palm out, an’ says it’s because the Plaza’s sheep gets sick. -I su’gests that him an’ me cut in an’ rescoo the saint; more partic’lar -since the image is all alone, an’ the outfit that’s been beatin’ him -up has abandoned said corrections to drink pulque an’ exercise their -moccasins in the _baile_. But the padre shakes his head. He allows it’s -a heap better to let the public fully vent its feelin’s. He explains -that when the sheep gets well the congregation ’ll round-up the image, -give him a reproachful talk an’ a fresh coat of paint, an’ put him back -on his perch. The saint ’ll come winner on the deal all right, the padre -says. - -“Besides,” argues the padre, “it is onneces-sary for pore blinded -mortals to come pawin’ about to protect a saint. These yere images,” - he insists, “can look after themse’fs. They’ll find the way outen their -troubles whenever they gets ready.” - -At that we proceeds for’ard to Casa Dolores an’ the promised Valley Tan, -an’ leaves the wooden saint to his meditations on the grass. After all, -I agrees with the padre. It’s the saint’s business to ride herd on -the interests of the Plaza Chaparita; an’ if he goes to sleep on the -lookout’s stool an’ takes to neglectin’ sech plays as them sheep gettin’ -sick, whatever is the Greasers goin’ to do? They’re shore bound to -express their disapproval; an’ I reckons as good a scheme as any is to -caper up, yank the careless image outen his niche with a lariat, an’ lam -loose an’ cavil at him with a club. - -This yere _fieste_ at the Plaza Chaparita is a day an’ night of -laughter, dance an’ mirth. But it ends bad. The padre an’ me is over to -the dance-hall followin’ our investigations touchin’ the Valley Tan -an’ the padre explains to me how he permits to his people a different -behavior from what’s possible among Americanos. - -“I studies for the church in Baltimore,” the padre says, “an’ thar the -priest must keep a curb on his Americano parishioners. They are not like -Mexicanos. They’re fierce an’ headlong an’ go too far. If you let them -gamble, they gamble too much; if you let them drink, they drink too -much. The evil of the Americano is that he overplays. It is not so -with the Mexicano. If the Mexicano gambles, it is only a trifle an’ for -pleasure; if he drinks, it is but enough to free a bird’s song in his -heart. All my people drink an’ dance an’ gamble; but it’s only play, -it is never earnest. See! in the whole Plaza Chaparita you find no -drunkard, no pauper; no one is too bad or too good or too rich or too -poor or too unhappy.” - -Then the priest beams on me like he disposes of the question; an’ since -I’ve jest been drinkin’ his Valley Tan I don’t enter no protests to what -he states. From what ensoos, however, I should jedge the padre overlooks -his game in one partic’lar. - -As me an’ the padre sits gazin’ on at the dance, a senorita with a dark -shawl over her head, drifts into the door like a shadow. She’s little; -an’ by what I sees of her face, she’s pretty. As she crosses in front -of the padre she stops an’ sort o’ drops down on one knee with her head -bowed. The padre blesses her an’ calls her “Chiquita;” then she goes on. -I don’t pay no onusual attention; though as me an’ the padre talks, -I notes her where she stands with her shawl still over her head in a -corner of the dance hall. - -Across from the little Chiquita is a young Greaser an’ his sweetheart. -This girl is pretty, too; but her shawl ain’t over her head an’ she -an’ her _muchacho_, from their smiles an’ love glances, is havin’ the -happiest of nights. - -“It looks like you’ll have a weddin’ on your hands,” I says to the -padre, indicatin’ where the two is courtin’. - -“Chiquita should not stay here,” says the padre talkin’ to himse’f. With -that he organizes like he’s goin’ over to the little shawled senorita in -the corner. - -It strikes me that the padre’s remark is a heap irrelevant. But I soon -sees that he onderstands the topics he tackles a mighty sight better -than me. The padre’s hardly moved when it looks like the senorita -Chiquita saveys he’s out to head her off. With that she crosses the -dance-hall swift as a cat an’ flashes a knife into the heart of the -laughing girl. The next moment the knife is planted in her own. - -It’s the old story, so old an’ common thar’s not a new word to be said. -Two dead girls; love the reason an’ the jealous knife the trail. Thar’s -not a scream, not a word; that entire _baile_ stands transfixed. As the -padre raises the little Chi-quita’s head, I sees the tears swimmin’ in -his eyes. It’s the one time I comes nearest thinkin’ well of a Mexican; -that padre, at least, is toler’ble. - -“That is a very sad finale--the death of the girls,” observed the Sour -Gentleman, reaching for the Scotch whiskey as though for comfort’s sake. -“And still, the glimpse you gave would move me to a pleasant estimate of -Mexicans.” - -“Why then,” returned the Old Cattleman, becoming also an applicant for -Scotch, “considered as abstract prop’sitions, Mexicans aint so bad. -Which they’re like Injuns; they improves a lot by distance. An’ they has -their strong p’ints, too; gratitoode is one. You-all confer a favor on a -Mexican, an’ he’ll hang on your trail a hundred years but what he’ll do -you a favor in return. An’ he’ll jest about pay ten for one at that. - -“Speakin’ of gratitoode, Sioux Sam yere tells a story to ’llustrate -how good deeds is bound to meet their reward. It’s what the squaws tells -the papooses to make ’em kind.” Then to Sioux Sam: “Give us the tale -of Strongarm an’ the Big Medicine Elk. The talk is up to you.” - -Sioux Sam was in no sort diffident, and readily told us the following: - - - - -CHAPTER X.--HOW STRONGARM WAS AN ELK. - -Moh-Kwa was the wisest of all the beasts along the Upper Yellowstone; -an’ yet Moh-Kwa could not catch a fish. This made Moh-Kwa have a bad -heart, for next to honey he liked fish. What made it worse was that in -Moh-Kwa’s cavern where he lived, there lay a deep pool which was the -camp of many fish; an’ Moh-Kwa would sit an’ look at them an’ long for -them, while the fish came close to the edge an’ laughed at Moh-Kwa, for -they knew beneath their scales that he could not catch them; an’ the -laughter of the fish made a noise like swift water running among rocks. -Sometimes Moh-Kwa struck at a fish with his big paw, but the fish never -failed to dive out of reach; an’ this made the other fish laugh at -Moh-Kwa more than before. Once Moh-Kwa got so angry he plunged into the -pool to hunt the fish; but it only made him seem foolish, for the fish -swam about him in flashing circles, an’ dived under him an’ jumped over -him, laughing all the time, making a play an’ a sport of Moh-Kwa. At -last he gave up an’ swam ashore; an’ then he had to sit by his fire an’ -comb his fur all day to dry himself so that he might feel like the same -bear again. - -One morning down by the Yellowstone, Moh-Kwa met Strongarm, the young -Sioux, an’ Strongarm had a buffalo fish which he had speared in the -river. An’ because Moh-Kwa looked at the fish hungrily an’ with water -in his mouth, Strongarm gave him the buffalo fish. Also he asked Moh-Kwa -why he did not catch fish since he liked them so well an’ the pool in -his cavern was the camp of many fish. An’ Moh-Kwa said it was because -the fish were cowards an’ would not stay an’ fight with him, but ran -away. - -“They are not so brave as the bees,” said Moh-Kwa, “for when I find a -bee-tree, they make me fight for the honey. The bees have big hearts -though little knives, but the fish have no hearts an’ run like water -down hill if they but see Moh-Kwa’s shadow from his fire fall across the -pool.” - -Strongarm said he would catch the fish for Moh-Kwa; an’ with that he -went to the Wise Bear’s house an’ with his spear took many fish, being -plenty to feed Moh-Kwa two days. Moh-Kwa was very thankful, an’ because -Strong-arm liked the Wise Bear, he came four times each moon an’ speared -fish for Moh-Kwa who was never so well fed with fish before. - -Strongarm was a mighty hunter among the Sioux an’ killed more elk than -did the ten best hunters of his village. So many elk did Strong-arm slay -that his squaw, the Blossom, made for their little son, Feather-foot, a -buckskin coat on which was sewed the eye-teeth of elk, two for each elk, -until there were so many eye-teeth on Feather-foot’s buckskin coat it -was like counting the leaves on a cottonwood to find how many there -were. An’ the Blossom was proud of Feather-foot’s coat, for none among -the Sioux had so beautiful a garment an’ the eye-teeth of the elk told -how big a hunter was Strongarm. - -While the Sioux wondered an’ admired at the elk-tooth coat, it made the -Big Medicine Elk, who was chief of the Elk people, hot an’ angry, an’ -turned his heart black against Strongarm. The Big Medicine Elk said he -would have revenge. - -Thus it happened one day that when Strong-arm stepped from his lodge, he -saw standing in front a great Elk who had antlers like the branches of a -tree. An’ the great Elk stamped his foot an’ snorted at Strongarm. Then -Strongarm took his bow an’ his lance an’ his knife an’ hunted the great -Elk to kill him; but the great Elk ran always a little ahead just out of -reach. - -At last the great Elk ran into the Pouch canyon an’ then Strongarm took -hope into his heart like a man takes air into his mouth, for the sides -of the Pouch canyon were high an’ steep an’ it ended with a high wall, -an’ nothing save a bird might get out again once it went in; for the -Pouch canyon was a trap which the Great Spirit had set when the world -was new. - -Strongarm was happy in his breast as he followed the great Elk into the -Pouch canyon for now he was sure. An’ he thought how the big eye-teeth -of so great an Elk would look on the collar of Feather-foot’s buckskin -coat. - -When Strongarm came to the upper end of the Pouch canyon, there the -great Elk stood waiting. - -“Hold!” said the great Elk, when Strongarm put an arrow on his -bowstring. - -[Illustration: 0157] - -But Strongarm shot the arrow which bounded off the great Elk’s hide an’ -made no wound. Then Strongarm ran against the great Elk with his lance, -but the lance was broken as though the great Elk was a rock. Then -Strongarm drew his knife, but when he went close to the great Elk, the -beast threw him down with his antlers an’ put his forefoot on Strongarm -an’ held him on the ground. - -“Listen,” said the great Elk, an’ Strongarm listened because he couldn’t -help it. “You have hunted my people far an’ near; an’ you can never get -enough of their blood or their eye-teeth. I am the Big Medicine Elk an’ -chief of the Elk people; an’ now for a vengeance against you, I shall -change you from the hunter to the hunted, an’ you shall know how good it -is to have fear an’ be an elk.” - -As the great Elk said this, Strongarm felt his head turn heavy with -antlers, while his nose grew long an’ his mouth wide, an’ hair grew out -of his skin like grass in the moon of new grass, an’ his hands an’ feet -split into hoofs; an’ then Strong-arm stood on his four new hoofs an’ -saw by his picture in the stream that he was an elk. Also the elk-fear -curled up in his heart to keep him ever in alarm; an’ he snuffed the -air an’ walked about timidly where before he was Strongarm and feared -nothing. - -Strongarm crept home to his lodge, but the Blossom did not know her -husband; an’ Feather-foot, his little son, shot arrows at him; an’ as -he ran from them, the hunters of his village came forth an’ chased -him until Strongarm ran into the darkness of the next night as it came -trailing up from the East, an’ the darkness was kind an’ covered him -like a blanket an’ Strongarm was hid by it an’ saved. - -When Strongarm did not come with the next sun to spear fish for Moh-Kwa, -the Wise Bear went to Strongarm’s lodge to seek him for he thought that -he was sick. An’ Moh-Kwa asked the Blossom where was Strongarm? An’ the -Blossom said she did not know; that Strongarm chased the great Elk -into the Pouch canyon an’ never came out again; an’ now a big Doubt had -spread its blankets in her heart an’ would not leave, but was making a -long camp, saying she was a widow. Then the Blossom wept; but Moh-Kwa -told her to wait an’ he would see, because he, Moh-Kwa, owed Strongarm -for many fish an’ would now pay him. - -Moh-Kwa went to the Big Medicine Elk. - -“Where is the Strongarm?” said Moh-Kwa. - -“He runs in the hills an’ is an elk,” said the Big Medicine Elk. “He -killed my people for their teeth, an’ a great fright was on all my -people because of the Strongarm. The mothers dare not go down to the -river’s edge to drink, an’ their children had no time to grow fat for -they were ever looking to meet the Strongarm. Now he is an elk an’ my -people will have peace; the mothers will drink an’ their babies be fat -an’ big, being no more chased by the Strongarm.” - -Then Moh-Kwa thought an’ thought, an’ at last he said to the Big -Medicine Elk: - -“That is all proud talk. But I must have the Strongarm back, for he -catches my fish.” - -But the Big Medicine Elk said he would not give Moh-Kwa back the -Strongarm. - -“Why should I?” asked the Big Medicine Elk. “Did not I save you in the -Yellowstone,” said Moh-Kwa, “when as you swam the river a drifting tree -caught in your antlers an’ held down your head to drown you? An’ did you -not bawl to me who searched for berries on the bank; an’ did I not swim -to you an’ save you from the tree?” Still the Big Medicine Elk shook his -antlers. - -“What you say is of another day. You saved me an’ that is ended. I will -not give you back the Strongarm for that. One does not drink the water -that is gone by.” - -Moh-Kwa then grew so angry his eyes burned red like fire, an’ he -threatened to kill the Big-Medicine Elk. But the Big Medicine Elk -laughed like the fish laughed, for he said he could not be killed by any -who lived on the land. - -“Then we will go to the water,” said Moh-Kwa; an’ with that he took the -Big Medicine Elk in his great hairy arms an’ carried him kicking an’ -struggling to the Yellowstone; for Moh-Kwa could hold the Big Medicine -Elk though he could not hurt him. - -When Moh-Kwa had carried the Big Medicine Elk to the river, he sat down -on the bank an’ waited with the Big Medicine Elk in his arms until a -tree came floating down. Then Moh-Kwa swam with the Big Medicine Elk to -the tree an’ tangled the branches in the antlers of the Big Medicine Elk -so that he was fast with his nose under the water an’ was sure to drown. - -“Now you are as you were when I helped you,” said Moh-Kwa. - -An’ the Catfish people in the river came with joy an’ bit the legs of -the Big Medicine Elk, an’ said, “Thank you, Moh-Kwa; you do well to -bring us food now an’ then since you eat so many fish.” - -As Moh-Kwa turned to swim again to the bank, he said over his shoulder -to the Big Medicine Elk: - -“Now you may sing your death song, for Pauguk, the Death, is in the -river with you an’ those are Pauguk’s catfish which gnaw your legs.” - -At this the Big Medicine Elk said between his cries of grief an’ fear -that if Moh-Kwa would save him out of the river, he would tell him how -to have the Strongarm back. So Moh-Kwa went again an’ freed the Big -Medicine Elk from the tree an’ carried him to the bank, while the -Catfish people followed, angrily crying: - -“Is this fair, Moh-Kwa? Do you give an’ then do you take away? Moh-Kwa! -you are a Pawnee!” - -When the Big Medicine Elk had got his breath an’ wiped the tears from -his eyes, he told Moh-Kwa that the only way to bring the Strongarm back -to be a hunter from being one of the hunted was for Feather-foot, his -son, to cut his throat; an’ for the Blossom, his squaw, to burn his -elk-body with cedar boughs. - -“An’ why his son, the Feather-foot?” asked Moh-Kwa. - -“Because the Feather-foot owes the Strongarm a life,” replied the Big -Medicine Elk. “Is not Strongarm the Feather-foot’s father an’ does not -the son owe the father his life?” - -Moh-Kwa saw this was true talk, so he let the Big Medicine Elk go free. - -“I will even promise that the Strongarm,” said Moh-Kwa, as the two -parted, “when again he is a Sioux on two legs, shall never hunt the Elk -people.” - -But the Big Medicine Elk, who was licking his fetlocks where the Catfish -people had hurt the skin, shook his antlers an’ replied: - -“It is not needed. The Strongarm has been one of the Elk people an’ will -feel he is their brother an’ will not hurt them.” - -Moh-Kwa found it a hard task to capture Strongarm when now he was an elk -with the elk-fear in his heart. For Strongarm had already learned the -elk’s warning which is taught by all the Elk people, an’ which says: - - Look up for danger and look down for gain; - - Believe no wolf’s word, and avoid the plain. - -Strongarm would look down for the grass with one eye, while he kept an -eye up among the branches or along the sides of the canyon for fear of -mountain lions. An’ he stuck close in among the hills, an’ would not go -out on the plains where the wolves lived; an’ he wouldn’t talk with a -wolf or listen to his words. - -But Strongarm, while he ran an’ hid from Moh-Kwa and the others, was not -afraid of the Blossom, who was his squaw, but would come to her gladly -if he might find her alone among the trees. - -“It is not the first time,” said the Wise Bear, “that the hunter has -made his trap of love.” - -With that he told the Blossom to go into the hills an’ call Strongarm -to her with her love. Then she was to bind his feet so that he might not -get away an’ run. - -The Blossom called Strongarm an’ he came; but he was fearful an’ -suspicious an’ his nose an’ his ears an’ his eyes kept guard until the -Blossom put her hand on his neck; an’ then Strongarm’s great love for -the Blossom smothered out his caution as one might smother a fire with -a robe; an’ the Blossom tied all his feet with thongs an’ bound his eyes -with her blanket so that Strongarm might not see an’ be afraid. - -Then came Feather-foot, gladly, an’ cut Strong-arm’s throat with his -knife; for Feather-foot did not know he killed his father--for that was -a secret thing with Moh-Kwa an’ the Blossom--an’ thought only how he -killed a great Elk. - -When Strongarm was dead, Moh-Kwa toiled throughout the day carrying -up the big cedar; an’ when a pile like a hill was made, Moh-Kwa put -Strongarm’s elk-body on its top, an’ brought fire from his house in the -rocks, an’ made a great burning. - -In the morning, the Blossom who had stayed with Moh-Kwa through the -night while the fire burned, said, “Now, although the big elk is gone -into ashes, I do not yet see the Strongarm.” But Moh-Kwa said, “You -will find him asleep in the lodge.” An’ that was a true word, for when -Moh-Kwa an’ the Blossom went to the lodge, there they found Strongarm -whole an’ good an’ as sound asleep as a tree at midnight. - -Outside the lodge they met the little Feather-foot who cried, “Where -is the big elk, Moh-Kwa, that I killed?” An’ the Blossom showed him his -father, Strongarm, where he slept, an’ said, “There is your big elk, -Feather-foot; an’ this will ever be your best hunting for it found you -your father again.” - -When Moh-Kwa saw that everything was settled an’ well, an’ that he would -now have always his regular fish, he wiped the sweat out of his eyes -with his paws which were all singed fur an’ ashes, an’ said, “I am the -weariest bear along the whole length of the Yellowstone, for I carried -some heavy trees an’ have worked hard. Now I will sleep an’ rest.” - -An’ with that Moh-Kwa lay down an’ snored an’ slept four days; then he -arose an’ eat up the countless fish which Strongarm had speared to be -ready for him. This done, Moh-Kwa lighted his pipe of kinnikinick, an’ -softly rubbing his stomach where the fish were, said: “Fish give Moh-Kwa -a good heart.” - -“Now that is what I call a pretty story,” said the Jolly Doctor. - -“It is that,” observed the Red Nosed Gentleman, with emphasis. “And I’ve -no doubt the Strongarm made it a point thereafter to be careful as to -what game he hunted. But, leaving fable for fact, my friend,”--the Red -Nosed Gentleman addressed now the Sour Gentleman--“would you not call -it your turn to uplift the spirits of this company? We have just enough -time and I just enough burgundy for one more story before we go to bed.” - -“While our friend, the Sioux Gentleman,” responded the Sour Gentleman, -“was unfolding his interesting fable, my thoughts--albeit I listened to -him and lost never a word--were to the rear with the old days which came -on the back of that catastrophe of tobacco. They come to me most clearly -as I sit here smoking and listening, and with your permission I’ll -relate the story of The Smuggled Silk.” - - - - -CHAPTER XI.--THAT SMUGGLED SILK. - -Should your curiosity invite it, and the more since I promised you -the story, we will now, my friends, go about the telling of that one -operation in underground silk. It is not calculated to foster the pride -of an old man to plunge into a relation of dubious doings of his youth. -And yet, as I look backward on that one bit of smuggling of which I was -guilty, so far as motive was involved, I exonerate myself. I looked on -the government, because of the South’s conquest by the North, and that -later ruin of myself through the machinations of the Revenue office, as -both a political and a personal foe. And I felt, not alone morally free, -but was impelled besides in what I deemed a spirit of justice to myself, -to wage war against it as best I might. It was on such argument, where -the chance proffered, that I sought wealth as a smuggler. I would -deplete the government--forage, as it were, on the enemy--thereby to -fatten my purse. - -As my hair has whitened with the sifting frosts of years, I confess -that my sophistries of smuggling seem less and less plausible, while -smuggling itself loses whatever of romantic glamour it may once have -been invested with, or what little color of respect to which it might -seem able to lay claim. This tale shall be told in simplest periods. -That is as should be; for expression should ever be meek and subjugated -when one’s story is the mere story of a cheat. There is scant room in -such recital for heroic phrase. Smuggling, and paint it with what genius -one may, can be nothing save a skulking, hiding, fear-eaten trade. -There is nothing about it of bravery or dash. How therefore and avoid -laughter, may one wax stately in any telling of its ignoble details? - -When, following my unfortunate crash in tobacco, I had cleared away the -last fragment of the confusion that reigned in my affairs, I was driven -to give my nerves a respite and seek a rest. For three months I had been -under severest stress. When the funeral was done--for funeral it seemed -to me--and my tobacco enterprise and those hopes it had so flattered -were forever laid at rest, my soul sank exhausted and my brain was in -a whirl. I could neither think with clearness nor plan with accuracy. -Moreover, I was prey to that depression and lack of confidence in -myself, which come inevitably as the corollary of utter weariness. - -Aware of this personal condition, I put aside thought of any present -formulation of a future. I would rest, recover poise, and win back that -optimism that belongs with health and youth. - -This was wisdom; I was jaded beyond belief; and fatigue means dejection, -and dejection spells pessimism, and pessimism is never sagacious nor -excellent in any of its programmes. - -For that rawness of the nerves I speak of, many apply themselves -to drink; some rush to drugs; for myself, I take to music. It was -midwinter, and grand opera was here. This was fortunate. I buried myself -in a box, and opened my very pores to those nerve-healthful harmonies. - -In a week thereafter I might call myself recovered. My soul was cool, -my eye bright, my mind clear and sensibly elate. Life and its promises -seemed mightily refreshed. - -No one has ever called me superstitious and yet to begin my -course-charting for a new career, I harked back to the old Astor House. -It was there that brilliant thought of tobacco overtook me two years -before. Perhaps an inspiration was to dwell in an environment. Again -I registered, and finding it tenantless, took over again my old room. -Still I cannot say, and it is to that hostelry’s credit, that my -domicile at the Astor aided me to my smuggling resolves. Those last had -growth somewhat in this fashion: - -I had dawdled for two hours over coffee in the café--the room and the -employment which had one-time brought me fortune--but was incapable -of any thought of value. I could decide on nothing good. Indeed, I did -naught save mentally curse those revenue miscreants who, failing of -blackmail, had destroyed me for revenge. - -Whatever comfort may lurk in curses, at least they carry no money -profit; so after a fruitless session over coffee and maledictions, I -arose, and as a calmative, walked down Broadway. - -At Trinity churchyard, the gates being open, I turned in and began -ramblingly to twine and twist among the graves. There I encountered a -garrulous old man who, for his own pleasure, evidently, devoted himself -to my information. He pointed out the grave of Fulton, he of the -steamboats; then I was shown the tomb of that Lawrence who would “never -give up the ship;” from there I was carried to the last low bed of the -love-wrecked Charlotte Temple. - -My eye at last, by the alluring voice and finger of the old guide, was -drawn to a spot under the tower where sleeps the Lady Cornbury, dead now -as I tell this, hardby two hundred years. Also I was told of that Lord -Cornbury, her husband, once governor of the colony for his relative, -Queen Anne; and how he became so much more efficient as a smuggler and -a customs cheat, than ever he was as an executive, that he lost his high -employ. - -Because I had nothing more worthy to occupy my leisure, I -listened--somewhat listlessly, I promise you, for after all I was -thinking on the future, not the past, and considering of the living -rather than those old dead folk, obscure, forgotten in their slim -graves--I listened, I say, to my gray historian; and somehow, after I -was free of him, the one thing that remained alive in my memory was the -smuggling story of our Viscount Cornbury. - -Among those few acquaintances I formed during my brief prosperity, was -one with a gentleman named Harris, who owned apartments under mine -on Twenty-second Street. Harris was elegant, educated, traveled, and -apparently well-to-do of riches. Busy with my own mounting fortunes, the -questions of who Harris was? and what he did? and how he lived? never -rapped at the door of my curiosity for reply. - -One night, however, as we sat over a late and by no means a first bottle -of wine, Harris himself informed me that he was employed in smuggling; -had a partner-accomplice in the Customs House, and perfect arrangements -aboard a certain ship. By these last double advantages, he came aboard -with twenty trunks, if he so pleased, without risking anything from -the inquisitiveness or loquacity of the officers of the ship; and later -debarked at New York with the certainty of going scatheless through the -customs as rapidly as his Inspector partner could chalk scrawlingly “O. -K.” upon his sundry pieces of baggage. - -Coming from Old Trinity, still mooting Corn-bury and his smugglings, -my thoughts turned to Harris. Also, for the earliest time, I began to -consider within myself whether smuggling was not a field of business -wherein a pushing man might grow and reap a harvest. The idea came to -me to turn “free-trader.” The government had destroyed me; I would make -reprisal. I would give my hand to smuggling and spoil the Egyptian. - -At once I sought Harris and over a glass of champagne--ever a favorite -wine with me--we struck agreement. As a finale we each put in fifteen -thousand dollars, and with the whole sum of thirty thousand dollars -Harris pushed forth for Europe while I remained behind. Harris visited -Lyons; and our complete investment was in a choicest sort of Lyons silk. -The rich fabrics were packed in a dozen trunks--not all alike, those -trunks, but differing, one from another, so as to prevent the notion as -they stood about the wharf that there was aught of relationship between -them or that one man stood owner of them all. - -It is not needed to tell of my partner’s voyage of return. It was -without event and one may safely abandon it, leaving its relation to -Harris himself, if he be yet alive and should the spirit him so move. -It is enough for the present purpose that in due time the trunks holding -our precious silk-bolts, with Harris as their convoy, arrived safe in -New York. - -I had been looking for the boat’s coming and was waiting on the wharf as -her lines and her stagings were run ashore. - -Our partner, the Inspector, and who was to enjoy a per cent, of the -profits of the speculation, was named Lorns. He rapidly chalked “O. K.” - with his name affixed to the end of each several trunk and it thereupon -with the balance of inspected baggage was promptly piled upon the wharf. - -There had been a demand for drays, I remember, and on this day when -our silks came in, I was able to procure but one. The ship did not dock -until late in the afternoon, and at eight o’clock of a dark, foggy April -evening, there still remained one of our trunks--the largest of all, it -was--on the wharf. The dray had departed with the second load for that -concealing loft in Reade Street which, during Harris’ absence, I had -taken to be used as the depot of those smuggling operations wherein we -might become engaged. I had made every move with caution; I had never -employed our real names not even with the drayman. - -As I tell you, the dray was engaged about the second trip. This last -large silk-trunk was left behind perforce; pile it how one might there -had been no safe room for it on the already overloaded dray. The drayman -promised to return and have it safely in our loft that night. - -For myself, I was from first to last lounging about the wharf, -overseeing the going away of our goods. Harris, so soon as I gave him -key and street-number, had posted to Reade Street to attend the silk’s -reception. - -Waiting for the coming back of the conveying dray proved but a slow, -dull business, and I was impatiently, at the hour I’ve named, walking -up and down, casting an occasional glance at the big last trunk where it -stood on end, a bit drawn out and separated from the common mountain of -baggage wherewith the wharf was piled. - -One of the general inspectors, a man I had never seen but whom I knew, -by virtue of his rank, to be superior to our chalk-wielding coparcener, -also paced the wharf and appeared to bear me company in a distant, -non-communicative way. This customs captain and myself, save for an -under inspector named Quin, had the dock to ourselves. The boat was -long in and most land folk had gotten through their concern with her -and wended homeward long before. There were, however, many passengers of -emigrant sort still held aboard the ship. - -As I marched up and down, Lorns came ashore and pretended some business -with his superior officer. As he returned to the ship and what duties he -had still to perform there, he made a slight signal to both myself and -his fellow inspector, Quin, to follow him. I was well known to Lorns, -having had several talks with him, while Harris was abroad. Quin I had -never met; but it quickly appeared that he was a confidant of Lorns, and -while without money interest in our affairs was ready to bear helping -hand should the situation commence to pinch. - -Quin and I went severally and withal carelessly aboard ship, and not at -all as though we were seeking Lorns. This was to darken the chief, whom -we both surmised to be the cause of Lorn’s signal. - -Once aboard and gathered in a dark corner, Lorns began at once: - -“Let me do the talking,” said Lorns with a nervous rapidity that at once -enlisted the ears of Quin and myself. “Don’t interrupt, but listen. The -chief suspects that last trunk. I can tell it by the way he acts. A bit -later, when I come ashore, he’ll ask to have it opened. Should he do so, -we’re lost; you and I.” This last was to me. Then to Quin: “Do you see -that long, bony Swiss, with the boots and porcelain pipe? He’s in an -ugly mood, doesn’t speak English, and within one minute after you return -to the wharf, he and I will be entangled in a rough and tumble riot. -I’ll attend to that. The row will be prodigious. The chief will be sent -for to settle the war, and when he leaves the wharf, Quin, don’t wait; -seize on that silk trunk and throw it into the river. There’s iron -enough clamped about the corners to sink it; besides, it’s packed so -tightly it’s as heavy as lead, and will go to the bottom like an anvil. -Then from the pile pull down some trunk similar to it in looks and stand -it in its place. It’ll go in the dark. Give the new trunk my mark, as -the chief has already read the name on the trunk. Go, Quin; I rely on -you.” - -“You can trust me, my boy,” retorted Quin, cheerfully, and turning on -his heel, he was back on the wharf in a moment, and apparently busy -about the pile of baggage. - -Suddenly there came a mighty uproar aboard ship. Lorns and the Swiss, -the latter already irate over some trouble he had experienced, were -rolling about the deck in a most violent scrimmage, the Swiss having -decidedly the worst of the trouble. The chief rushed up the plank; Lorns -and the descendant of Tell and Winkelried, were torn apart; and then a -double din of explanation ensued. After ten minutes, the chief was able -to straighten out the difficulty--whatever its pretended cause might be -I know not; for I held myself warily aloof, not a little alarmed by -what Lorns had communicated--and repaired again to his station upon the -wharf. - -As the chief came down the plank, Quin, who had not been a moment behind -him in going aboard to discover the reasons of the riot, followed. Brief -as was that moment, however, during which Quin had lingered behind, -he had made the shift suggested by Lorns; the silk trunk was under the -river, a strange trunk stood in its stead. - -As the chief returned, he walked straight to this suspected trunk and -tipped it down with his foot. Then to Quin: - -“Ask Lorns to step _here_.” - -Quin went questing Lorns; shortly Lorns and Quin came back together. The -chief turned in a brisk, sharp, official way to Lorns: - -“Did you inspect this trunk?” - -“I did,” said Lorns, looking at the chalk marks as if to make sure. - -“Open it!” - -No keys were procurable; the owners, Lorns said, had long since left the -docks. But Lorns suggested that he get hammer and cold-chisel from the -ship. - -The trunk was opened and found free and innocent of aught contraband. -The chief wore a puzzled, dark look; he felt that he’d been cheated, -but he couldn’t say how. Therefore, being wise, the chief gulped, said -nothing, and as life is short and he had many things to do, soon after -left the docks and went his way. - -“That was a squeak!” said Lorns when we were at last free of the -dangerous chief. “Quin, I thank you.” - -“That’s all right,” retorted Quin, with a grin; “do as much for me some -time.” - -That night, with the aid of a river pirate, our trunk, jettisoned by the -excellent Quin, was fished up; and being tight as a drum, its contents -had come to little harm with the baptism. At last, our dozen silk -trunks--holding a treasure of thirty thousand dollars and whereon we -looked to clear a heavy profit--were safe in the Reade Street loft; and -my hasty heart, which had been beating at double speed since that almost -fatal interference, slowed to normal. - -One might now suppose our woes were at an end, all danger over, and -nothing to do but dispose of that shimmering cargo to best advantage. -Harris and I were of that spirit-lifting view; we began on the very next -day to feel about for customers. - -Harris, whose former smuggling exploits had dealt solely with gems, -knew as little of silk as did I. Had either been expert he might have -foreseen a coming peril into whose arms we in our blindness all but -walked. No, our troubles were not yet done. We had escaped the engulfing -suck of Charybdis, only to be darted upon by those six grim mouths of -her sister monster, Scylla, over the way. - -Well do I recall that morning. I had seen but two possible purchasers of -silks when Harris overtook me. His eye shone with alarm. Lorns had -run him down with the news--however he himself discovered it, I never -knew--that another danger yawned. - -Harris hurried me to our Reade Street lair and gave particulars. - -“It seems,” said Harris, quite out of breath with the speed we’d made -in hunting cover, “that Stewart is for America the sole agent of these -particular brands of silk which we’ve brought in. Some one to whom we’ve -offered them has notified the Stewart company. At this moment and as we -sit here, the detectives belonging to Stewart, and for all I may -guess, the whole Central Office as well, are on our track. They want to -discover who has these silks; and how they came in, since the customs -records show no such importations. And there’s a dark characteristic to -these silks. Each bolt has its peculiar, individual selvage. Each, with -a sample of its selvage, is registered at the home looms. Could anyone -get a snip of a selvage he could return with it to Lyons, learn from the -manufacturers’ book just when it was woven, when sold, and to whom. I -can tell you one thing,” observed Harris, as he concluded his story, -“we’re in a bad corner.” - -How the cold drops spangled my brows! I began to wish with much heart -that I’d never met Harris, nor heard, that Trinity churchyard day, of -Cornbury and his smuggling methods of gathering gold. - -There was one ray of hope; neither Harris nor I had disclosed our names, -nor the whereabouts or quantity of the silks; and as each had been -dealing with folk with whom he’d never before met, we were both as yet -mysteries unsolved. - -Nor were we ever solved. Harris and I kept off the streets during -daylight hours for a full month. We were not utterly idle; we -unpleasantly employed ourselves in trimming away that telltale selvage. - -Preferring safety to profit, we put forth no efforts to realize on our -speculations for almost a year. By that time the one day’s wonder of -“Who’s got Stewart’s silks?” had ceased to disturb the mercantile world -and the grand procession of dry goods interest passed on and over it. - -At last we crept forth like felons--as, good sooth! we were--and -disposed of our mutilated silks to certain good folk whose forefathers -once ruled Palestine. These gentry liked bargains, and were in no wise -curious; they bought our wares without lifting an eyebrow of inquiry, -and from them constructed--though with that I had no concern--those long -“circulars,” so called, which were the feminine joy a third of a century -gone. - -As to Harris and myself; what with delays, what with expenses, what with -figures reduced to dispose of our plunder, we got evenly out. We got -back our money; but for those fear-shaken hours of two separate perils, -we were never paid. - -I smuggled no more. Still, I did not relinquish my pious purpose to -despoil that public treasury Egyptian quoted heretofore. Neither did I -give up the Customs as a rich field of illicit endeavor. But my methods -changed. I now decided that I, myself, would become an Inspector, like -unto the useful Lorns, and make my fortune from the opulent inside. I -procured the coveted appointment, for I could bring power to bear, and -later I’ll tell you of The Emperor’s Cigars. - -***** - -When I was in my room that night, making ready for bed, I could still -hear the soft, cold fingers of the snow upon the pane. What a storm was -that! Our landlord who had been boy and man and was now gray in that old -inn, declared how he had never witnessed the smothering fellow to it. - -The following day, while still and bright and no snow to fall, showed a -temperature below zero. The white blockade still held us fast, and now -the desperate cold was come to be the ally of the snow. Departure was -never a question. - -As we kicked the logs into a cheerful uproar of sparks, and drew that -evening about the great fireplace, it was the Old Cattleman to break -conversational ground. - -“Do you-all know,” said he, “I shore feels that idle this evenin’ it’s -worse’n scand’lous--it’s reedic’lous.” Here he threw himself back in -his armchair and yawned. “Pardon these yere demonstrations of weariness, -gents,” he observed; “they ain’t aimed at you none. That’s the fact, -though; this amazin’ sensation of bein’ held a prisoner is beginnin’ to -gnaw at me a heap. Talk of ‘a painted ship upon a painted ocean,’ -like that poem sharp wrote of! Why that vessel’s sedyoolously employed -compared to us!” - -“You should recall,” remarked the Jolly Doctor, “how somewhere it is -said that whatever your hand finds to do, you should do it with all your -heart. Now, I would say the counsel applies to our present position. -Since we must needs be idle, let us be idle heartily and happily, and -get every good to lie hidden in what to me, at least, is a most pleasant -companionship.” - -“I shore unites with you,” responded the Old Cattleman, “in them -script’ral exhortations to do things with all your heart. It was Wild -Bill Hickox’s way, too; an’ a Christian adherence to that commandment, -not only saves Bill’s life, but endows him with the record for -single-handed killin’s so far as we-all has accounts.” - -“Is it a story?” asked the Red Nosed Gentleman. “Once in a while I -relish a good blood and thunder tale.” - -“It’s this a-way,” said the Old Cattleman. “Bill’s hand is forced by the -Jake McCandlas gang. Bill has ’em to do; an’ rememberin’, doubtless, -the Bible lessons of his old mother back in Illinois, he shore does -’em with all his heart, as the good book says. This yere is the story -of ‘The Wiping Out of McCandlas.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XII.--THE WIPING OUT OF McCANDLAS. - -Tell you-all a tale of blood? It shore irritates me a heap, gents, when -you eastern folks looks allers to the west for stories red an’ drippin’ -with murder. Which mighty likely now the west is plenty peaceful -compared with this yere east itse’f. Thar’s one thing you can put in -your mem’randum book for footure ref’rence, an’ that is, for all them -years I inhabits Arizona an’ Texas an’ sim’lar energetic localities, -I never trembles for my life, an’ goes about plumb furtive, expectin’ -every moment is goin’ to be my next that a-way, ontil I finds myse’f -camped on the sunrise side of the Alleghenies. - -Nacherally, I admits, thar has been a modicum of blood shed west an’ -some slight share tharof can be charged to Arizona. No, I can’t say I -deplores these killin’s none. Every gent has got to die. For one, I’m -mighty glad the game’s been rigged that a-way. I’d shore hesitate a lot -to be born onless I was shore I’d up an’ some day cash in. Live forever? -No, don’t confer on me no sech gloomy outlook. If a angel was to appear -in our midst an’ saw off on me the news that I was to go on an’ on as -I be now, livin’ forever like that Wanderin’ Jew, the information would -stop my clock right thar. I’d drop dead in my moccasins. - -It don’t make much difference, when you gives yourse’f to a ca’m -consid’ration of the question as to when you dies or how you dies. The -important thing is to die as becomes a gent of sperit who has nothin’ to -regret. Every one soon or late comes to his trail’s end. Life is like -a faro game. One gent has ten dollars, another a hundred, another a -thousand, and still others has rolls big enough to choke a cow. But -whether a gent is weak or strong, poor or rich, it’s written in advance -that he’s doomed to go broke final. He’s doomed to die. Tharfore, when -that’s settled, of what moment is it whether he goes broke in an hour, -or pikes along for a week--dies to-day or postpones his funeral for -years an’ mebby decades? - -Holdin’ to these yere views, you can see without my tellin’ that a -killin’, once it be over, ain’t likely to harass me much. Like the -rest of you-all, I’ve been trailin’ out after my grave ever since I was -foaled--on a hunt for my sepulcher, you may say--an’ it ought not to -shock me to a showdown jest because some pard tracks up ag’inst his last -restin’ place, spreads his blankets an’ goes into final camp before it -come my own turn. - -But, speakin’ of killin’s, the most onusual I ever hears of is when -Wild Bill Hickox cleans up the Jake McCandlas gang. This Bill I knows -intimate; he’s not so locoed as his name might lead a gent to concloode. -The truth is, he’s a mighty crafty, careful form of sport; an’ he never -pulled a gun ontil he knew what for an’ never onhooked it ontil he knew -what at. - -An’ speakin’ of the latter--the onhookin’ part--that Wild Bill never -missed. That’s his one gift; he’s born to make a center shot whenever -his six-shooter expresses itse’f. - -This McCandlas time is doorin’ them border troubles between Missouri -an’ Kansas. Jest prior tharunto, Bill gets the ill-will of the Missouri -outfit by some gun play he makes at Independence, then the eastern end -of the old Santa Fe trail. What Bill accomplishes at Independence is a -heap effectual an’ does him proud. But it don’t endear him none to the -Missouri heart. Moreover, it starts a passel of resentful zealots to -lookin’ for him a heap f’rocious, an’ so he pulls his freight. - -It’s mebby six months later when Bill is holdin’ down a stage station -some’eres over in Kansas--it’s about a day’s ride at a road-gait from -Independence--for Ben Holiday’s overland line. Thar’s the widow of a -_compadre_ of Bill who has a wickeyup about a mile away, an’ one day -Bill gets on his hoss, Black Nell, an’ goes romancin’ over to see -how the widow’s gettin’ on. This Black Nell hoss of Bill’s is some -cel’brated. Black Nell is tame as a kitten an’ saveys more’n a hired -man. She’d climb a pa’r of steps an’ come sa’n-terin’ into a dance hall -or a hurdy gurdy if Bill calls to her, an’ I makes no doubt she’d a-took -off her own saddle an’ bridle an’ gone to bed with a pa’r of blankets, -same as folks, if Bill said it was the proper antic for a pony. - -It’s afternoon when Bill rides up to pow-wow with this relict of his -pard. As he comes into the one room--for said wickeyup ain’t palatial, -an’ consists of one big room, that a-way, an’ a jim-crow leanto--Bill -says: - -“Howdy, Jule?” like that. - -“Howdy, Bill?” says the widow. “’Light an’ rest your hat, while I -roam ’round an’ rustle some chuck.” This widow has the right idee. - -While Bill is camped down on a stool waitin’ for the promised _carne_ -an’ flap-jacks, or whatever may be the grub his hostess is aimin’ to -on-loose, he casts a glance outen the window. He’s interested at once. -Off across the plains he discerns the killer, McCandlas an’ his band -p’intin’ straight for the widow’s. They’re from Missouri; thar’s ’leven -of ’em, corral count, an’ all “bad.” As they can see his mare, Black -Nell, standin’ in front of the widow’s, Bill argues jestly that the -McCandlas outfit knows he’s thar; an’ from the speed they’re makin’ in -their approach, he likewise dedooces that they’re a heap eager for his -company. - -Bill don’t have to study none to tell that thar’s somebody goin’ to get -action. It’s likely to be mighty onequal, but thar’s no he’p; an’ so -Bill pulls his gun-belt tighter, an’ organizes to go as far as he can. -He has with him only one six-shooter; that’s a severe setback. Now, if -he was packin’ two the approaching war jig would have carried feachers -of comfort. But he’s got a nine-inch bowie, which is some relief. When -his six-shooter’s empty, he can fall back on the knife, die hard, an’ -leave his mark. - -As Bill rolls the cylinder of his gun to see if she’s workin’ free, -an’ loosens the bowie to avoid delays, his eye falls on a rifle hangin’ -above the door. - -“Is it loaded, Jule?” asks Bill. - -“Loaded to the gyards,” says the widow. - -“An’ that ain’t no fool of a piece of news, neither,” says Bill, as he -reaches down the rifle. “Now, Jule, you-all better stampede into the -cellar a whole lot ontil further orders. Thar’s goin’ to be heated times -’round yere an’ you’d run the resk of gettin’ scorched.” - -“I’d sooner stay an’ see, Bill,” says the widow. “You-all knows how -eager an’ full of cur’osity a lady is,” an’ here the widow beams on Bill -an’ simpers coaxin’ly. - -“An’ I’d shore say stay, Jule,” says Bill, “if you could turn a trick. -But you sees yourse’f, you couldn’t. An’ you’d be in the way.” - -Thar’s a big burrow out in the yard; what Kansas people deenominates as -a cyclone cellar. It’s like a cave; every se’f-respectin’ Kansas fam’ly -has one. They may not own no bank account; they may not own no good -repoote; but you can gamble, they’ve got a cyclone cave. - -Shore, it ain’t for ornament, nor yet for ostentation. Thar’s allers a -breeze blowin’ plenty stiff across the plains. Commonly, it’s strenyous -enough to pick up a empty bar’l an’ hold it ag’inst the side of a -buildin’ for a week. Sech is the usual zephyr. Folks don’t heed them -none. But now an’ then one of these yere cyclones jumps a gent’s camp, -an’ then it’s time to make for cover. Thar’s nothin’ to be said back to -a cyclone. It’ll take the water outen a well, or the money outen your -pocket, or the ha’r off your head; it’ll get away with everything about -you incloodin’ your address. Your one chance is a cyclone cellar; an’ -even that refooge ain’t no shore-thing, for I knowed a cyclone once that -simply feels down an’ pulls a badger outen his hole. Still, sech as the -last, is onfrequent. - -The widow accepts Bill’s advice an’ makes for the storm cave. This -leaves Bill happy an’ easy in his mind, for it gives him plenty of -room an’ nothin’ to think of but himse’f. An’ Bill shore admires a good -fight. - -He don’t have long to wait after the widow stampedes. Bill hears the -sweep of the ’leven McCandlas hosses as they come chargin’ up. No, -he can’t see; he ain’t quite that weak-minded as to be lookin’ out the -window. - -As the band halts, Bill hears McCandlas say: - -“Shore, gents; that’s Wild Bill’s hoss. We’ve got him treed an’ out on -a limb; to-morry evenin’ we’ll put that long-ha’red skelp of his in a -showcase in Independence.” Then McCandlas gives a whoop, an’ bluffs Bill -to come out. “Come out yere, Bill; we needs you to decide a bet,” yells -McCandlas. “Come out; thar’s no good skulkin’.” - -“Say, Jake,” retorts Bill; “I’ll gamble that you an’ your hoss thieves -ain’t got the sand to come after me. Come at once if you comes; I -despises delays, an’ besides I’ve got to be through with you-all an’ -back to the stage station by dark.” - -“I’ll put you where thar ain’t no stage lines, Bill, long before dark,” - says McCandlas. An’ with that he comes caperin’ through the window, -sash, glass, an’ the entire lay-out, as blithe as May an’ a gun in each -hand. - -Bill cuts loose the Hawkins as he’s anxious to get the big gun off his -mind. It stops McCandlas, “squar’ in the door,” as they says in monte; -only it’s the window. McCandlas falls dead outside. - -“An’ I’m sorry for that, too,” says Bill to him-se’f. “I’m preemature -some about that shot. I oughter let Jake come in. Then I could have got -his guns.” - -When McCandlas goes down, the ten others charges with a whoop. They -comes roarin’ through every window; they breaks in the door; they -descends on Bill’s fortress like a ’possum on a partridge nest! - -An’ then ensoos the busiest season which any gent ever cuts in upon. The -air is heavy with bullets an’ thick with smoke. The walls of the room -later looks like a colander. - -It’s a mighty fav’rable fight, an’ Bill don’t suffer none in his repoote -that Kansas afternoon. Faster than you can count, his gun barks; an’ -each time thar’s a warrior less. One, two, three, four, five, six; they -p’ints out after McCandlas an’ not a half second between ’em as they -starts. It was good luck an’ good shootin’ in combination. - -It’s the limit; six dead to a single Colt’s! No gent ever approaches it -but once; an’ that’s a locoed sharp named Metzger in Raton. He starts in -with Moulton who’s the alcade, an’ beefs five an’ creases another; an’ -all to the same one gun. The public, before he can reload, hangs Metzger -to the sign in front of the First National Bank, so he don’t have much -time to enjoy himse’f reviewin’ said feats. - -Rifle an’ six-shooter empty; seven dead an’ done, an’ four to take his -knife an’ talk it over with! That’s the situation when Bill pulls his -bowie an’ starts to finish up. - -It shore ain’t boy’s play; the quintette who’s still prancin’ about the -field is as bitter a combination as you’d meet in a long day’s ride. -Their guns is empty, too; an’ they, like Bill, down to the steel. An’ -thar’s reason to believe that the fight from this p’int on is even -more interestin’ than the part that’s gone before. Thar’s no haltin’ or -hangin’ back; thar ain’t a bashful gent in the herd. They goes to the -center like one man. - -Bill, who’s as quick an’ strong as a mountain lion, with forty times the -heart an’ fire, grips one McCandlas party by the wrist. Thar’s a twist -an’ a wrench an’ Bill onj’ints his arm. - -That’s the last of the battle Bill remembers. All is whirl an’ smoke an’ -curse an’ stagger an’ cut an’ stab after that, with tables crashin’ an’ -the wreck an’ jangle of glass. - -But the end comes. Whether the struggle from the moment when it’s got -down to the bowies lasts two minutes or twenty, Bill never can say. When -it’s over, Bill finds himse’f still on his feet, an’ he’s pushin’ the -last gent off his blade. Split through the heart, this yere last sport -falls to the floor in a dead heap, an’ Bill’s alone, blood to both -shoulders. - -Is Bill hurt? Gents, it ain’t much likely he’s put ’leven fightin’ -men into the misty beyond, the final four with a knife, an’ him plumb -scatheless! No, Bill’s slashed so he wouldn’t hold hay; an’ thar’s more -bullets in his frame than thar’s pease in a pod. The Doc who is called -in, an’ who prospects Bill, allers allowed that it’s the mistake of his -life he don’t locate Bill an’ work him for a lead mine. - -When the battle is over an’ peace resoomes its sway, Bill begins to -stagger. An’ he’s preyed on by thirst. Bill steadies himse’f along the -wall; an’ weak an’ half blind from the fogs of fightin’, he feels his -way out o’ doors. - -Thar’s a tub of rain-water onder the eaves; it’s the only thing Bill’s -thinkin’ of at the last. He bends down to drink; an’ with that, faints -an’ falls with his head in the tub. - -It’s the widow who rescoos Bill; she emerges outen her cyclone cellar -an’ saves Bill from drownin’. An’ he lives, too; lives to be downed -years afterward when up at Deadwood a timid party who don’t dare come -’round in front, drills Bill from the r’ar. But what can you look for? -Folks who lives by the sword will perish by the sword as the scripters -sets forth, an’ I reckons now them warnin’s likewise covers guns. - -“And did that really happen?” asked the Red Nosed Gentleman, drawing a -deep breath. - -“It’s as troo as that burgundy you’re absorbin’,” replied the Old -Cattleman. - -“I can well believe it,” observed the Sour Gentleman; “a strong hour -makes a strong man. Did this Wild Bill Hickox wed the widow who pulled -him out of the tub?” - -“Which I don’t think so,” returned the Old Cattleman. “If he does, Bill -keeps them nuptials a secret. But it’s a cinch he don’t. As I says at -the jump, Bill is a mighty wary citizen an’ not likely to go walkin’ -into no sech ambuscade as a widow.” - -“You do not think, then,” observed the Red Nosed Gentleman, “that a wife -would be a blessing?” - -“She wouldn’t be to Wild Bill Hickox,” said the Old Cattleman. “Thar is -gents who ought never to wed, an’ Bill’s one. He was bound to be killed -final; the game law was out on Bill for years. Now when a gent is shore -to cash in that a-way, why should he go roundin’ up a wife? Thar oughter -be a act of congress ag’in it, an’ I onderstand that some sech measure -is to be introdooced.” - -“Passing laws,” remarked the Jolly Doctor, “is no such easy matter, now, -as passing the bottle.” Here the Jolly Doctor looked meaningly at the -Red Nosed Gentleman, who thereupon shoved the burgundy into the Jolly -Doctor’s hand with all conceivable alacrity. Like every good drinker, -the Red Nosed Gentleman loved a cup companion. “There was a western -person,” went on the Jolly Doctor, “named Jim Britt, who came east to -have a certain law passed; he didn’t find it flowers to his feet.” - -“What now was the deetails?” said the Old Cattleman. “The doin’s an’ -plottin’s an’ doubleplays of them law-makin’ mavericks in congress is -allers a heap thrillin’ to me.” - -“Very well,” responded the Jolly Doctor; “let each light a fresh cigar, -for it’s rather a long story, and when all are comfortable, I’ll give -you the history of ‘How Jim Britt Passed His Bill.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XIII.--HOW JIM BRITT PASSED HIS BILL. - -Last Chance was a hamlet in southeastern Kansas. Last Chance, though -fervid, was not large. Indeed, a cowboy in a spirit of insult born of -a bicker with the town marshal had said he could throw the loop of -his lariat about Last Chance and drag it from the map with his pony. -However, this was hyperbole. - -Jim Britt was not the least conspicuous among the men of Last Chance. -Withal, Jim Britt was much diffused throughout the commerce of that -village and claimed interests in a dozen local establishments, from -a lumber yard to a hotel. Spare of frame, and of an anxious predatory -nose, was Jim Britt; and his gray eyes ever roving for a next -investment; and the more novel the enterprise, the more leniently did -Jim Britt regard it. The new had for him a fascination, since he was in -way and heart an Alexander and hungered covetously for further worlds to -conquer. Thus it befell that Jim Britt came naturally to his desire to -build a railway when the exigencies of his affairs opened gate to the -suggestion. - -Jim Britt became the proprietor of a lead mine--or was it zinc?--in -southeastern Missouri, and no mighty distance from his own abode of Last -Chance. The mine was somewhat thrust upon Jim Britt by Fate, since -he accepted it for a bad debt. It was “lead mine or nothing,” and Jim -Britt, whose instincts, like Nature, abhorred a vacuum, took the mine. -It was a good mine, but a drawback lurked in the location; it lay over -the Ozark Hills and far away from any nearest whistle of a railroad. - -This isolation taught Jim Britt the thought of connecting his mine by -rail with Last Chance; the latter was an easiest nearest point, and the -route offered a most accommodating grade. A straight line, or as the -crow is said to fly but doesn’t, would make the length of the proposed -improvement fifty miles. When done, it would serve not only Jim Britt’s -mine, but admirably as a feeder for the Fort Scot and Gulf; and Jim -Britt foresaw riches in that. Altogether, the notion was none such -desperate scheme. - -There was a side serious, however, which must be considered. The line -would cross the extreme northeast angle of the Indian Territory, or as -it is styled in those far regions, the “Nation,” and for this invasion -of redskin holdings the consent of the general government, through its -Congress assembled, must be secured. - -Jim Britt; far from being depressed, said he would go to Washington and -get it; he rather reveled in the notion. Samantha, his wife, shook her -head doubtfully. - -“Jim Britt,” said Samantha, severely, “you ain’t been east since Mr. -Lincoln was shot. You know no more of Washington than a wolf. I’d give -that railroad up; and especially, I’d keep away from Congress. Don’t -try to braid that mule’s tail”--Samantha was lapsing into the metaphor -common of Last Chance--“don’t try to braid that mule’s tail. It’ll kick -you plumb out o’ the stall.” - -But Jim Britt was firm; the mule simile in no sort abated him. - -[Illustration: 0199] - -“But what could you do with Congress?” persisted Samantha; “you, a -stranger and alone?” - -Jim Britt argued that one determined individual could do much; energy -wisely employed would overcome mere numbers. He cited the ferocious -instance of a dim relative of his own, a vivacious person yclept Turner, -who because of injuries fancied or real, hung for years about the tribal -flanks of the Comanches and potted their leading citizens. This the -vigorous Turner kept up until he had corralled sixty Comanche top-nots; -and the end was not yet when the Comanches themselves appealed to their -agent for protection. They said they couldn’t assemble for a green corn -dance, or about a regalement of baked dog, without the Winchester of the -unauthorized Turner barking from some convenient hill; the squaws would -then have nothing left but to wail the death song of some eminent spirit -thus sifted from their midst. When they rode to the hill in hunt of -Turner, he would be miles away on his pony, and adding to his safety -with every jump. The Comanches were much disgusted, and demanded the -agent’s interference. - -Upon this mournful showing, Turner was brought in and told to desist; -and as a full complement of threats, which included among their features -a trial at Fort Smith and a gibbet, went with the request, Turner was -in the end prevailed on to let his Winchester sleep in its rack, and -thereafter the Comanches danced and devoured dog unscared. The sullen -Turner said the Comanches had slain his parent long ago; the agent -expressed regrets, but stuck for it that even with such an impetus a -normal vengeance should have run itself out with the conquest of those -sixty scalps. - -Jim Britt told this story of Turner to Samantha; and then he argued that -as the Comanches were made to feel a one-man power by the industrious -Turner, so would he, Jim Britt, for all he stood alone, compel Congress -to his demands. He would take that right of way across the Indian -Territory from between their very teeth. He was an American citizen and -Congress was his servant; in this wise spake Jim Britt. - -“That’s all right,” argued the pessimistic Samantha; “that’s all right -about your drunken Turner; but he had a Winchester. Now you ain’t goin’ -to tackle Congress with no gun, Jim Britt.” - -Despite the gloomy prophecies of Samantha, whom Jim Britt looked on as -a kind of Cassandra without having heard of Cassandra, our would-be -railroad builder wound up the threads and loose ends of his Last Chance -businesses, and having, as he described it, “fixed things so they -would run themselves for a month,” struck out for Washington. Jim Britt -carried twenty-five hundred dollars in his pocket, confidence in his -heart, and Samantha’s forebode of darkling failure in his ears. - -While no fop and never setting up to be the local Brummel, Jim Britt’s -clothes theretofore had matched both his hour and environment, and held -their decent own in the van of Last Chance fashion. But the farther -Jim Britt penetrated to the eastward in his native land, the more his -raiment seemed to fall behind the age; and at the last, when he was -fairly within the gates of Washington, he began to feel exceeding wild -and strange. Also, it affected him somewhat to discover himself almost -alone as a tobacco chewer, and that a great art preserved in its -fullness by Last Chance had fallen to decay along the Atlantic. These, -however, were questions of minor moment, and save that his rococo garb -drove the sensitive Jim Britt into cheap lodgings in Four-and-one-half -Street, instead of one of the capital’s gilded hotels, they owned no -effect. - -This last is set forth in defence against an imputation of parsimony -on the side of Jim Britt. He was one who spent his money like a king -whenever and wherever his education or experience pointed the way. It -was his clothes of a remote period to make him shy, else Jim Britt would -have shrunk not from the Raleigh itself, but climbed and clambered -and browsed among the timberline prices of its grill-room, as safe and -satisfied as ever browsed mountain goat on the high levels of its upland -home. Yea, forsooth! Jim Britt, like a sailor ashore, could spend his -money with a free and happy hand. - -Jim Britt, acting on a hint offered of his sensibilities, for a -first step reclothed himself from a high-priced shop; following these -improvements, save for the fact that he appalled the eye as a trifle -gorgeous, he might not have disturbed the sacred taste of Connecticut -Avenue itself. In short, in the matter of garb, Jim Britt, while -audible, was down to date. - -With the confidence born of his new clothes--for clothes in some -respects may make the man--Jim Britt sate him down to study Congress. -He deemed it a citadel to be stormed; not lacking in military genius he -began to look it over for a weak point. - -These adventures of Jim Britt now about a record, occurred, you should -understand, almost a decade ago. In that day there should have been -eighty-eight senators and three hundred and fifty-six representatives, -albeit, by reason of death or failure to elect, a not-to-be-noticed -handful of seats were vacant. - -By an industrious perusal of the Congressional directory, wherein the -skeleton of each House was laid out and told in all its divers committee -small-bones, Jim Britt began to understand a few of the lions in his -path. For his confusion he found that Congress was sub-divided into full -sixty committees, beginning with such giant conventions as the Ways and -Means, Appropriations, Military, Naval, Coinage, Weights and Measures, -Banking and Currency, Indian, Public Lands, Postal, and Pensions, and -dwindling down to ignoble riffraff--which owned each a chairman, a -committee room, a full complement of clerks and messengers, and an -existence, but never convened--like the Committee on Acoustics and -Ventliation, and Alcoholic Liquor Traffic. - -Jim Britt learned also of the Sergeants at Arms of Senate and House, and -how these dignitaries controlled the money for those bodies and paid the -members their salaries. Incidentally, and by way of gossip, he was told -of that House Sergeant who had levanted with the riches entrusted to his -hands, and left the broken membership, gnashing its teeth in poverty and -impotent gloom, unable to draw pay. - -Then, too, there was a Document Room where the bills and resolutions -were kept when printed. Also, about each of the five doors of House -and Senate, when those sacred gatherings were in session, there were -situated a host of messengers, carried for twelve hundred dollars a year -each on the Doorkeeper’s rolls. It was the duty and pleasure of these -myrmidons to bring forth members into the corridors, to the end that -they be refreshed with a word of counsel from constituents who had -traveled thither for that purpose; and in the finish to lend said -constituents money to return home. - -Jim Britt, following these first connings of the directory, went -personally to the capitol, and from the galleries, leaning his chin on -the rail the while, gazed earnestly on greatness about the transaction -of its fame. These studies and personally conducted tours, and those -conversations to be their incident which came off between Jim Britt -and chance-blown folk who fell across his pathway, enlarged Jim Britt’s -store of information in sundry fashions. He discovered that full ten -thousand bills and resolutions were introduced each Congress; that by -virtue of a mere narrowness of time not more than five per cent, of this -storm of business could be dealt with, the other ninety-five, whether -for good or ill, being starved to death for lack of occasion. The -days themselves were no longer than five working hours since Congress -convened at noon. - -The great radical difference between House and Senate loomed upon Jim -Britt in a contrast of powers which abode with the presiding officers of -those mills to grind new laws. The president of the Senate owned few -or none. He might enforce Jefferson’s rules for debates and call a -recalcitrant senator to order, a call to which the recalcitrant paid -little heed beyond tart remarks on his part concerning his own high -determinations to yield to no gavel tyranny, coupled with a forceful -though conceited assurance flung to the Senate at large, that he, the -recalcitrant, knew his rights (which he never did), and would uphold -them (which he never failed to do.) The Senate president named no -committees; owned no control over the order of business; indeed he was -limited to a vote on ties, a warning that he would clear the galleries -(which was never done) when the public therein roosting, applauded, and -the right to prevent two senators from talking at one and the same time. -These marked the utmost measure of his influence. Any senator could get -the floor for any purpose, and talk on any subject from Prester John to -Sheep in the Seventeenth Century, while his strength stood. Also, and -much as dogs have kennels permitted them for their habitation, the -presiding officer of the Senate--in other words, the Vice-President of -the nation--was given a room, separate and secluded to himself, into -which he might creep when chagrin for his own unimportance should -overmaster him or otherwise his woes become greater than he might -publicly bear. - -The House Speaker was a vastly different cock, with a louder crow and -longer spur. The Speaker was a king, indeed; and an absolute monarch -or an autocrat or what you will that signifies one who may do as he -chooses, exercise unbridled will, and generally sit beneath the broad -shadows of the vine and the fig tree of his prerogatives with none to -molest him or make him afraid. The Speaker was, so to phrase it, the -entire House, the other three hundred and fifty-five members acting only -when he consented or compelled them, and then usually by his suggestion -and always under his thumb. No bill could be considered without the -Speaker’s permission; and then for so long only as he should allow, and -by what members he preferred. No man could speak to a measure wanting -the gracious consent of this dignitary; and no word could be uttered--at -least persisted in--To which he felt distaste. The Speaker, when lengths -and breadths are measured, was greater than the Moscow Czar and showed -him a handless infant by comparison. - -As a half-glove of velvet for his iron hand, and to mask and soften -his pure autocracy--which if seen naked might shock the spirit of -Americanism--there existed a Rules Committee. This subbody, whereof the -Speaker was chief, carried, besides himself, but two members; and these -he personally selected, as indeed he did the entire membership of every -committee on the House muster-rolls. This Rules Committee, with the -Speaker in absolute sway, acted with reference to the House at large as -do the Board of Judges for a racecourse. It declared each day what bills -should be taken up, limited debate, and to pursue the Track simile to a -last word, called on this race or cleared the course of that race, and -fairly speaking dry-nursed the House throughout its travels, romps and -lessons. - -Jim Britt discovered that in all, counting Speaker, Rules Committee, -and a dozen chairmen of the great committees, there existed no more -than fifteen folk who might by any stretch of veracity be said to have -a least of voice in the transaction of House business. In the gagged -and bound cases of the other three hundred and forty-one, and for what -public good or ill to flow from them, their constituents would have -fared as well had they, instead of electing these representatives, -confined themselves to writing the government a letter setting forth -their wants. - -In reference to his own bill, Jim Britt convinced himself of two -imposing truths. Anybody would and could introduce it in either House or -Senate or in both at once; then, when thus introduced and it had taken -the routine course to the proper committee, the situation would ask -the fervent agreement of a majority in each body, to say nothing of the -Speaker’s consent--a consent as hard to gain as a girl’s--to bring it up -for passage. - -Nor was there any security of concert. The bill might be fashionable, -not to say popular, with one body, while the other turned rigid back -upon it. It might live in the House to die in the Senate, or succeed in -the Senate and perish in the House. There were no safety and little hope -to be won in any corner, and the lone certainty to peer forth upon Jim -Britt was that the chances stood immeasurably against him wherever he -turned his eyes. The camel for the needle’s eye and the rich man -into heaven, were easy and feasible when laid side by side with the -Congressional outlook for his bill. - -While Jim Britt was now sensibly cast down and pressed upon by despair, -within him the eagerness for triumph grew taller with each day. For one -daunting matter, should he return empty of hand, Samantha would wear -the fact fresh and new upon her tongue’s end to the last closing of his -eyes. It would become a daily illustration--an hourly argument in her -practiced mouth. - -There was one good to come to Jim Britt by his investigations and that -was a good instruction. Like many another, Jim Britt, from the deceitful -distance of Last Chance, had ever regarded both House and Senate -as gigantic conspiracies. They were eaten of plot and permeated of -intrigue; it was all chicane and surprise and sharp practice. Congress -was a name for traps and gins and pits and snares and deadfalls. The -word meant tunnels and trap-doors and vaults and dungeons and sinister -black whatnot. Jim Britt never paused to consider wherefore Congress -should, for ends either clean or foul, conceal within itself these -midnight commodities of mask and dark-lantern, and go about its destiny -a perennial Guy Fawkes, ready to explode a situation with a touch and -blow itself and all concerned to far-spread flinders. Had he done so he -might have dismissed these murky beliefs. - -It is, however, never too late to mend. It began now to dawn upon Jim -Britt by the morning light of what he read and heard and witnessed, that -both Houses in their plan and movement were as simple as a wire fence; -no more recondite than is a pair of shears. They might be wrong, but -they were not intricate; they might spoil a deal of cloth in their -cutting, or grow dull of edge or loose of joint and so not cut at -all, but they were not mysterious. Certainly, Congress was no more a -conspiracy than is a flock of geese, and a brooding hen would be as -guilty of a plot and as deep given to intrigue. Congress was a stone -wall or a precipice or a bridgeless gulf or chloroform or what one -would that was stupefying or difficult of passage to the border of the -impossible, but there dwelt nothing occult or secret or unknowable in -its bowels. These truths of simplicity Jim Britt began to learn and, -while they did not cheer, at least they served to clear him up. - -Following two weeks of investigation, Jim Britt secured the introduction -of his bill. This came off by asking; the representative from the Last -Chance district performing in the one body, while one of the Kansas -senators acted in the more venerable convention. - -Now when the bill was introduced, printed, and in the lap of the proper -committee, Jim Britt went to work to secure the bill’s report. He might -as well have stormed the skies to steal a star; he found himself as -helpless as a fly in amber. - -About this hour in his destinies, Jim Britt made a radical and, as -it turned, a decisive move. He had now grown used to Washington and -Washington to him, and while folk still stared and many grinned, Jim -Britt did not receive that ovation as he moved about which marked and -made unhappy his earlier days in the town. Believing it necessary to his -bill’s weal, Jim Britt began to haunt John Chamberlin’s house of call as -then was, and to scrape acquaintance with statesmen who passed hours of -ease and wine in its parlors. - -In the commencement of his Chamberlin experiences Jim Britt met much -to affright him. A snowy-bearded senator from Nevada sat at a table. On -seeing Jim Britt smile upon him in a friendly way--he was hoping to make -the senator’s acquaintance--he of the snow-beard, apropos of nothing, -suddenly thundered: - -“I have this day read John Sherman’s defence of the Crime of -’Seventy-Three. John Sherman contends that no crime was committed -because no criminals were caught.” - -This outburst so dismayed Jim Britt that he sought a far corner and no -more tempted the explosiveness of Snow-Beard. - -Again, Jim Britt would engage a venerable senator from Alabama in talk. -He was instantly taken by the helpless button, and for a quintette of -hours told of the national need of a Panama Canal, and given a list of -what railroads in their venality set the flinty face of their opposition -to its coming about. - -These things, the thunders of Snow-Beard and the exhaustive settings -forth of the senator from the south, pierced Jim Britt; for he reflected -that if the questions of silver and Panama could not be budged for their -benefit by these gentlemen of beard and long experience and who dwelt -well within the breastworks of legislation, then his bill for that small -right of way, and none to aid it save himself in his poor obscurity, -could hope for nothing except death and burial where it lay. - -There was a gentleman of Congress well known and loved as the Statesman -from Tupelo. He was frequent and popular about Chamberlin’s. The -Statesman from Tupelo was a humorist of celebration and one of the -redeeming features of the House of Representatives. His eye fell upon -the queer, ungainly form of Jim Britt, with hungry face, eyes keen but -guileless, and nose of falcon curve. - -The Statesman from Tupelo beheld in Jim Britt with his Gothic simplicity -a self-offered prey to the spear of every joker. The Statesman from -Tupelo, with a specious suavity of accent and a blandness irresistible, -drew forth Jim Britt in converse. The latter, flustered, flattered, went -to extremes of confidence and laid frankly bare his railroad hopes and -fears which were now all fears. - -The Statesman from Tupelo listened with decorous albeit sympathetic -gravity. When Jim Britt was done he spoke: - -“As you say,” observed the Statesman from Tupelo, “your one chance is -to get acquainted with a majority of both Houses and interest them -personally in your bill.” - -“But how might a party do that soonest?” asked Jim Britt. “I don’t want -to camp yere for the balance of my days. Besides, thar’s Samantha.” - -“Certainly, there’s Samantha,” assented the Statesman from Tupelo. Then -following a pause: - -“I suppose the readiest method would be to give a dinner. Could you -undertake that?” - -“Why, I reckon I could.” - -The dinner project obtained kindly foothold in the breast of Jim Britt; -he had read of such banquet deeds as a boy when the papers told the -splendors of Sam Ward and the Lucullian day of the old Pacific Mail. Jim -Britt had had no experience of Chamberlin prices, since his purchases at -that hotel had gone no farther a-field than a now-and-then cigar. He had -for most part subsisted at those cheap restaurants which--for that there -be many threadbare folk, spent with their vigils about Congress, hoping -for their denied rights--are singularly abundant in Washington. These -modest places of regale would give no good notion of Chamberlin’s, but -quite the contrary. Wherefore, Jim Britt, quick with railway ardor and -to get back to the far-away Samantha, took the urgent initiative, and -said he would order the dinner for what night the Statesman from Tupelo -deemed best, if only that potent spirit would agree to gather in the -guests. - -“We will have the dinner, then,” said He of Tupelo, “on next Saturday. -You can tell Chamberlin; and I’ll see to the guests.” - -“How many?” said Chamberlin’s steward, when he received the orders of -Jim Britt. - -The coming railway magnate looked at the Statesman from Tupelo. - -“Say fifty,” remarked the Statesman from Tupelo. - -Jim Britt was delighted. He would have liked sixty guests better, or -if one might, one hundred; but fifty was a fair start. There could come -other dinners, for the future holds a deal of room. In time Jim Britt -might dine a full moiety of Congress. The dinner was fixed; the menu -left to the steward’s ingenuity and taste; and now when the situation -was thus relaid, and Saturday distant but two days, Jim Britt himself -called for an apartment at Chamberlin’s, sent for his one trunk, and -established himself on the scene of coming dinner action to have instant -advantage of whatever offered that might be twisted to affect his -lead-mine road. - -The long tables for Jim Britt’s dinner were spread in a dining room -upstairs. There were fifty covers, and room for twenty more should -twenty come. The apartment itself was a jungle of tropical plants, -and the ground plan of the feast laid on a scale of bill-threatening -magnificence. - -This was but right. For when the steward would have consulted the -exultant Jim Britt whose florid imaginings had quite carried him off his -feet, that gentleman said simply: - -“Make the play with the bridle off! Don’t pinch down for a chip.” - -Thereupon the steward cast aside restraint and wandered forth upon that -dinner with a heart care-free and unrestrained. He would make of it a -moment of terrapin and canvas-back and burgundy which time should date -from and folk remember for long to the Chamberlin praise. - -Saturday arrived, and throughout the afternoon Jim Britt, by grace -of the good steward, who had a pride of his work and loved applause, -teetered in and out of the dining room and with dancing eye and mouth -ajar gave rein to admiration. It would be a mighty dinner; it would land -his bill in his successful hands, and make, besides, a story to amaze -the folk of Last Chance to a standstill. These be not our words; rather -they flowed as the advance jubilations of Jim Britt. - -There was one thought to bear upon Jim Britt to bashful disadvantage. -The prospect of entertaining fifty statesmen shook his confidence and -took his breath. To repair these disasters he called privily from time -to time for whiskey. - -It was not over-long before he talked thickly his encomiums to the -steward. On his last visit to survey that fairyland of a dining room, -Jim Britt counted covers laid for several hundred guests; what was still -more wondrous, he believed they would come and the prospect rejoiced -him. There were as many lights, too, in the chandeliers as stars of a -still winter’s night, while the apartment seemed as large as a ten-acre -lot and waved a broad forest of foliage. - -That he might be certainly present on the arrival of the first -guest--for Jim Britt knew and felt his duties as a host--Jim Britt -lay down upon a lounge which, to one side, was deeply, sweetly bowered -beneath the overhanging palms. Then Jim Britt went earnestly to sleep -and was no more to be aroused than a dead man. - -The Statesman from Tupelo appeared; by twos and threes and tens, -gathered the guests; Jim Britt slept on the sleep of innocence without -a dream. A steering committee named to that purpose on the spot by the -Statesman from Tupelo, sought to recover Jim Britt to a knowledge of -his fortunate honors. Full sixty guests were there, and it was but -right that he be granted the pleasure, not to say the glory, of their -acquaintance. - -It was of no avail; Jim Britt would not be withdrawn from slumbers deep -as death. The steering committee suspended its labors of restoration. As -said the chairman in making his report, which, with a wine glass in his -hand, he subsequently did between soup and fish: - -“Our most cunning efforts were fruitless. We even threw water on him, -but it was like throwing water on a drowned rat.” - -Thus did his slumbers defend themselves, and Jim Britt snore unchecked. - -But the dinner was not to flag. The Statesman from Tupelo took the head -of the table and the chairman of the steering committee the foot, the -repast proceeded while wine and humor flowed. - -It was a dream of a dinner, a most desirable dinner, a dinner that -should stand for years an honor to Jim Britt of Last Chance. It raged -from eight till three. Corks and jokes were popping while laughter -walked abroad; speeches were made and songs were sung. Through it all, -the serene founder of the feast slept on, and albeit eloquence took -up his name and twined about it flowery compliment, he knew it not. -Tranquilly on his lounge he abode in dear oblivion. - -Things mundane end and so did Jim Britt’s dinner. There struck an hour -when the last song was sung, the last jest was made, and the last -guest departed away. The Statesman from Tupelo superintended the -transportation of Jim Britt to his room, and having made him safe, He -of Tupelo went also out into the morning, and that famous banquet was of -the perfumed past. - -It dawned Wednesday before the Statesman from Tupelo called again at -Chamberlin’s to ask for the excellent Jim Britt. The Statesman from -Tupelo explained wherefore he was thus laggard. - -“I thought,” he said to Chamberlin, “that our friend would need Sunday, -Monday and Tuesday to straighten up his head.” - -“The man’s gone,” said Chamberlin; “he departed Monday morning.” - -“And whither?” - -“Home to Last Chance.” - -“What did he go home for?” - -“That dinner broke him, I guess. It cost about eighteen hundred dollars, -and he only had a little over a hundred when the bill was paid.” - -The Statesman from Tupelo mused, while clouds of regret began to gather -on his brow. His conscience had him by the collar; his conscience was -avenging that bankruptcy of Jim Britt. - -The Statesman from Tupelo received Jim Britt’s address from the hands -of Chamberlin’s clerk. The next day the Statesman from Tupelo wrote Jim -Britt a letter. It ran thus: - -Chamberlin’s Hotel. - -My Dear Sir:-- - -Don’t come back. Write me in full the exact story of what you want and -why you want it. I’ve got a copy of your bill from the Document Room, -and so soon as I hear from you, shall urge the business before the -proper committee. - -When Jim Britt’s reply came to hand, the Statesman from Tupelo--whom -nobody could resist--prevailed on the committee to report the bill. Then -he got the Speaker, who while iron with others was as wax in the hands -of the Statesman from Tupelo, to recognize him to bring up the bill. -The House, equally under his spell, gave the Statesman from Tupelo its -unanimous consent, and the bill was carried in the blink of a moment to -its third reading and put upon its passage. Then the Statesman from -Tupelo made a speech; he said it was a confession. - -The Statesman from Tupelo talked for fifteen minutes while the House -howled. He told the destruction of Jim Britt. He painted the dinner and -pointed to those members of the House who attended; he reminded them of -the desolation which their appetites had worked. He said the House was -disgraced in the downfall of Jim Britt, and admitted that he and his -fellow diners were culpable to a last extreme. But there was a way to -repair all. The bill must be passed, the stain on the House must be -washed away, Jim Britt must stand again on his fiscal feet, and then he, -the Statesman from Tupelo, and his fellow conspirators, might once more -look mankind in the eye. - -There be those who will do for laughter what they would not do for -right. The House passed Jim Britt’s bill unanimously. - -The Statesman from Tupelo carried it to the Senate. He explained the -painful situation and described the remedy. Would the Senate unbend from -its stern dignity as the greatest deliberative body of any clime or age, -and come to the rescue of the Statesman from Tupelo and the House of -Representatives now wallowing in infamy? - -The Senate would; by virtue of a kink in Senate rules which permitted -the feat, the Jim Britt Bill was instantly and unanimously adopted -without the intervention of a committee, the ordering a reference or a -roll-call. The Statesman from Tupelo thanked the Senate and withdrew, -pretending emotion. - -There was one more journey to make, one more power to consult, and the -mighty work would be accomplished. The President must sign the bill. The -Statesman from Tupelo walked in on that tremendous officer of state and -told him the tale of injury done Jim Britt. The Statesman from Tupelo, -by way of metaphor, called himself and his fellow sinners, cannibals, -and showed how they had eaten Jim Britt. Then he reminded the President -how he had once before gone to the rescue of cannibals in the case of -Queen Lil. Would he now come to the relief of the Statesman from Tupelo -and his fellow Anthropophagi of the House? - -The President was overcome with the word and the idea; he scribbled his -name in cramped copperplate, and the deed was done. The Jim Britt Bill -was a law, and Jim Britt saved from the life-long taunts of Samantha, -the retentive. The road from Last Chance to the lead mine was built, -and on hearing of its completion the Statesman from Tupelo wrote for an -annual pass. - -***** - -“Then it was luck after all,” said the Red - -Nosed Gentleman, “rather than management to save the day for your Jim -Britt.” - -“Entirely so,” conceded the Jolly Doctor. - -“There’s a mighty deal in luck,” observed the Red Nosed Gentleman, -sagely. “Certainly, it’s the major part in gambling, and I think, -too, luck is a decisive element in every victory or defeat a man -experiences.” - -“And, now,” observed the Sour Gentleman, “now that you mention gambling, -suppose you redeem your promise and give us the story of ‘How to Tell -the Last Four.’ The phrase is dark to me and has no meaning, but I -inferred from what you were saying when you used it, that you alluded -to some game of chance. Assuredly, I crave pardon if I be in error,” and -now the Sour Gentleman bowed with vast politeness. - -“You are not in error,” returned the Red Nosed Gentleman, “and I did -refer to gambling. Casino, however, when played by Casino Joe was no -game of chance, but of science; his secret, he said in explanation, lay -in ‘How to Tell the Last Four.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XIV.--HOW TO TELL THE LAST FOUR. - -Casino Joe, when thirty years ago he came about the Bowery, was in -manner and speech a complete expression of the rustical. His brow was -high and fine and wise; but lank hair of yellow spoiled with its ragged -fringe his face--a sallow face, wide of mouth and with high cheek bones. -His garb was farmerish; kip-skin boots, coat and trousers of gray jeans, -hickory shirt, and soft shapeless hat. Nor was Casino Joe in disguise; -these habiliments made up the uniform of his ancestral New Hampshire. -Countryman all over, was Casino Joe, and this look of the uncouth served -him in his chosen profession. - -Possibly “chosen” as a term is indiscreet. Gamblers are born and not -made; they occur and they do not choose; they are, compared with more -conservative and lawful men, what wolves are to honest dogs--cousins, -truly, but tameless depredators, living lean and hard, and dying when -die they do, neglected, lone and poor. Yet it is fate; they are born to -it as much as is the Ishmael wolf and must run their midnight downhill -courses. - -Gamblers, that is true gamblers, are folk of specialties. Casino Joe’s -was the game which gave to him his name--at casino he throve invincibly. - -“It is my gift,” he said. - -Two things were with Casino Joe at birth; the genius for casino and that -jack-knife talent to whittle which belongs with true-born Yankees. -Of this latter I had proof long after poor Casino Joe wras dead and -nourishing the grass. The races were in Boston; it was when Goldsmith -Maid reigned Queen of the trotting turf. Her owner came to me at the -Adams House and told how the aged sire of Goldsmith Maid, the great -Henry Clay, was in his equine, joint-stiffened dotage pastured on a not -too distant farm. He was eager to have a look at the old horse; and I -went with him for this pilgrimage. - -As we drove up to the tavern which the farmstead we sought surrounded, -my curious eye was caught by a fluttering windmill contrivance perched -upon the gable. It was the figure of a woman done in pine and perhaps -four feet of height, carved in the somewhat airy character of a ballet -dancer. Instead of a dance, however, the lady contented herself with an -exhibition of Indian Club swinging--one in each pine palm; the breeze -offering the whirling impulse--in the execution wherof she poised -herself with one foot on a wooden ball not unlike the arrowing bronze -Diana of Madison Square. This figure, twirling clubs, as a mere windmill -would have been amazing enough; but as though this were not sufficiently -wondrous, at regular intervals our ballet dancer shifted her feet on -the ball, replacing the right with the left and again the left with the -right in measured alternation. The miracle of it held me transfixed. - -The host came fatly to his front stoop and smiled upon my wide-eyed -interest. - -“Where did you get it?” I asked. - -“That was carved with a jack-knife,” replied mine host, “by a party -called ‘Casino Joe.’ It took him’most a year; he got it mounted and -goin’ jest before he died.” - -For long I had lost trace of Casino Joe; it was now at this change house -I blundered on the news how my old gambling friend of the Bowery came -with his consumption and some eight thousand dollars--enough to end -one’s life with--and made this place home until his death. His grave lay -across a field in the little rural burying ground where he had played -when a boy, for Casino Joe was native of these parts. - -There were no cheatings or tricky illicitisms hidden in Joe’s -supremacies of casino. They were works of a wax-like memory which kept -the story of the cards as one makes entries in a ledger. When the last -hands were out between Joe and an adversary, a glance at his mental -entries of cards already played, and another at his own hand, unerringly -informed him of what cards his opponent held. This he called “Telling -the last four.” - -It was as an advantage more than enough to enable Joe to win; and while -I lived in his company, I never knew him to be out of pocket by that -divertisement. The marvel was that he could keep accurate track of -fifty-two cards as they fell one after the other into play, and do -these feats of memory in noise-ridden bar-rooms and amid a swirl of -conversation in which he more or less bore part. - -Those quick folk of the fraternity whom he encountered and who from time -to time lost money to Casino Joe, never once suspected his victories to -be a result of mere memory. They held that some cheat took place. But -as it was not detectable and no man might point it out, no word of fault -was uttered. Joe took the money and never a protest; for it is as much -an axiom of the gaming table as it is of the law that “Fraud must -be proved and will never be presumed or inferred.” With no evidence, -therefore, the losing gamblers made no protesting charge, and Joe went -forward collecting the wealth of any and all who fought with him at his -favorite science. - -Casino Joe, as I have said, accounted for his mastery at casino by his -power to “Tell the last four,” and laid it all to memory. - -“And yet,” said Joe one evening as I urged him to impart to me his -secret more in detail, “it may depend on something else. As I’ve told -you, it’s my gift. Folk have their gifts. Once when I was in the town -of Warrensburg in Western Missouri, I was shown a man who had gifts -for mathematics that were unaccountable. He was a coarse, animalish -creature, this mathematician; a half idiot and utterly without -education. A sullen, unclean beast of a being, he shuffled about in -a queer, plantigrade fashion like a bear. He was ill-natured, yet too -timid to do harm; and besides a genius for figures, his distinguishing -characteristics were hunger measured by four men’s rations and an -appetite for whiskey which to call swinish would be marking a weakness -on one’s own part in the art of simile. Yet this witless creature, -unable to read his own printed name, knew as by an instinct every -mathematical or geometrical term. You might propose nothing as a problem -that he would not instantly solve. He could tell you like winking, -the area of a seven or eight-angled figure so you but gave him the -dimensions; he would announce the surface measurements of a sphere when -told either its diameter or circumference. Once, as a poser, a learned -teacher proposed a supposititious cone seven feet in altitude and with a -diameter of three feet at the base, and asked at what distance from the -apex it should be divided to make both parts equal of bulk and weight. -The gross, growling being made correct, unhesitating reply. This monster -of mathematics seemed also to carry a chronometer in his stomach, for -day or night, he could and would--for a drink of rum--tell you the hour -to any splinter of a second. You might set your watch by him as if he -were the steeple clock. I don’t profess,” concluded Casino Joe, “to -either the habits or the imbecility of this genius of figures, yet it -may well be that my abilities to keep track of fifty-two Cards as -they appear in play and know at every moment--as a bookkeeper does -a balance--what cards are yet to come, are not of cultivation or -acquirement, but were extant within me at my birth.” When Casino -Joe appeared in the Bowery he came to gamble at cards. That buzzing -thoroughfare was then the promenade of the watchful brotherhood of -chance. In that hour, too, it stood more the fashion--for there are -fashions in gambling as in everything else--to win and lose money at -short-cards, and casino enjoyed particular vogue. There were scores -of eminent practitioners about New York, and Joe had little trouble in -securing recognition. Indeed, he might have played the full twenty-four -hours of every day could he have held up his head to such labors. - -There was at the advent of our rural Joe into metropolitan circles none -more alert or breathless for pastmastery in unholy speculation than -myself. About twenty-one should have been my years, and I carried that -bubbling spirit for success common to the youth of every walk. _Aut -Cosar aut nullus!_ was my warcry, and I did not consider Joe and his -career for long before I was slave to the one hope of finally gaining -his secret. One might found fortune on it; like the philosopher’s stone -it turned everything to gold. - -With those others who fell before Joe I also believed his success to be -offspring of some cheat. And while the rustic Joe was engaged against -some fellow immoralist, I’ve sat and watched for hours upon end to -discover what winding thing Joe did. There was no villainy of double -dealing or chicane of cut-shifting or of marked cards at which I was -not adept. And what I could so darkly perform I was equally quick to -discover when another attempted it. But, albeit I eyed poor Joe with a -cat’s vigilance--a vigilance to have saved the life of Argus had he but -emulated it with his hundred eyes--I noted nothing. And the reason was a -simple one. There was literally nothing to discover; Joe played honestly -enough; his advantage dwelt in his memory and that lay hidden within his -head. - -Despairing of a discovery by dint of watching, I made friendly overtures -to Joe, hoping to wheedle a secret which I could not surprise. My -proffers of comradeship were met more than half way. Joe was a kindly -though a lonely soul and had few friends; his queer garb of the -cowpastures together with his unfailing domination at casino kept -others of the fraternity at a distance. Also I had been much educated of -books by Father Glennon, and put in my spare time with reading. As Joe -himself had dived somewhat into books, we were doubly drawn to each -other. Hours have we sat together in Joe’s nobly furnished rooms--for -he lived well if he did not dress well--and overhauled for our mutual -amusement the literature of the centuries back to Chaucer and his Tabard -Inn. - -At this time Joe was already in the coils of that consumption whereof at -last he died. And what with a racking cough and an inability to breathe -while lying down, Joe seldom slept in a bed. The best he might do was to -gain what snatches of slumber he could while propped in an arm-chair. It -thus befell that at his suggestion and to tell the whole truth, at -his generous expense, I came finally to room with Joe. Somebody -should utilize the bed. Being young and sound of nerves, his restless -night-roamings about the floors disturbed not me; I slept serenely -through as I doubtless would through the crack of doom had such calamity -surprised us at that time, and Joe and I prospered bravely in company. - -Beseech and plead as I might, however, Joe would not impart to me that -hidden casino strength beyond his word that no fraud was practiced--a -fact whereof my watchings had made me sure--and curtly describing it as -an ability to “Tell the last four.” - -While Joe housed me as his guest for many months and paid the bills, one -is not to argue therefrom any unhappy pauperism on my boyish part. In -good sooth! I was more than rich during those days, with a fortune of -anywhere from five hundred to as many as four thousand dollars. Like all -disciples of chance I had these riches ever ready in my pocket for what -prey might offer. - -It was now and then well for Joe that I went thus provided. That badly -garbed squire of good dame Fortune, who failed not of a profit at -casino, had withal an overpowering taste to play faro; and as if by some -law of compensation and to preserve an equilibrium, he would seem to sit -down to a faro layout only to lose. - -Time and again he came to his rooms stripped of the last dollar. On -these harrowing occasions Joe would borrow a round-number stake from me -and so return to the legitimate sure harvests of casino, vowing never to -lose himself and his money in any quicksands of farobank again. - -It must be admitted that these anti-faro vows were never kept; once firm -on his feet by virtue of casino renewed, it was not over long ere he -“tried it just once more,” to lose again. These faro bankruptcies would -overtake Joe about once a month. - -One day I made a mild plot; I had foregone all hope of coaxing Joe’s -secret from him; now I resolved to bring against him the pressure of a -small intrigue. I lay in ambush for Joe, waylaid him as it were in the -weak hour of his destitution and ravished from him at the point of his -necessities that which I could come by in no other way. - -It was following a disastrous night at faro when Joe appeared without -so much silver in his pockets as might serve to keep the fiends from -dancing there. Having related his losses he asked for the usual five -hundred wherewith to re-enter the sure lists of casino and begin the -combat anew. - -To his sore amazement and chagrin--and somewhat to his alarm, for at -first he thought me as poor as himself from my refusal--I shook my sage -young head. - -“Haven’t you got it?” asked Joe anxiously. - -“Oh, yes,” I replied, “I’ve got it; and it’s yours on one condition. -Teach me how to ‘Tell the last four,’ and you may have five hundred and -five hundred with it.” - -Then I pointed out to Joe his mean unfairness in not equipping me with -this resistless knowledge. Save for that one pregnant secret I was -as perfect at casino as any sharper on the Bowery. Likewise, were the -situation reversed, I’d be quick to instruct him. I’d lend no more; -there would come no further five hundred save as the price of that -touchstone--the golden secret of how to “Tell the last four.” This I set -forth jealously. - -“Why, then,” said Joe, “I’ll do my best to teach you. But it will cost -a deal of work. You’ll have to put in hours of practice and curry and -groom and train your memory as if it were a horse for a great race. I -tell you the more readily--for I could elsewhere easily get the five -hundred and for that matter five thousand other dollars to keep it -company--since I believe I’ve not many months to live at best”--here, as -if in confirmation, a gust of coughing shook him--“and this secret shall -be your legacy.” - -With these words, Joe got a deck of cards and began a game of casino -with me as an adversary. Slowly playing the cards, he explained and -strove to illustrate those mental methods by which he kept account and -tabbed them as they were played. If I could lay bare this system here -I would; but its very elaboration forbids. It was as though Joe owned a -blackboard in his head with the fifty-two cards told off by numbers in -column, and from which he erased a card the moment it appeared in play. -By processes of elimination, he came finally to “Tell the last four,” - and as the last hands were dealt knew those held by his opposite as -much as ever he knew his own. This advantage, with even luck and perfect -skill made him not to be conquered. - -It took many sittings with many lessons many hours long; but in time -because of my young faculties--not too much cumbered of those thousand -and one concerns to come with years and clamor for remembrance--I grew -as perfect as Joe. - -And it was well I learned the secret when I did. Soon after, I became -separated from Joe; I went southward to New Orleans and when I was next -to New York Joe had disappeared. Nor could I find trace or sign of -his whereabouts. He went in truth to his old village, and my earliest -information thereof came only when the tavern host told the origin -of the club-swinging ballet dancer then toeing it so gallantly on his -gables. - -But while I parted with my friend, I never forgot him. The knowledge he -gave double-armed me at the game. It became the reason of often riches -in my hands, and was ever a resort when I erred over horse races or was -beaten down by some storm of faro. Then it was profitably I recalled -Casino Joe and his instructions; and his invincible secret of “How to -tell the last four.” - -“Is it not strange,” said the Jolly Doctor, when the Red Nosed Gentleman -had finished, “that I who never cared to gamble, should listen with -delight to a story of gamblers and gambling? But so it is; I’ve heard -scores such in my time and always with utmost zest. I’ll even tell one -myself--as it was told me--when it again becomes my duty to furnish this -good company entertainment. Meanwhile, unless my memory fails, it should -be the task of our descendant of Hiawatha”--here the Jolly Doctor turned -smilingly to Sioux Sam--“to take up the burden of the evening.” - -The Old Cattleman, joining with the Jolly Doctor in the suggestion, -and Sioux Sam being in no wise loth to be heard, our half-savage friend -related “How Moh-Kwa Fed the Catfish.” - - - - -CHAPTER XV.--HOW MOH-KWA FED THE CATFISH. - -One day Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, had a quarrel with Ish-koo-dah, the -Fire. Moh-Kwa was gone from home two days, for Moh-Kwa had found a large -patch of ripe blackberries, an’ he said it was prudent to stay an’ eat -them all up lest some other man find them. So Moh-Kwa stayed; an’ though -he ate very hard the whole time an’ never slept, so many an’ fat were -the blackberries, it took two suns to eat them. - -When Moh-Kwa came into his cavern, he found Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, grown -small an’ hot an’ angry, for he had not been fed for two days. Moh-Kwa -gave the Fire a bundle of dry wood to eat, an’ when the Fire’s stomach -was full an’ he had grown big an’ bright with plenty, he sat up on his -bed of coals an’ found fault with Moh-Kwa for his neglect. - -“An’ should you neglect me again for two days,” said the Fire, “I will -know I am not wanted an’ shall go away.” - -Moh-Kwa was much tired with no sleep, so he answered Ish-koo-dah, the -Fire, sharply. - -“You are always hungry,” said Moh-Kwa; “also you are hard to suit. If I -give you green wood, you will not eat it; if the wood be wet, you turn -away. Nothing but old dry wood will you accept. Beggars like you should -not own such fine tastes. An’ do you think, Fire, that I who have much -to do an’ say an’ many places to go--I, Moh-Kwa, who am as busy as the -bees in the Moon of Blossoms, have time to stay ever by your side -to pass you new dry wood to eat? Go to; you are more trouble that a -papoose!” - -Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, did not say anything to this, for the Fire’s -feelings were hurt; an’ Moh-Kwa who was heavy with his labors over the -blackberries lay down an’ took a big sleep. - -When Moh-Kwa awoke, he sat blinking in the darkness of his cavern, for -Ish-koo-dah, while Moh-Kwa slept, had gone out an’ left night behind. - -For five days Moh-Kwa had no fire an’ it gave him a bad heart; for while -Moh-Kwa could eat his food raw an’ never cared for that, he could not -smoke his kinnikinick unless Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, was there to light -his pipe for him. - -For five days Moh-Kwa smoked no kinnikinick; an’ Moh-Kwa got angry -because of it an’ roared an’ shouted up an’ down the canyons, an’ to -show he did not care, Moh-Kwa smashed his redstone pipe on a rock. But -in his stomach Moh-Kwa cared, an’ would have traded Ish-koodah, the -Fire, four armsful of dry cedar just to have him light his kinnikinick -but once. But Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, was gone out an’ would not come -back. - -[Illustration: 0239] - -Openhand, the good Sioux an’ great hunter, heard Moh-Kwa roaring for his -kinnikinick. An’ Openhand told him he behaved badly, like a young squaw -who wants new feathers an’ cannot get them. Then Openhand gave Moh-Kwa -another pine, an’ brought the Fire from his own lodge; an’ again -Moh-Kwa’s cavern blazed with Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, in the middle of the -floor, an’ Moh-Kwa smoked his kinnikinick. An’ Moh-Kwa’s heart felt good -an’ soft an’ pleasant like the sunset in the Moon of Fruit. Also, he -gave Ish-koo-dah plenty of wood to eat an’ never scolded him for being -always hungry. - -All the Sioux loved Openhand; for no one went by his lodge empty but -Openhand gave him a piece of buffalo meat; an’ if a Sioux was cold, he -put a blanket about his shoulders. An’ for this he was named “Openhand,” - an’ the Sioux were never tired of talking good talk of Open-hand, an’ -the noise of his praises never died out. - -Coldheart hated Openhand because he was so much loved. Coldheart was -himself sulky an’ hard, an’ his hand was shut tight like a beaver-trap -that is sprung, an’ it would not open to give anything away. Those who -came hungry went hungry for all of Coldheart; an’ if they were cold, -they were cold. Coldheart wrapped his robes the closer, an’ was the -warmest whenever he thought the frost-wolf was gnawing others. - -“I do not rule the ice,” said Coldheart; “hunger does not come or go -on its war-trail by my orders. An’ if the Sioux freeze or starve, an’ -Pau-guk, the Death, walks among the lodges, it is because the time is -Pau-guk’s an’ I cannot help it.” - -So Coldheart kept his blankets an’ his buffalo meat for himself an’ -his son, the Blackbird, an’ gave nothing away. An’ for these things, -Coldheart was hated while Openhand was praised; an’ the breast of -Coldheart was so eaten with his wrath against Openhand that it seemed as -though Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, had gone into Coldheart’s bosom an’ made a -camp. - -Coldheart would have called Pau-guk to his elbow an’ killed Openhand; -but Coldheart was not sure. The Openhand moved as quick as a fish in the -Yellowstone, an’ stood as tall an’ strong as the big pine on the hill; -there were no three warriors, the bravest of the Sioux, who could have -gone on the trail of Openhand an’ shown his skelp on their return, for -Openhand was a mighty fighter an’ had a big heart, so that even Fear -himself was afraid of Openhand an’ never dared come where he was. - -Coldheart knew well that he could not fight with Openhand; for to find -this out, he made his strongest medicine an’ called Jee-bi, the -Spirit; an’ Jee-bi talked with Pau-guk, the Death, an’ asked Pau-guk -if Coldheart went on the trail of Openhand to take his skelp, which one -Pau-guk would have at the trail’s end. An’ Pau-guk said he would have -Coldheart, for Openhand would surely kill him. When Jee-bi, the Spirit, -told Coldheart the word of Pau-guk, Coldheart saw then that he must go a -new trail with his hate. - -Coldheart smoked an’ smoked many pipes; but the thoughts of Openhand -an’ how he was loved by the Sioux made his kinnikinick bitter. Still -Coldheart smoked; an’ at last the thought came that if he could not kill -Openhand, he would kill the Young Wolf, who was Openhand’s son. When -this thought folded its wings an’ perched in the breast of Coldheart, he -called for the evil Lynx, who was Coldheart’s friend, an’ since he was -the wickedest of the Sioux, would do what Coldheart said. - -The Lynx came an’ sat with Coldheart in his lodge; an’ the lodge was -closed tight so that none might listen, an’ because it was cold. The -Coldheart told the Lynx to go with his war-axe when the next sun was up -an’ beat out the brains of the Young Wolf. - -“An’ when he is dead,” said Coldheart, “you must bring me the Young -Wolf’s heart to eat. Then I will have my revenge on Openhand, his -father, whom I hate; an’ whenever I meet the Openhand I will laugh with -the thought that I have eaten his son’s heart.” - -But there was one who listened to Coldheart while he gave his orders -to the evil Lynx, although she was no Sioux. This was the Widow of the -Great Rattlesnake of the Rocks who had long before been slain by Yellow -Face, his brother medicine. The Widow having hunted long an’ hard had -crawled into the lodge of Cold-heart to warm herself while she rested. -An’ as she slept beneath a buffalo robe, the noise of Coldheart talking -to the evil Lynx woke the Widow up; an’ so she sat up under her buffalo -robe an’ heard every word, for a squaw is always curious an’ would -sooner hear new talk than find a string of beads. - -That night as Moh-Kwa smoked by Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, an’ fed him -dry sticks so he would not leave him again, the Widow came an’ warmed -herself by Moh-Kwa’s side. An’ Moh-Kwa asked the Widow how she fared; -an’ the Widow while hungry said she was well, only that her heart was -made heavy by the words of Coldheart. Then the Widow told Moh-Kwa what -Coldheart had asked the evil Lynx to do, an’ how for his revenge against -Openhand he would eat the Young Wolf’s heart. - -Moh-Kwa listened to the Widow with his head on one side, for he would -not lose a word; an’ when she had done, Moh-Kwa was so pleased that he -put down his pipe an’ went to a nest which the owls had built on the -side of the cavern an’ took down a young owl an’ gave it to the Widow to -eat. An’ the Widow thanked Moh-Kwa an’ swallowed the little owl, while -the old owl flew all about the cavern telling the other owls what -Moh-Kwa had done. The owls were angry an’ shouted at Moh-Kwa. - -“The Catfish people said you were a Pawnee! But you are worse; you are -a Shoshone, Moh-Kwa; yes, you are a Siwash! Bird-robber, little -owl-killer, you an’ your Rattlesnake Widow are both Siwashes!” - -But Moh-Kwa paid no heed; he did not like the owls, for they stole his -meat; an’ when he would sleep, a company of the older owls would get -together an’ hold a big talk that was like thunder in Moh-Kwa’s cavern -an’ kept him awake. Moh-Kwa said at last that if the owls called the -Widow who was his guest a Siwash again, he would give her two more baby -owls. With that the old owls perched on their points of rocks an’ were -silent, for they feared Moh-Kwa an’ knew he was not their friend. - -When the Widow had eaten her little owl, she curled up to sleep two -weeks, for such was the Widow’s habit when she had eaten enough. An’ as -she snored pleasantly, feathers an’ owl-down were blown out through her -nose, but the young owl was gone forever. - -Moh-Kwa left the Widow sleeping an’ went down the canyon in the morning -to meet the evil Lynx where he knew he would pass close by the bank of -the Yellowstone. An’ when Moh-Kwa saw the evil Lynx creeping along with -his war-axe in his hand on the trail of the Young Wolf’s heart, he gave -a great shout: “Ah! Lynx, I’ve got you!” An’ then he started for the -Lynx with his paws spread. For Moh-Kwa loved the Open-hand, who brought -back to him Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, when he had gone out of Moh-Kwa’s -cavern an’ would not return. - -But Moh-Kwa did not reach the Lynx, for up a tree swarmed the Lynx out -of Moh-Kwa’s reach. - -When Moh-Kwa saw the evil Lynx hugging close to the tree, the new -thought made Moh-Kwa laugh. An’ with that he reached up with his great -arms an’ began to bend down the tree like a whip. When Moh-Kwa had bent -the tree enough, he let it go free; an’ the tree sprang straight like -an osage-orange bow. It was so swift an’ like a whip that the Lynx could -not hold on, but went whirling out over the river like a wild duck when -its wing is broken by an arrow; an’ then the Lynx splashed into the -Yellowstone. - -When the Lynx struck splashing into the Yellowstone, all the Catfish -people rushed for him with the Big Chief of the Catfish at their head. -Also, Ah-meek, the Beaver, was angry; for Ahmeek was crossing the -Yellowstone with a bundle of bulrushes in his mouth to help build his -winter house on the bank, an’ the Lynx struck so near to Ah-meek that -the waves washed his face an’ whiskers, an’ he was startled an’ lost the -bulrushes out of his mouth an’ they were washed away. - -Ah-meek who was angry, an’ the Catfish people who were hungry, charged -on the Lynx; but the Lynx was not far enough from the shore for them, -an’ while the Catfish people pinched him an’ Ah-meek, the Beaver, clawed -him, the Lynx crawled out on the bank an’ was safe. - -But Moh-Ivwa met the Lynx when he crawled out of the Yellowstone looking -like Dah-hin-dah, the Bull-frog, an’ Moh-Kwa picked him up with his paws -to throw him back. - -But a second new thought came; an’ although the Catfish people screamed -at him an’ Ah-meek who had lost his bulrushes was black with anger, -Moh-Kwa did not throw the Lynx back into the river but stood him on his -feet an’ told him what to do. An’ when Moh-Kwa gave him the orders, the -Lynx promised to obey. - -Moh-Kwa killed a fawn; an’ the Lynx took its heart in his hand an’ -went with it to Coldheart an’ said it was the heart of Young Wolf. An’ -Coldheart roasted it an’ ate it, thinking it was Young Wolf’s heart. - -For a day was the Coldheart glad, for he felt strong an’ warm with the -thought that now he was revenged against Openhand; an’ Coldheart longed -to tell Openhand that he had eaten his son’s heart. But Coldheart was -too wise to make this boast; he knew that Openhand whether with knife or -lance or arrow would give him at once to Pau-guk, an’ that would end his -revenge. - -Still Coldheart thought he would go to Open-hand’s lodge an’ feed his -eyes an’ ears with Open-hand’s groans an’ mournings when now his son, -the Young Wolf, was gone. But when Coldheart came to the lodge of -Openhand, he was made sore to meet the Young Wolf who was starting forth -to hunt. Coldheart spoke with the Young Wolf to make sure he had been -cheated; an’ then he went back to kill the Lynx. - -But Coldheart was too late; the Lynx had not waited; now he was gone -with his squaws an’ his ponies an’ his blankets to become a Pawnee. The -Lynx was tired of being a Sioux. - -When the Widow’s sleep was out, Moh-Kwa sent her to hide in the lodge -of Coldheart to hear what next he would plan. The Widow went gladly, -for Moh-Kwa promised four more small young owls just out of the egg. The -Widow lay under the buffalo robe an’ heard the words of Coldheart. In a -week, she came back to Moh-Kwa an’ told him what Coldheart planned. - -Coldheart had sent twenty ponies to the Black-foot chief, Dull Knife, -where he lived on the banks of the Little Bighorn. Also, Coldheart sent -these words in the mouth of his runner: - -“My son and the son of my enemy will come to your camp in one moon. You -will marry the Rosebud, your daughter, to my son, while the son of my -enemy you will tie an’ give to your young men to shoot at with their -arrows until he be dead, an’ afterward until they have had enough sport. -My son will bring you a white arrow; the son of my enemy will bring -you a black arrow.” Moh-Kwa laughed when he heard this from the Widow’s -lips; an’ because she had been faithful, Moh-Kwa gave her the four small -owls just from the egg. An’ the older owls took it quietly an’ only -whispered their anger; for Moh-Kwa said that if they screamed an’ -shouted when now he must sit an’ think until his head ached, he would -knock down every nest. - -When his plan was ripe, Coldheart put on a good face an’ went to the -lodge of Openhand an’ gave him a red blanket an’ said he was Openhand’s -friend. An’ Openhand an’ all the Sioux said this must be true talk -because of the red blanket; for Coldheart was never known to give -anything away before. - -Openhand an’ Coldheart sat down an’ smoked; for Moh-Kwa had never told -how Coldheart had sent the Lynx for the Young Wolf’s heart. Moh-Kwa -never told tales; moreover Moh-Kwa had also his own plans as well as -Coldheart. - -When Openhand an’ Coldheart came to part, an’ Coldheart was to go again -to his own lodge, he asked that Openhand send his son, Young Wolf, with -the Blackbird who would go to wed the young squaw, Rosebud, where she -dwelt with Dull Knife, her father, in their camp on the Little Bighorn. -An’ Openhand did not hesitate, but said, “Yes;” an’ the Young Wolf -himself was glad to go, like all boys who hope to see new scenes. - -As Young Wolf an’ the Blackbird next day rode away, Coldheart stuck a -black arrow in the cow-skin quiver of Young Wolf, an’ a white arrow in -that of the Blackbird, saying: - -“Give these to the Dull Knife that he may know you are my sons an’ come -from me, an’ treat you with much love.” - -Many days the young men traveled to reach Dull Knife’s camp on the -Little Bighorn. In the night of their last camp, Moh-Kwa came silently, -an’ while the young men slept swapped Coldheart’s arrows; an’ when -they rode to the lodge of Dull Knife, an’ while the scowling Blackfeet -gathered about--for the sight of a Sioux gives a Blackfoot a hot -heart--the black arrow was in the quiver of the Blackbird an’ the white -arrow in that of Young Wolf. - -“How!” said the young men to Dull Knife. “How! how!” said Dull Knife. -“An’ now, my sons, where are the arrows which are your countersigns?” - -When the young men took out the arrows they saw that they had been -changed; but they knew not their message an’ thought no difference would -come. So they made no talk since that would lose time; an’ Young Wolf -gave Dull Knife the white arrow while the Blackbird gave him the black -arrow. - -An’ holding an arrow in each hand--one white, one black--Dull Knife -said: - -“For the twenty ponies which we have got, the Blackfeet will carry forth -the word of Cold-heart; for the Blackfeet keep their treaties, being -honest men.” - -[Illustration: 0251] - -An’ so it turns that the Blackbird is shot full of arrows until he -bristles like the quills on the back of Kagh, the Hedgepig. But Young -Wolf is taken to the Rosebud, an’ they are married. The Young Wolf would -have said: “No!” for he did not understand; but Dull Knife showed him -first a war-axe an’ next the Rosebud. An’ the Rosebud was more beautiful -in the eye of youth than any war-axe; besides Young Wolf was many days -march from the lodge of his father, Openhand, an’ marriage is better -than death. Thinking all of which, the Young Wolf did not say “no” but -said “yes,” an’ at the wedding there was a great feast, for the Dull -Knife was a big chief an’ rich. - -Ma-ma, the Woodpecker, stood on the top of a dead tree an’ saw the -wedding; an’ when it was over, he flew straight an’ told Moh-Kwa so that -Moh-Kwa might know. - -When Young Wolf an’ the Rosebud on their return were a day’s ride from -the Sioux, Moh-Kwa went to the lodge of Coldheart an’ said: - -“Come, great plotter, an’ meet your son an’ his new squaw.” - -An’ Coldheart came because Moh-Kwa took him by his belts an’ ran with -him; for Moh-Kwa was so big an’ strong he could run with a pony an’ its -rider in his mouth. - -Moh-Kwa told Coldheart how the Blackbird gave Dull Knife the black arrow -an’ was shot with all the arrows of five quivers. Coldheart groaned like -the buffalo when he dies. Then Moh-Kwa showed him where Young Wolf -came on with the beautiful Rosebud; and that he was followed by twenty -pack-ponies which carried the presents of Dull Knife for his daughter -an’ his new son. - -“An’ now,” said Moh-Kwa, “you have seen enough; for you have seen that -you have made your foe happy an’ killed your own son. Also, I have -cheated the Catfish people twice; once with the Big Medicine Elk an’ -once with the Lynx, both of whom I gave to the Catfish people an’ took -back. It is true, I have cheated the good Catfish folk who were once my -friends, an’ now they speak hard of me an’ call me a ‘Pawnee,’ the whole -length of the Yellowstone from the Missouri to the Falls. However, Moh -Kwa has something for the Catfish people this time which he will not -take back, an’ by to-morrow’s sun, the river will ring with Moh-Kwa’s -praises.” - -Moh-Kwa carried Coldheart to the Yellowstone, an’ he sang an’ shouted -for all the Catfish people to come. Then Moh-Kwa took Coldheart to -a deep place in the river a long way from the bank. An’ Moh-Kwa held -Coldheart while the Chief of the Catfish got a strong hold, an’ his -squaw--who was four times bigger than the Catfish Chief--got also a -strong hold; an’ then what others of the Catfish people were there took -their holds. When every catfish was ready Moh-Kwa let Coldheart slip -from between his paws, an’ with a swish an’ a swirl, the Catfish people -snatched Coldheart under the water an’ tore him to pieces. For many days -the Yellowstone was bank-full of good words for Moh-Kwa; an’ all the -Catfish people said he was a Sioux an’ no cheat of a Pawnee who gives -only to take back. - -That night in his cavern Moh-Kwa sat by Ish-koo-dah, the Fire, an’ -smoked an’ told the Widow the story, an’ how it all began by Openhand -bringing the Fire back to be his friend when they had quarreled an’ the -Fire had gone out an’ would not return. An’ while Moh-Kwa told the tale -to the Widow, not an owl said a word or even whispered, but blinked in -silence each on his perch; for the Widow seemed lean an’ slim as she lay -by the fire an’ listened; an’ the owls thought it would be foolish to -remind Moh-Kwa of their presence. - -***** - -“Now, do you know,” said the Red Nosed Gentleman, with his head on one -side as one who would be deemed deeply the critic, “these Indian stories -are by no means bad.” Then leaning across to the Old Cattleman, he -asked: “Does our Sioux friend make them up?” - -“Them tales,” said the Old Cattleman, lighting a new cigar, “is most -likely as old as the Yellowstone itse’f. The squaws an’ the old bucks -tell ’em to the children, an’ so they gets passed along the line. -Sioux Sam only repeats what he’s done heard from his mother.” - -“And now,” remarked the Jolly Doctor, addressing the Sour Gentleman, -“what say you? How about that story of the Customs concerning which you -whetted our interest by giving us the name. It is strange, too, that -while my interest is still as strong as ever, the name itself has clean -slipped through the fingers of my memory.” At this the Jolly Doctor -glared about the circle as though in wonder at the phenomenon of an -interest which remained when the reason of it had faded away. - -“I will willingly give you the story,” said the Sour Gentleman. “That -name you search for is ‘The Emperor’s Cigars.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XVI.--THE EMPEROR’S CIGARS. - -It is not the blood which flows at the front, my friends, that is the -worst of war; it is the money corruption that goes on at the rear. -In old Sparta, theft was not theft unless discovered in process of -accomplishment, and those larcenous morals taught of Lycurgus would -seem, on the tails of our own civil war, to have found widest consent -and adoption throughout every department of government. The public hour -reeled with rottenness, and you may be very sure the New York Customs -went as staggeringly corrupt as the rest. - -It is to my own proper shame that I should have fallen to have art or -part or lot in such iniquities. Yet I went into them with open eyes and -hands, and a heart--hungry as a pike’s--for whatever of spoil chance or -skilfully constructed opportunity might place within my reach. My sole -defense, and that now sounds slight and trivial even to my partial ears, -was the one I advanced the other day; my two-ply hatred of government -both for injuries done my region of the South as well as the personal -ruin visited on me when my ill-wishers struck down that enterprise of -steamed tobacco which was making me rich. That is all I may urge in -extenuation, and I concede its meager insufficiency. - -As I’ve said, I obtained an appointment as an inspector of Customs, and -afterward worked side by side, and I might add hand and glove, with our -old friends, Quin and Lorns of the Story of the Smuggled Silks. That -fearsome honest Chief Inspector who so put my heart to a trot had been -dismissed--for some ill-timed integrity, I suppose--sharply in the wake -of that day he frightened me; and when I took up life’s burdens as an -officer of the Customs, my companions, together with myself, were all -black sheep together. Was there by any chance an honest man among us, he -did not mention it, surely; nor did he lapse into act or deed that might -have been evidence to prove him pure. Yes, forsooth! ignorance could -be overlooked, drunkenness condoned, indolence reproved; but for that -officer of our Customs who in those days was found honest, there -shone no ray of hope. He was seized on and cast into outer unofficial -darkness, there to exercise his dangerous probity in private life. There -was no room for such among us; no peace nor safety for the rest while -he remained. Wherefore, we of a proper blackness, were like so many -descendants of Diogenes, forever searching among ourselves to find an -honest man; but with fell purpose when discovered, of his destruction. -We maintained a strictest quarantine against any infection of truth, and -I positively believe, with such success, that it was excluded from our -midst. That honest Chief Inspector was dismissed, I say; Lorns told me -of it before I’d been actively in place an hour, and the news gave me -deepest satisfaction. - -That gentleman who was official head of the coterie of revenue hunters -to which I was assigned was peculiarly the man unusual. His true name, -if I ever heard it, I’ve forgot; among us of the Customs, he was known -as Betelnut Jack. Lorns took me into his presence and made us known to -one another early in my revenue career. I had been told stories of this -man by both Lorns and Quin. They deeply reverenced him for his virtues -of courage and cunning, and the praises of Betelnut Jack were constant -in their mouths. - -Betelnut Jack was at his home in the Bowery. Jack, in years gone by, had -been a hardy member of one of those Volunteer fire companies which in -that hour notably augmented the perils of an urban life. Jack was -a doughty fighter, and with a speaking trump in one hand and a -spanner-wrench in the other, had done deeds of daring whereof one might -still hear the echo. And he became for these strong-hand reasons a tower -of strength in politics; and obtained that eminence in the Customs which -was his when first we met. - -Betelnut Jack received Lorns and myself in his dingy small coop of a -parlor. He was unmarried--a popular theory in accounting for this being -that he’d been crossed in love in his youth. Besides the parlor, Jack’s -establishment contained only one room, a bedroom it was, a shadow larger -than the bed. - -Betelnut Jack himself was wiry and dark, and with a face which, while -showing marks of former wars, shone the seat of kindly good-humor. - -There had been an actor, Chanfrau, who played “Mose, the Fireman.” - Betelnut Jack resembled in dress his Bowery brother of the stage. His -soiled silk hat stood on a dresser. He wore a long skirted coat, a red -shirt, a belt which upheld--in a manner so absent-minded that one feared -for the consequences--his trousers; these latter garments in their -terminations were tucked inside the gaudy tops of calfskin boots; small -and wrinkleless these, and fitting like a glove, with the yellow seams -of the soles each day carefully re-yellowed to the end that they be -admired of men. Betelnut Jack’s dark hair, a shade of gray streaking it -in places, was crisp and wavy; and a long curl, carefully twisted and -oiled, was brought down as low as the angle of his jaw just forward of -each ear. - -“Be honest, young man!” said Betelnut Jack, at the close of a lecture -concerning my duties; “be honest! But if you must take wrong money, take -enough each time to pay for the loss of your job. Do you see this?” And -Jack’s hand fell on a large morocco-bound copy of “Josephus” which lay -on his table. “Well, Lorns will tell you what stories I look for in -that.” - -And Lorns, as we came away, told me. Once a week it was the practice of -each inspector to split off twenty per cent, of his pillage. He would, -thus organized, pay a visit to his chief, the worthy Betel-nut Jack. As -they gossiped, Jack’s ever-ready hospitality would cause him to retire -for a moment to the bedroom in search of a demijohn of personal whisky. -While alone in the parlor, the visiting inspector would place his -contribution between the leaves of “Josephus,” and thereby the -humiliating, if not dangerous, passage of money from hand to hand was -missed. - -There existed but one further trait of caretaking forethought belonging -with the worthy Betelnut Jack. It would have come better had others -of that crooked clique of customs copied Betelnut Jack in this last -cautious characteristic. Justice is a tortoise, while rascality’s a -hare; yet justice though shod with lead wins ever the race at last. -Betelnut Jack knew this; and while getting darkly rich with the others, -he was always ready for the fall. While his comrades drove fast horses, -or budded brown-stone fronts, or affected extravagant opera and supper -afterward with those painted lilies, in whose society they delighted, -Betelnut Jack clung to his old rude Bowery nest of sticks and straws -and mud, and lived on without a change his Bowery life. He suffered -no improvements whether of habit or of habitat, and provoked no -question-asking by any gilded new prosperities of life. - -As fast as Betelnut Jack got money, he bought United States bonds. With -each new thousand, he got a new bond, and tucked it safely away among -its fellows. These pledges of government he kept packed in a small -hand-bag; this stood at his bed’s head, ready for instant flight with -him. When the downfall did occur, as following sundry years of loot and -customs pillage was the desperate case, Betelnut Jack with the earliest -whisper of peril, stepped into his raiment and his calfskin boots, took -up his satchel of bonds, and with over six hundred thousand dollars of -those securities--enough to cushion and make pleasantly sure the balance -of his days--saw the last of the Bowery, and was out of the country and -into a corner of safety as fast as ship might swim. - -But now you grow impatient; you would hear in more of detail concerning -what went forward behind the curtains of Customs in those later ’60’s. -For myself, I may tell of no great personal exploits. I did not remain -long in revenue service; fear, rather than honesty, forced me to resign; -and throughout that brief period of my office holding, youth and a lack -of talent for practical iniquity prevented my main employment in those -swart transactions which from time to time took place. I was liked, I -was trusted; I knew what went forward and in the end I had my share of -the ill profits; but the plans and, usually, the work came from others -of a more subtile and experienced venality. - -In this affair of The Emperor’s Cigars, the story was this. I call -them The Emperor’s Cigars because they were of a sort and quality made -particularly for the then Imperial ruler of the French. They sold at -retail for one dollar each, were worth, wholesale, seventy dollars a -hundred, and our aggregate harvest of this one operation was, as I now -remember, full sixty thousand dollars. - -My first knowledge was when Lorns told me one evening of the seizure--by -whom of our circle, and on what ship, I’ve now forgotten--of one hundred -thousand cigars. They were in proper boxes, concealed I never knew how, -and captured in the very act of being smuggled and just as they came -onto our wharf. In designating the seizure, and for reasons which I’ve -given before, they were at once dubbed and ever afterwards known among -us as The Emperor’s Cigars. - -These one hundred thousand cigars were taken to the Customs Depot of -confiscated goods. The owners, as was our rule, were frightened with -black pictures of coming prison, and then liberated, never to be seen -of us again. They were glad enough to win freedom without looking once -behind to see what became of their captured property. - -It was one week later when a member of our ring, from poorest tobacco -and by twenty different makers, caused one hundred thousand cigars, -duplicates in size and appearance of those Emperor’s Cigars, to be -manufactured. These cost two and one-half cents each; a conscious -difference, truly! between that and those seventy cents, the wholesale -price of our spoil. Well, The Emperor’s Cigars were removed from their -boxes and their aristocratic places filled by the worthless imitations -we had provided. Then the boxes were again securely closed; and to look -at them no one would suspect the important changes which had taken place -within. - -The Emperor’s Cigars once out of their two thousand boxes were carefully -repacked in certain zinc-lined barrels, and reshipped as “notions” to -Havana to one of our folk who went ahead of the consignment to receive -them. In due course, and in two thousand proper new boxes they again -appeared in the port of New York; this time they paid their honest duty. -Also, they had a proper consignment, came to no interrupting griefs; and -being quickly disposed of, wrought out for us that sixty thousand dollar -betterment of which I’ve spoken. - -As corollary of this particular informality of The Emperor’s Cigars, -there occurred an incident which while grievous to the victims, made no -little fun for us; its relation here may entertain you, and because of -its natural connection with the main story, will come properly enough. -At set intervals, the government held an auction of all confiscated -goods. At these markets to which the public was invited to appear and -bid, the government asserted nothing, guaranteed nothing. In disposing -of such gear as these cigars, no box was opened; no goods displayed. -One saw nothing but the cover, heard nothing but the surmise of an -auctioneer, and thereupon, if impulse urged, bid what he pleased for a -pig in a poke. - -Thus it came to pass that on the occasion when The Emperor’s Cigars -were held aloft for bids, the garrulous lecturer employed in selling the -collected plunder of three confiscation months, took up one of the two -thousand boxes as a sample, and said: - -“I offer for sale a lot of two thousand packages, of which the one I -hold in my hand is a specimen. Each package is supposed to contain fifty -cigars. What am I bid for the lot? What offer do I hear?” - -That was the complete proffer as made by the government; for all that -the bidding was briskly sharp. Those who had come to purchase were there -for bargains not guarantees; moreover, there was the box; and could they -not believe their experience? Each would-be bidder knew by the size -and shape and character of the package that it was made for and should -contain fifty cigars of the Emperor brand. Wherefore no one distrusted; -the question of contents arose to no mind; and competition grew instant -and close. Bid followed bid; five hundred dollars being the mark of -each advance, as the noisy struggle between speculators for the lot’s -ownership proceeded. - -At last those celebrated marketeers, Grove and Filtord, received the -lot--one hundred thousand of The Emperor’s Cigars--for forty-five -thousand dollars. What thoughts may have come to them later, when they -searched their bargain for its merits, I cannot say. Not one word of -inquiry, condemnation or complaint came from Grove and Filtord. Whatever -their discoveries, or whatever their deductions, they maintained a -profound taciturnity. Probably they did not care to court the laughter -of fellow dealers by disclosures of the trap into which they had so -blindly bid their way. Surely, they must in its last chapters have been -aware of the swindle! To have believed in the genuineness of the goods -would have dissipated what remnant of good repute might still have clung -to that last of the Napoleons who was their inventor, and justified the -coming destruction of his throne and the birth of the republic which -arose from its ruins. As I say, however, not one syllable of complaint -came floating back from Grove and Filtord. They took their loss, and -were dumb. - -My own pocket was joyfully gorged with much fat advantage of this -iniquity--for inside we were like whalers, each having a prearranged per -cent, of what oil was made, no one working for himself alone--long prior -to that bidding which so smote on Grove and Filtord. The ring had no -money interest in the confiscation sales; those proceeds went all to -government. We divided the profits of our own disposal of the right true -Emperor’s Cigars on the occasion of their second appearance in port; and -that business was ended and over and division done sundry weeks prior to -the Grove and Filtord disaster. - -That is the story of The Emperor’s Cigars; there came still one little -incident, however, which was doubtless the seed of those apprehensions -which soon drove me to quit the Customs. I had carried his double tithes -to Betelnut Jack. This was no more the work of policy than right. The -substitution of the bogus wares, the reshipment to Cuba of The Emperor’s -Cigars, even the zinc-lined barrels, the repackage and second appearance -and sale of our prizes, were one and all by direction of Betelnut Jack. -He planned the campaign in each least particular. To him was the credit; -and to him came the lion’s share, as, in good sooth! it should if there -be a shadow of that honor among rogues whereof the proverb tells. - -On the evening when I sought Betelnut Jack, we sat and chatted briefly -of work at the wharfs. Not one word, mind you! escaped from either that -might intimate aught of customs immorality. That would have been a gross -breach of the etiquette understood by our flock of customs cormorants. -No; Betelnut Jack and I confined discussion to transactions absolutely -white; no other was so much as hinted at. - -Then came Betelnut Jack’s proposal of his special Willow Run; he retired -in quest of the demijohn; this was my cue to enrich “Josephus,” ready on -the dwarf center table to receive the goods. My present to Betelnut Jack -was five one-hundred-dol-lar bills. - -Somewhat in haste, I took these from my pocket and opened “Josephus” to -lay them between the pages. Any place would do; Betelnut Jack would -know how to discover the rich bookmark. As I parted the book, my eye -was arrested by a sentence. As I’ve asserted heretofore, I’m not -superstitious; yet that casual sentence seemed alive and to spring upon -me from out “Josephus” as a threat: - -“And these men being thieves were destroyed by the King’s laws; and -their people rended their garments, put on sackcloth, and throwing ashes -on their heads went about the streets, crying out.” - -That is what it said; and somehow it made my heart beat quick and little -like a linnet’s heart. I put in my contribution and closed the book. But -the words clung to me like ivy; I couldn’t free myself. In the end, they -haunted me to my resignation; and while I remained long enough to -share in the affair of the German Girl’s Diamonds, and in that of the -Filibusterer, when the hand of discovery fell upon Lorns and Quin, and -others of my one-time comrades, I was far away, facing innocent, if -sometimes dangerous, problems on our western plains. - -“With a profound respect for you,” observed the Jolly Doctor to the -Sour Gentleman when that raconteur had ended, “and disavowing a least -imputation personal to yourself, I must still say that I am amazed by -the corruption which your tale discloses of things beyond our Customs -doors. To be sure, you speak of years ago; and yet you leave one to -wonder if the present be wholly free from taint.” - -“It will be remarkable,” returned the Sour Gentleman, “when any arm of -government is exerted with entire integrity and no purpose save public -good, and every thought of private gain eliminated. The world never -has been so virtuous, nor is it like to become so in your time or mine. -Government and those offices which, like the works of a watch, are made -to constitute it, are the production of politics, and politics, mind -you, is nothing save the collected and harmonised selfishness of men. -The fruit is seldom better than the tree, and when a source is foul the -stream will wear a stain.” Here the Sour Gentleman sighed as though over -the baseness of the human race. - -“While there’s to be no doubt,” broke in the Red Nosed Gentleman, -“concerning the corruption existing in politics and the offices and -office holders bred therefrom, I am free to say that I’ve encountered -as much blackness, and for myself I have been swindled oftener among -merchants plying their reputable commerce of private scales and counters -as in the administration of public affairs.” - -The Red Nosed Gentleman here looked about with a challenging eye as one -who would note if his observation is to meet with contradiction. Finding -none, he relapsed into silence and burgundy. - -“Speakin’ of politics,” said the Old Cattleman, who had listened to the -others as though he found their discourse instructive, “it’s the one -thing I’ve seen mighty little of. The only occasion on which I finds -myse’f immersed in politics is doorin’ the brief sojourn I makes in -Missouri, an’ when in common with all right-thinkin’ gents, I whirls in -for Old Stewart.” - -“Would you mind,” remarked the Jolly Doctor in a manner so amiable it -left one no power to resist, “would you mind giving us a glimpse of that -memorable campaign in which you bore doubtless no inconsiderable part? -We should have time for it, before we retire.” - -“Which the part I bears,” responded the Old Cattleman, “wouldn’t amount -to the snappin’ of a cap. As to tellin’ you-all concernin’ said outburst -of pop’lar enthoosiasm for Old Stewart, I’m plumb willin’ to go as far -as you likes.” Drawing his chair a bit closer to the fire and seeing to -it that a glass of Scotch was within the radius of his reach, the Old -Cattleman began. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII.--THE GREAT STEWART CAMPAIGN. - -As I states, I saveys nothin’ personal of politics. Thar’s mighty -little politics gets brooited about Wolfville, an’ I ain’t none shore -but it’s as well. The camp’s most likely a heap peacefuller as a -com-moonity. Shore, Colonel Sterett discusses politics in that Coyote -paper he conducts; but none of it’s nearer than Washin’ton, an’ it all -seems so plumb dreamy an’ far away that while it’s interestin’, it can’t -be regyarded as replete of the harrowin’ excitement that sedooces a -public from its nacheral rest an’ causes it to set up nights an’ howl. - -Rummagin’ my mem’ry, I never does hear any politics talked local but -once, an’ that’s by Dan Boggs. It’s when the Colonel asks Dan to what -party he adheres in principle--for thar ain’t no real shore-enough -party lurkin’ about in Arizona much, it bein’ a territory that a-way -an’ mighty busy over enterprises more calc’lated to pay--an’ Dan retorts -that he’s hooked up with no outfit none as yet, but stands ready as far -as his sentiments is involved to go buttin’ into the first organization -that’ll cheapen nose-paint, ’liminate splits as a resk in faro-bank, -an’ raise the price of beef. Further than them tenets, Dan allows he -ain’t got no principles. - -Man an’ boy I never witnesses any surplus of politics an’ party strife. -In Tennessee when I’m a child every decent gent has been brought up a -Andy Jackson man, an’ so continyoos long after that heroic captain is -petered. As you-all can imagine, politics onder sech conditions goes -all one way like the currents of the Cumberland. Thar’s no bicker, no -strife, simply a vast Andy Jackson yooniformity. - -The few years I puts in about Arkansaw ain’t much different. Leastwise -we-all don’t have issues; an’ what contests does arise is gen’rally -personal an’ of the kind where two gents enjoys a j’int debate with -their bowies or shows each other how wrong they be with a gun. An’ while -politics of the variety I deescribes is thrillin’, your caution rather -than your intellects gets appealed to, while feuds is more apt to be -their frootes than any draw-in’ of reg’lar party lines. Wherefore I -may say it’s only doorin’ the one year I abides in Missouri when I -experiences troo politics played with issues, candidates, mass-meetin’s -an’ barbecues. - -For myse’f, my part is not spectacyoolar, bein’ I’m new an’ raw an’ -young; but I looks on with relish, an’ while I don’t cut no hercoolean -figger in the riot, I shore saveys as much about what’s goin’ on as the -best posted gent between the Ozarks an’ the Iowa line. - -What you-all might consider as the better element is painted up to beat -Old Stewart who’s out sloshin’ about demandin’ re-election to Jeff City -for a second term. The better element says Old Stewart drinks. An’ this -accoosation is doubtless troo a whole lot, for I’m witness myse’f to the -following colloquy which takes place between Old Stewart an’ a jack-laig -doctor he crosses up with in St. Joe. Old Stewart’s jest come forth from -the tavern, an’ bein’ on a joobilee the evenin’ before, is lookin’ an’ -mighty likely feelin’ some seedy. - -“Doc,” says Old Stewart, openin’ his mouth as wide as a young raven, an’ -then shettin’ it ag’in so’s to continyoo his remarks, “Doc, I wish you’d -peer into this funnel of mine.” - -Then he opens his mouth ag’in in the same egree-gious way, while the -scientist addressed scouts about tharin with his eyes, plenty owley. At -last the Doc shows symptoms of bein’ ready to report. - -“Which I don’t note nothin’ onusual, Gov’nor, about that mouth,” says -the Doc, “except it’s a heap voloominous.” - -“Don’t you discern no signs or signal smokes of any foreign bodies?” - says Old Stewart, a bit pettish, same as if he can’t onderstand sech -blindness. - -“None whatever!” observes the Doc. - -“It’s shore strange,” retorts Old Stewart, still in his complainin’ -tones; “thar’s two hundred niggers, a brick house an’ a thousand acres -of bottom land gone down that throat, an’ I sort o’ reckons some traces -of ’em would show.” - -That’s the trouble with Old Stewart from the immacyoolate standpint of -the better classes; they says he overdrinks. But while it’s convincin’ -to sooperior folks an’ ones who’s goin’ to church an’ makin’ a speshulty -of it, it don’t sep’rate Old Stewart from the warm affections of the -rooder masses--the catfish an’ quinine aristocracy that dwells along the -Missouri; they’re out for him to the last sport. - -“Suppose the old Gov’nor does drink,” says one, “what difference does -that make? Now, if he’s goin’ to try sootes in co’t, or assoome the -pressure as a preacher, thar’d be something in the bluff. But it don’t -cut no figger whether a gov’nor is sober or no. All he has to do is -pardon convicts an’ make notaries public, an’ no gent can absorb licker -s’fficient to incapac’tate him for sech trivial dooties.” - -One of the argyments they uses ag’in Old Stewart is about a hawg-thief -he pardons. Old Stewart is headin’ up for the state house one mornin’, -when he caroms on a passel of felons in striped clothes who’s pesterin’ -about the grounds, tittivatin’ up the scenery. Old Stewart pauses in -front of one of ’em. - -“What be you-all in the pen’tentiary for?” says Old Stewart, an’ he’s -profoundly solemn. - -Tharupon the felon trails out on a yarn about how he’s a innocent an’ -oppressed person. He’s that honest an’ upright--hear him relate the -tale--that you’d feel like apol’gizin’. Old Stewart listens to this -victim of intrigues an’ outrages ontil he’s through; then he goes -romancin’ along to the next. Thar’s five wronged gents in that striped -outfit, five who’s as free from moral taint or stain of crime as Dave -Tutt’s infant son, Enright Peets Tutt. - -But the sixth is different. He admits he’s a miscreant an’ has done -stole a hawg. - -“However did you steal it, you scoundrel?” demands Old Stewart. - -“I’m outer meat,” says the crim’nal, “an’ a band of pigs comes pi -rootin’ about, an’ I nacherally takes my rifle an’ downs one.” - -“Was it a valyooable hawg?” - -“You-all can gamble it ain’t no runt,” retorts the crim’nal. “I shore -ain’t pickin’ out the worst, an’ I’m as good a jedge of hawgs as ever -eats corn pone an’ cracklin’.” - -At this Old Stewart falls into a foamin’ rage an’ turns on the two -gyards who’s soopervisin’ the captives. - -“Whatever do you-all mean,” he roars, “bringin’ this common an’ -confessed hawg-thief out yere with these five honest men? Don’t you know -he’ll corrupt ’em?” - -Tharupon Old Stewart reepairs to his rooms in the state house an’ -pardons the hawg convict with the utmost fury. - -“An’ now, pull your freight,” says Old Stewart, to the crim’nal. “If -you’re in Jeff City twenty-four hours from now I’ll have you shot at -sunrise. The idee of compellin’ five spotless gents to con-tinyoo in -daily companionship with a low hawg-thief! I pardons you, not because -you merits mercy, but to preserve the morals of our prison.” - -The better element concloods they’ll take advantage of Old Stewart’s -willin’ness for rum an’ make a example of him before the multitoode. -They decides they’ll construct the example at a monstrous meetin’ that’s -schedyooled for Hannibal, where Old Stewart an’ his opponent--who stands -for the better element mighty excellent, seein’ he’s worth about a -million dollars with a home-camp in St. Looey, an’ never a idee above -dollars an’ cents--is programmed for one of these yere j’int debates, -frequent in the politics of that era. The conspiracy is the more -necessary as Old Stewart, mental, is so much swifter than the better -element’s candidate, that he goes by him like a antelope. Only two -days prior at the town of Fulton, Old Stewart comes after the better -element’s candidate an’ gets enough of his hide, oratorical, to make a -saddle-cover. The better element, alarmed for their gent, resolves -on measures in Hannibal that’s calc’lated to redooce Old Stewart to -a shorething. They don’t aim to allow him to wallop their gent at the -Hannibal meetin’ like he does in old Callaway. With that, they confides -to a trio of Hannibal’s sturdiest sots--all of ’em acquaintances an’ -pards of Old Stewart--the sacred task of gettin’ that statesman too -drunk to orate. - -This yere Hannibal barbecue, whereat Old Stewart’s goin’ to hold a -open-air discussion with his aristocratic opponent, is set down for -one in the afternoon. The three who’s to throw Old Stewart with copious -libations of strong drink, hunts that earnest person out as early as -sun-up at the tavern. They invites him into the bar-room an’ bids the -bar-keep set forth his nourishment. - -Gents, it works like a charm! All the mornin’, Old Stewart swings an’ -rattles with the plotters an’ goes drink for drink with ’em, holdin’ -nothin’ back. - -For all that the plot falls down. When it’s come the hour for Old -Stewart to resort to the barbecue an’ assoome his share in the -exercises, two of the Hannibal delegation is spread out cold an’ -he’pless in a r’ar room, while Old Stewart is he’pin’ the third--a gent -of whom he’s partic’lar fond--upstairs to Old Stewart’s room, where he -lays him safe an’ serene on the blankets. Then Old Stewart takes another -drink by himse’f, an’ j’ins his brave adherents at the picnic grounds. -Old Stewart is never more loocid, an’ ag’in he peels the pelt from the -better element’s candidate, an’ does it with graceful ease. - -Old Stewart, however, is regyarded as in peril of defeat. He’s mighty -weak in the big towns where the better element is entrenched, an’ -churches grow as thick as blackberries. Even throughout the rooral -regions, wherever a meetin’ house pokes up its spire, it’s onderstood -that Old Stewart’s in a heap of danger. - -It ain’t that Old Stewart is sech a apostle of nose-paint neither; it -ain’t whiskey that’s goin’ to kill him off at the ballot box. It’s the -fact that the better element’s candidate--besides bein’ rich, which is -allers a mark of virchoo to a troo believer--is a church member, an’ -belongs to a congregation where he passes the plate, an’ stands high up -in the papers. This makes the better element’s gent a heap pop’lar with -church folk, while pore Old Stewart, who’s a hopeless sinner, don’t -stand no show. - -This grows so manifest that even Old Stewart’s most locoed supporters -concedes that he’s gone; an’ money is offered at three to one that the -better element’s entry will go over Old Stewart like a Joone rise over a -tow-head. Old Stewart hears these yere misgivin’s an’ bids his folks be -of good cheer. - -“I’ll fix that,” says Old Stewart. “By election day, my learned opponent -will be in sech disrepoote with every church in Missouri he won’t be -able to get dost enough to one of ’em to give it a ripe peach.” Old -Stewart onpouches a roll which musters fifteen hundred dollars. “That’s -mighty little; but it’ll do the trick.” - -Old Stewart’s folks is mystified; they can’t make out how he’s goin’ to -round up the congregations with so slim a workin’ cap’tal. But they has -faith in their chief; an’ his word goes for all they’ve got. When he -lets on he’ll have the churches arrayed ag’inst the foe, his warriors -takes heart of grace an’ jumps into the collar an’ pulls like lions -refreshed. - -It’s the fourth Sunday before election when Old Stewart, by speshul an’ -trusted friends presents five hundred dollars each to a church in St. -Looey, an’ another in St. Joe, an’ still another in Hannibal; said gifts -bein’ in the name an’ with the compliments of his opponent an’ that -gent’s best wishes for the Christian cause. - -Thar’s not a doubt raised; each church believes it-se’f favored -five hundred dollars’ worth from the kindly hand of the millionaire -candidate, an’ the three pastors sits pleasantly down an’ writes -that amazed sport a letter of thanks for his moonificence. He don’t -onderstand it none; but he decides it’s wise to accept this accidental -pop’larity, an’ he waxes guileful an’ writes back an’ says that while he -don’t clearly onderstand, an’ no thanks is his doo, he’s tickled to hear -he’s well bethought of by the good Christians of St. Looey, St. Joe an’ -Hannibal, as expressed in them missives. The better element’s candidate -congratulates himse’f on his good luck, stands pat, an’ accepts his -onexpected wreaths. That’s jest what Old Stewart, who is as cunnin’ as a -fox, is aimin’ at. - -In two days the renown of them five-hundred-dollar gifts goes over the -state like a cat over a back roof. In four days every church in the -state hears of these largesses. An’ bein’ plumb alert financial, as -churches ever is, each sacred outfit writes on to the better element’s -candidate an’ desires five hundred dollars of that onfortunate -publicist. He gets sixty thousand letters in one week an’ each calls for -five hundred. - -Gents, thar’s no more to be said; the better element’s candidate is up -ag’inst it. He can’t yield to the fiscal demands, an’ it’s too late to -deny the gifts. Whereupon the other churches resents the favoritism -he’s displayed about the three in St. Looey, St. Joe an’ Hannibal. -They regyards him as a hoss-thief for not rememberin’ them while his -weaselskin is in his hand, an’ on election day they comes down on him -like a pan of milk from a top shelf! You hear me, they shorely blots -that onhap-py candidate off the face of the earth, an’ Old Stewart is -Gov’nor ag’in. - -On the fourth evening of our companionship about the tavern fire, it was -the Red Nosed Gentleman who took the lead with a story. - -“You spoke,” said the Red Nosed Gentleman, addressing the Jolly Doctor, -“of having been told by a friend a story you gave us. Not long ago I was -in the audience while an old actor recounted how he once went to the aid -of an individual named Connelly. It was not a bad story, I thought; and -if you like, I’ll tell it to-night. The gray Thespian called his -adventure The Rescue of Connelly, and these were his words as he related -it. We were about a table in Browne’s chop house when he told it.” - - - - -CHAPTER XVIII.--THE RESCUE OF CONNELLY. - -Equipped as we are for the conquest of comfort with fresh pipes, -full mugs, and the flavor of a best of suppers still extant within our -mouths, it may be an impertinence for one to moralize. And yet, as I go -forward to this incident, I will premise that, in every least exigency -of life, ill begets ill, while good springs from good and follows the -doer with a profit. Such has been my belief; such, indeed, has been my -unbroken experience; and the misfortunes of Connelly, and my relief of -them, small matters in themselves, are in proof of what I say. - -At sixty I look back with envy on that decade which followed my issuing -forth from Trinity College, when, hopeless, careless, purposeless beyond -the moment, I wandered the face of the earth and fed or starved at the -hands of chance-born opportunity. I was up or down or rich or poor, and, -with an existence which ran from wine to ditch water and back again -to wine, was happy. I recall how in those days of checkered fortune, -wherein there came a proportion of one hour of shadow to one moment of -sun, I was wont to think on riches and their possession. I would say to -myself: “And should it so befall that I make my millions, I’ll have -none about me but broken folk: I’ll refuse to so much as permit the -acquaintance of a rich man.” I’ve been ever deeply controlled by the -sentiment therein expressed. Sure it is, I’ve been incapable of the -example of the Levite, and could never keep to the other side of the way -when distress appealed. - -My youth was wild, and staid folk called it “vicious.” I squandered my -fortune; melted it, as August melteth ice, while still at Trinity. It -was my misfortune to reach my majority before I reached my graduation, -and those two college years which ensued after I might legally write -myself “man” and the wild days that filled them up, brought me to -face the world with no more shillings than might take me to Australia. -However, they were gay though graceless times--those college years; and -Dublin, from Smock Alley to Sackville Street, may still remember them. - -Those ten years after quitting Dublin were years of hit or miss. I did -everything but preach or steal. Yes, I even fought three prize-fights; -and there were warped, distorted moments when, bloody but victorious, I -believed it better to be a fighter than to be a bishop. - -But for the main, I drifted to the theaters and lived by the drama. -Doubtless I was a wretched actor--albeit I felt myself a Kemble--but the -stage was so far good to me it finally brought me--as an underling of -much inconsequence--to the fair city of New York. I did but little for -the drama, but it did much for me; it led me to America. And now that -I’ve come to New York in this story, I’ve come to Connelly. - -Mayhap I had been in New York three weeks. It was a chill night in -April, and I was going down Broadway and thinking on bed; for, having -done nothing all day save run about, I was very tired. It was under -the lamps at the corner of Twenty-ninth Street, that I first beheld -Connelly. Thin of face as of coat, he stood shivering in the keen air. -There was something so beaten in the pose of the sorrowful figure that I -was brought to a full stop. - -As strange to the land and its courtesies as I was to Connelly, I -hesitated for a moment to speak. I was loth to be looked upon as one -who, from a motive of curiosity, would insult another in bad luck. But I -took courage from my virtue and at last made bold to accost him: - -“Why do you stand shivering here?” I said. “Why don’t you go home?” - -“It’s a boarding-house,” said Connelly. “I owe the old lady thirty -dollars and if I go back she’ll hold me prisoner for it.” - -Then he told me his name, and that the trouble with him came from too -much rum. Connelly had a Dublin accent and it won on me; moreover, I -also had had troubles traceable to rum. - -“Come home,” I said; “you can’t stand here all night. Come home; I’ll go -with you and have a talk with the old lady myself. Perhaps I’ll find a -way to soften her or make her see reason.” - -“She’s incapable of seeing reason,” said Connelly; “incapable of seeing -anything save money. She understands nothing but gold. She’ll hold me -captive a week; then if I don’t pay, she’ll have me arrested. You don’t -know the ‘old lady:’ she’s a demon unless she’s paid.” - -However, I led Connelly over to Sixth Avenue and restored his optimism -with strong drink. Then I bought a quart of whiskey; thus sustained, -Connelly summoned courage and together we sought his quarters. In his -little room we sat all night, discussing the whiskey and Dublin and -Connelly’s hard fate. - -With the morning I was presented to the “old lady,”--an honor to make -one quake. When I reviewed her acrid features, I knew that Connelly -was right. Nothing could move that stony heart but money. I put off, -therefore, those gallantries and blandishments I might otherwise have -introduced, and came at once to the question. - -“How much does Connelly owe?” - -“Thirty dollars!” - -The words were emphasized with a click of teeth that would have done -credit to a rat-trap. - -There was a baleful gleam, too, in the jadestone eye. Clearly, Connelly -had read the signs aright. He might regard himself as a prisoner until -the “old lady” was paid. - -That iron landlady went away to her duties and I counted my fortunes. -They assembled but twenty-four dollars--a slim force and not one -wherewith to storm the citadel of Connelly’s troubles. How should I -augment my capital? I knew of but one quick method and that flowed with -risks--it was the races. - -I turned naturally to the horses, for it was those continuous efforts -which I put forth to name winners that had so dissipated my patrimony. -About the time I might have selected a victor now and then, my wealth -was departed away. It is always thus. Sinister yet satirical paradox! -the best judges of racing have ever the least money! - -There was no new way open to me, however, in this instance of Connelly. -I must pay his debt that day if I would redeem him from this Bastile of -a boarding-house, and the races were my single chance. I explained to -Connelly; obtained him the consolation of a second quart wherewith to -cure the sharper cares of his bondage, and started for the race-course. -I knew nothing of American horses and less of American tracks, but I -held not back for that. In the transaction of a work of virtue I would -trust to lucky stars. - -As I approached the race-course gates, my eyes were pleased with the -vision of that excellent pugilist, Joe Coburn. I had known this unworthy -in Melbourne; he had graced the ringside on those bustling occasions -when I pulled shirt over head and held up my hands for the stakes and -the honor of old Ireland. Grown too fat for fisticuffs, Coburn struggled -with the races for his daily bread. As he was very wise of horses, and -likewise very crooked, I bethought me that Coburn’s advice might do me -good. If there were a trap set, Coburn should know; and he might aid a -former fellow-gladiator to have advantage thereof and show the road to -riches. - -Are races ever crooked? Man! I whiles wonder at the age’s ignorance! -Crooked? Indubitably crooked. There was never rascal like your rascal -of sport; there’s that in the word to disintegrate integrity. I make -no doubt it was thus in every time and clime and that even the Olympian -games themselves were honeycombed with fraud, and the sacred Altis -wherein they were celebrated a mere hotbed of robbery. However, to -regather with the doubtful though sapient Coburn. - -“Who’s to win the first race?” I asked. - -“Play Blue Bells!” and Coburn looked at me hard and as one who held -mysterious knowledge. - -Blue Bells!--I put a cautious five-dollar piece on Blue Bells. I saw -her at the start. Vilest of beasts, she never finished--never met my -eye again. I asked someone what had become of her. He said that, taking -advantage of sundry missing boards over on the back-stretch, Blue Bells -had bolted and gone out through the fence. This may have been fact or -it may have been sarcasmal fiction; the truth important is, I lost my -wager. - -Still true to a first impression--though I confess to confidence a trifle -shaken--I again sought Coburn. - -“That was a great tip you gave me!” I said. “That suggestion of Blue -Bells was a marvel! What do you pick for the next?” - -“Get Tambourine!” retorted Coburn. “It’s a sure thing.” - -Another five I placed on Tambourine; not without misgivings. But what -might I do better? My judgment was worthless where I did not know one -horse from another. I might as well take Coburn’s advice; the more since -he went often wrong and might name a winner by mistake. Five, therefore, -on Tambourine; and when he started my hopes and Connelly--whose -consoling quart must be a pint by now--went with him. - -At the worst I may so far compliment Tambourine as to say that I saw him -again. He finished far in the rear; but at least he had the honesty to -go around the course. Yet it was five dollars lost. When Tambourine went -back to his stable, my capital was reduced by half, and Connelly and -liberty as far apart as when we started. - -Following the disaster of Tambourine I sought no more the Coburn. -Clearly it was not that philosopher’s afternoon for naming winners. Or -if it were, he was keeping their names a secret. - -Thus ruminating, I sat reading the race card, when of a blinking -sudden my eye was caught by the words “Bill Breen.” The title seemed a -suggestion. Bill Breen had been my roommate--my best friend in the days -of old Trinity. I pondered the coincidence. - -“If this Bill Breen,” I reflected, “is half as fast as my Bill Breen, -he’s fit to carry Cæsar and his fortunes.” - -The more I considered, the more I was impressed. It was like sinking in -a quicksand. In the end I was caught. I waxed reckless and placed ten -dollars--fairly my residue of riches--on Bill Breen in one of those -old-fashioned French Mutual pools common of that hour; having done so, I -crept away to a lonesome seat in the grandstand and trembled. It was now -or never, and Bill Breen would race freighted with the fate of Connelly. - -About two seats to my right, and with no one between, sat a round, -bloated body of a man. He looked so much like a pig that, had he been -put in a sty, you would have had nothing save the fact that he wore a -hat to distinguish him from the other inmates. And yet I could tell by -the mien of him, and his airs of lofty isolation and superiority, that -he knew all about a horse--knew so much more than common folk that he -despised them and withdrew from their society. It was like tempting -the skies to speak to him, so wrapped was he in the dignity of his -vast knowledge, but my quaking solicitude over Bill Breen and the awful -stakes he ran for in poor Connelly’s evil case, emboldened me. With a -look, deprecatory at once and apologetic, I turned to this oracle: - -“Do you know a horse named Bill Breen?” I asked. - -“I do,” he replied coldly. Then ungrammatically: “That’s him walking -down the track to the scales for the ‘jock’ to weigh in,” and he pointed -to a greyhound-shaped chestnut. - -“Can he race?” I said, with a gingerly air of merest curiosity. - -“He can race, but he won’t,” and the swinish man twined the huge gold -chain about his right fore-hoof. “I lost fifty dollars on him Choosday. -The horse can race, but he won’t; he’s crazy.” - -“He looks well,” I observed timidly. - -“Sure! he looks well,” assented the swinish one; “but never mind his -looks; he won’t win.” - -Then came the start and the horses got away on the first trial. They -went off in a bunch, and it gave me some color of satisfaction to note -Bill Breen well to the front. - -“He has a good start,” I ventured. - -“Hang the start!” derided the swinish one. - -“He won’t win, I tell you; he’ll go and jump over the fence and never -come back.” - -As the horses went from the quarter to the half mile post, Bill Breen, -running easily, was strongly in the lead and increasing. My blood began -to tingle. - -“He’s ahead at the half mile.” - -“And what of it?” retorted the swinish one, disgustedly. “Now keep your -eye on him. In ten seconds he’ll fly up in the air and stay there. He -won’t win; the horse is crazy.” - -As the field swung into the homestretch and each jockey picked his route -for the run to the wire, Bill Breen was going like a bird, twenty yards -to the good if a foot. The swinish one placed the heavy member that had -been caressing the watch-chain on my shoulder. He did not wait for any -comment from me. - -“Sit still,” he howled; “sit still. He won’t win. If he can’t lose any -other way, he’ll stop back beyant on the stretch and bite the boy off -his back. That’s what he’ll do; he’ll bite the jockey off his back.” - -To this last assurance, delivered with a roar, I made no answer. The -horses were coming like a whirlwind; riders lashing, nostrils straining. -The roll of the hoofs put my heart to a sympathetic gallop. I could not -have said a word if I had tried. With the grandstand in a tumult, the -horses flashed under the wire, Bill Breen winner with a flourish by a -dozen lengths. - -Connelly was saved. - -As the horses were being dismissed, and “Bill Breen” was hung from the -judges’ stand as “first,” the swinish one contemplated me gravely and in -silence. - -“Have you a ticket on him?” - -“I have,” I replied. - -“Then you’ll win a million dollars.” This with a toss as he arose to go. -“You’ll win a million dollars. You’re the only fool who has.” - -It’s like the stories you read. The swinish one was so nearly correct -in his last remark that I found but two tickets besides my own on Bill -Breen. It has the ring of fable, but I was richer by eleven hundred and -thirty-two dollars when that race was over. Blue Bells and Tambourine -were forgotten; Bill Breen had redeemed the day! It was pleasant when -I had cashed my ticket to observe me go about recovering the lost -Connelly. - -“Now, there,” cried the Jolly Doctor, “there is a story which tells of -a joy your rich man never knows--the joy of being rescued from a money -difficulty.” - -“And do you think a rich man is for that unlucky?” asked the Sour -Gentleman. - -“Verily, do I,” returned the Jolly Doctor, earnestly. “I can conceive -of nothing more dreary than endless riches--the wealth that is by the -cradle--that from birth to death is as easy to one’s hand as water. How -should he know the sweet who has not known the bitter? Man! the thorn is -ever the charm of the rose.” - -It was discovered in the chat which followed the Red Nosed Gentleman’s -tale that Sioux Sam might properly be regarded as the one who should -next take up the burden of the company’s entertainment. It stood a -gratifying characteristic of our comrade from the Yellowstone that he -was not once found to dispute the common wish. He never proffered a -story; but he promptly told one when asked to do so. He was taciturn, -but he was no less ready for that, and the moment his name was called he -proceeded with the fable of “Moh-Kwa and the Three Gifts.” - - - - -CHAPTER XIX.--MOH-KWA AND THE THREE GIFTS. - -This is in the long time ago when the sun is younger an’ not so big -an’ hot as now, an’ Kwa-Sind, the Strong Man, is a chief of the Upper -Yellowstone Sioux. It is on a day in the Moon-of-the-first-frost an’ -Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, is gathering black-berries an’ filling his -mouth. As Moh-Kwa pulls the bush towards him, he pierces his paw with -a great thorn so that it makes him howl an’ shout, for much is his rage -an’ pain. Moh-Kwa cannot get the great thorn out; because Moh-Kwa’s -claws while sharp an’ strong are not fingers to pull out a thorn; an’ -the more Moh-Kwa bites his paw to get at the thorn, the further he -pushes it in. At last Moh-Kwa sits growling an’ looking at the thorn an’ -wondering what he is to do. - -[Illustration: 0295] - -While Moh-Kwa is wondering an’ growling, there comes walking Shaw-shaw, -the Swallow, who is a young man of the Sioux. The Swallow has a good -heart; but his spirit is light an’ his nature as easily blown about -on each new wind as a dead leaf. So the Sioux have no respect for the -Swallow but laugh when he comes among them, an’ some even call him -Shau-goh-dah-wah, the Coward, for they do not look close, an’ mistake -lightness for fear. - -When the Swallow came near, Moh-Kwa, still growling, held forth his paw -an’ showed the Swallow how the thorn was buried in the big pad so that -he could not bite it out an’ only made it go deeper. An’ with that the -Swallow, who had a good heart, took Moh-Kwa’s big paw between his knees -an’ pulled out the great thorn; for the Swallow had fingers an’ not -claws like Moh-Kwa, an’ the Swallow’s fingers were deft an’ nimble to do -any desired deed. - -When Moh-Kwa felt the relief of that great thorn out of his paw, he was -grateful to the Swallow an’ thought to do him a favor. - -“You are laughed at,” said Moh-Kwa to the Swallow, “because your spirit -is light as dead leaves an’ too much blown about like a tumbleweed -wasting its seeds in foolish travelings to go nowhere for no purpose -so that only it goes. Your heart is good, but your work is of no -consequence, an’ your name will win no respect; an’ with years you -will be hated since you will do no great deeds. Already men call -you Shau-goh-dah-wah, the Coward. I am Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear of the -Yellowstone, an’ I would do you a favor for taking my paw an’ the thorn -apart. But I cannot change your nature; only Pau-guk, the Death, can do -that; an’ no man may touch Pau-guk an’ live. Yet for a favor I will give -you three gifts, which if you keep safe will make you rich an’ strong -an’ happy; an’ all men will love you an’ no longer think to call you -Shau-goh-dah-wah, the Coward.” - -Moh-Kwa when he had ended this long talk, licked his paw where had been -the great thorn, an’ now that the smart was gone an’ he could put his -foot to the ground an’ not howl, he took the Swallow an’ carried him to -his house in the rocks. An’ Moh-Kwa gave the Swallow a knife, a necklace -of bear-claws, an’ a buffalo robe. - -“While you carry the knife,” said Moh-Kwa, “all men will respect an’ -fear you an’ the squaws will cherish you in their hearts. While you wear -the bear-claws, you will be brave an’ strong, an’ whatever you want you -will get. As for the skin of the buffalo, it is big medicine, an’ if you -sit upon it an’ wish, it will carry you wherever you ask to go.” - -Besides the knife, the bear-claws an’ the big medicine robe, Moh-Kwa -gave the Swallow the thorn he had pulled from his foot, telling him -to sew it in his moccasin, an’ when he was in trouble it would bring -Moh-Kwa to him to be a help. Also, Moh-Kwa warned the Swallow to beware -of a cunning squaw. - -“For,” said Moh-Kwa, “your nature is light like dead leaves, an’ such as -you seek ever to be a fool about a cunning squaw.” - -When the Swallow came again among the Sioux he wore the knife an’ the -bear-claws that Moh-Kwa had given him; an’ in his lodge he spread the -big medicine robe. An’ because of the knife an’ the bear-claws, the -warriors respected an’ feared him, an’ the squaws loved him in their -hearts an’ followed where he went with their eyes. Also, when he wanted -anything, the Swallow ever got it; an’ as he was swift an’ ready to want -things, the Swallow grew quickly rich among the Sioux, an’ his lodge -was full of robes an’ furs an’ weapons an’ new dresses of skins an’ -feathers, while more than fifty ponies ate the grass about it. - -Now, this made Kwa-Sind, the Strong Man, angry in his soul’s soul; for -Kwa-Sind was a mighty Sioux, an’ had killed a Pawnee for each of his -fingers, an’ a Blackfoot an’ a Crow for each of his toes, an’ it -made his breast sore to see the Swallow, who had been also called -Shau-goh-dah-wah, the Coward, thought higher among the Sioux an’ be a -richer man than himself. Yet Kwa-Sind was afraid to kill the Swallow -lest the Sioux who now sung the Swallow’s praises should rise against -him for revenge. - -Kwa-Sind told his hate to Wah-bee-noh, who was a medicine man an’ -juggler, an’ agreed that he would give Wah-bee-noh twenty ponies to make -the Swallow again as he was so that the Sioux would laugh at him an’ -call him Shau-goh-dah-wah, the Coward. - -Wah-bee-noh, the medicine man, was glad to hear the offer of Kwa-Sind, -for he was a miser an’ thought only how he might add another pony to his -herd. Wah-bee-noh told Kwa-Sind he would surely do as he asked, an’ that -the Swallow within three moons would be despised among all the Sioux. - -Wah-bee-noh went to his lodge an’ made his strongest medicine an’ called -Jee-bi, the Spirit. An’ Jee-bi, the Spirit, told Wah-bee-noh of the -Swallow’s knife an’ bear-claws an’ the medicine robe. - -An’ now Wah-bee-noh made a plan an’ gave it to his daughter who was -called Oh-pee-chee, the Robin, to carry out; for the Robin was full of -craft an’ cunning, an’ moreover, beautiful among the young girls of the -Sioux. - -The Robin dressed herself until she was like the red bird; an’ then she -walked up an’ down in front of the lodge of the Swallow. An’ when the -Swallow saw her, his nature which was light as dead leaves at once -became drawn to the Robin, an’ the Swallow laughed an’ made a place by -his side for the Robin to sit down. With that the Robin came an’ sat by -his side; an’ after a little she sang to him Ewah-yeah, the Sleep-song, -an’ the Swallow was overcome; his eyes closed an’ slumber settled down -upon him like a night-fog. - -Then the Robin stole the knife from its sheath an’ the bear-claws from -about the neck of the Swallow; but the medicine robe the Robin could not -get because the Swallow was asleep upon it, an’ if she pulled it from -beneath him he would wake up. - -The Robin took the knife an’ the bear-claws an’ carried them to -Wah-bee-noh, her father, who got twelve ponies from Kwa-Sind for them -an’ added the ponies to his herd. An’ the heart of Wah-bee-noh danced -the miser’s dance of gain in his bosom from mere gladness; an’ because -he would have eight more ponies from Kwa-Sind, he sent the Robin back to -steal the medicine robe when the Swallow should wake up. - -The Robin went back, an’ finding the Swallow still asleep on the -medicine robe, lay down by his side; an’ soon she too fell asleep, for -the Robin was a very tired squaw since to be cunning an’ full of craft -is hard work an’ soon wearies one. - -When the Swallow woke up he missed his knife an’ bear-claws. Also, he -remembered that Moh-Kwa had warned him for the lightness of his spirit -to beware of a cunning squaw. When these thoughts came to the Swallow, -an’ seeing the Robin still sleeping by his side, he knew well that she -had stolen his knife an’ bear-claws. - -Now, the Swallow fell into a great anger an’ thought an’ thought what -he should do to make the Robin return the knife an’ bear-claws she had -stolen. Without them the Sioux would laugh at him an’ despise him as -before, an’ many would again call him Shau-goh-dah-wah, the Coward, an’ -the name bit into the Swallow’s heart like a rattlesnake an’ poisoned it -with much grief. - -While the Swallow thought an’ the Robin still lay sleeping, a plan came -to him; an’ with that, the Swallow seeing he was with the Robin lying -on the medicine robe, sat up an’ wished that both himself an’ the Robin -were in a far land of rocks an’ sand where a great pack of wolves lived. - -Like the flash an’ the flight of an arrow, the Swallow with the Robin -still asleep by his side, an’ with the medicine robe still beneath them -on the ground, found himself in a desolate land of rocks an’ sands, an’ -all about him came a band of wolves who yelped an’ showed their teeth -with the hunger that gnawed their flanks. - -Because the wolves yelped, the Robin waked up; an’ when she saw their -white teeth shining with hunger she fell down from a big fear an’ cried -an’ twisted one hand with the other, thinking Pau-guk, the Death, was on -his way to get her. The Robin wept an’ turned to the Swallow an’ begged -him to put her back before the lodge of Wah-bee-noh, her father. - -But the Swallow, with the anger of him who is robbed, spoke hard words -out of his mouth. - -“Give me back the knife an’ the bear-claws you have stolen. You are a -bad squaw, full of cunning an’ very crafty; but here I shall keep you -an’ feed you--legs an’ arms an’ head an’ body--to my wolf-friends -who yelp an’ show their teeth out yonder, unless I have my knife an’ -bear-claws again.” - -This brought more fear on the Robin, an’ she felt that the Swallow’s -words were as a shout for Pau-guk, the Death, to make haste an’ claim -her; yet her cunning was not stampeded but stood firm in her heart. - -The Robin said that the Swallow must give her time to grow calm an’ -then she would find the knife an’ bear-claws for him. While the Swallow -waited, the Robin still wept an’ sobbed for fear of the white teeth of -the wolves who stood in a circle about them. But little by little, the -crafty Robin turned her sobs softly into Ewah-yeah, the Sleep-song; an’ -soon slumber again tied the hands an’ feet an’ stole the eyes of the -Swallow. - -Now the Robin did not hesitate. She tore the big medicine robe from -beneath the Swallow; throwing herself into its folds, the Robin wished -herself again before Wah-bee-noh’s lodge, an’ with that the robe rushed -with her away across the skies like the swoop of a hawk. The Swallow was -only awake in time to see the Robin go out of sight like a bee hunting -its hive. - -Now the Swallow was so cast down with shame that he thought he would -call Pau-guk, the Death, an’ give himself to the wolves who sat watching -with their hungry eyes. But soon his heart came back, an’ his spirit -which was light as dead leaves, stirred about hopefully in his bosom. - -While he considered what he should now do, helpless an’ hungry, in this -desolate stretch of rocks an’ sand an’ no water, the thorn which -had been in Moh-Kwa’s paw pricked his foot where it lay sewed in his -moccasin. With that the Swallow wished he might only see the Wise Bear -to tell him his troubles. - -As the Swallow made this wish, an’ as if to answer it, he saw Moh-Kwa -coming across the rocks an’ the sand. When the wolves saw Moh-Kwa, they -gave a last howl an’ ran for their hiding places. - -Moh-Kwa himself said nothing when he came up, an’ the Swallow spoke not -for shame but lay quiet while Moh-Kwa took him by the belt which was -about his middle an’ throwing him over his shoulder as if the Swallow -were a dead deer, galloped off like the wind for his own house. - -When Moh-Kwa had reached his house, he gave the Swallow a piece of -buffalo meat to eat. Then Moh-Kwa said: - -“Because you would be a fool over a beautiful squaw who was cunning, you -have lost my three gifts that were your fortune an’ good fame. Still, -because you were only a fool, I will get them back for you. You must -stay here, for you cannot help since your spirit is as light as dead -leaves, an’ would not be steady for so long a trail an’ one which calls -for so much care to follow.” - -Then Moh-Kwa went to the door of his house an’ called his three -friends, Sug-gee-mah, the Mosquito, Sub-bee-kah-shee, the Spider, an’ -Wah-wah-tah-see, the Firefly; an’ to these he said: - -“Because you are great warriors an’ fear nothing in your hearts I have -called you.” - -An’ at that, Wah-wah-tah-see, an’ Sub-bee-kah-shee, an’ Sug-gee-mah -stood very straight an’ high, for being little men it made them proud -because so big a bear as Moh-Kwa had called them to be his help. - -“To you, Sub-bee-kah-shee,” said Moh-Kwa, turning to the Spider, “I -leave Kwa-Sind; to you, Wah-wah-tah-see, the Firefly, falls the honor of -slaying Wah-bee-noh, the bad medicine man; while unto you, Sug-gee-mah -descends the hardest task, for you must fight a great battle with -Nee-pah-win, the Sleep.” - -Moh-Kwa gave his orders to his three friends; an’ with that -Sub-bee-kah-shee, crept to the side of Kwa-Sind where he slept an’ bit -him on the cheek; an’ Kwa-Sind turned first gray an’ then black with the -spider’s venom, an’ then died in the hands of Pau-guk, the Death, who -had followed the Spider to Kwa-Sind’s lodge. - -[Illustration: 0305] - -While this was going forward, Wah-wah-tah-see, the Firefly, came as -swift as wing could carry to the lodge where Wah-bee-noh was asleep -rolled up in a bear-skin. Wah-bee-noh was happy, for with the big -medicine robe which the Robin had brought him, he already had bought the -eight further ponies from Kwa-Sind an’ they then grazed in Wah-bee-noh’s -herd. As Wah-bee-noh laughed in his sleep because he dreamed of the -twenty ponies he had earned from Kwa-Sind, the Firefly stooped an’ stung -him inside his mouth. An’ so perished Wah-bee-noh in a flame of fever, -for the poison of Wah-wah-tah-see, the Firefly, burns one to death like -live coals. - -Sug-gee-mah, the Mosquito, found Nee-pah-win, the Sleep, holding the -Robin fast. But Sug-gee-mah was stout, an’ he stooped an’ stung the -Sleep so hard he let go of the Robin an’ stood up to fight. - -All night an’ all day an’ all night, an’ yet many days an’ nights, did -Sug-gee-mah, the ‘bold Mosquito, an’ Nee-pah-win, the Sleep, fight for -the Robin. An’ whenever Nee-pah-win, the Sleep, would take the Robin in -his arms, ‘Sug-gee-mah, the Mosquito, would strike him with his little -lance. For many days an’ nights did Sug-gee-mah, the Mosquito, hold -Nee-pah-win, the Sleep, at bay; an’ in the end the Robin turned wild an’ -crazy, for unless Nee-pah-win, the Sleep, takes each man an’ woman in -his arms when the sun goes down it is as if they were bitten by the evil -polecats who are rabid; an’ the men an’ women who are not held in the -arms of Nee-pah-win go mad an’ rave like starved wolves till they die. -An’ thus it was with the Robin. After many days an’ nights, Pau-guk, -the Death, came for her also, an’ those three who had done evil to the -Swallow were punished. - -Moh-Kwa, collecting the knife, the bear-claws an’ the big medicine robe -from the lodge of Kwa-Sind, gave them to the Swallow again. This time -the Swallow stood better guard, an’ no squaw, however cunning, might -make a fool of him--though many tried--so he kept his knife, the -bear-claws, an’ the big medicine robe these many years while he lived. - -As for Sub-bee-kah-shee, the Spider, an’ Wah-wah-tah-see, the Firefly, -an’ Sug-gee-mah, the brave Mosquito, Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, for a -reward gave them an’ their countless squaws an’ papooses forever that -fine swamp where Apuk-wah, the Bulrush, grows thick an’ green, an’ -makes a best hunting grounds for the three little warriors who killed -Kwa-Sind, Wah-bee-noh, an’ the Robin on that day when Moh-Kwa called -them his enemies. An’ now when every man was at peace an’ happy, Moh-Kwa -brought the Sioux together an’ re-named the Swallow “Thorn-Puller;” an’ -by that name was he known till he died. - -“How many are there of these Sioux folk-lore tales?” asked the Jolly -Doctor of Sioux Sam. - -“How many leaves in June?” asked Sioux Sam. “If our Great Medicine”--so -he called the Jolly Doctor--“were with the Dakotahs, the old men an’ -the squaws would tell him a fresh one for every fresh hour of his life. -There is no end.” - -While the Jolly Doctor was reflecting on this reply, the Red Nosed -Gentleman, raising his glass of burgundy to the Sour Gentleman who -returned the compliment in whiskey, said: - -“My respects to you, sir; and may we hope you will now give us that -adventure of The German Girl’s Diamonds?” - -“I shall have the utmost pleasure,” responded the Sour Gentleman. “You -may not consider it of mighty value as a story, but perhaps as a chapter -in former Custom’s iniquity one may concede it a use.” - - - - -CHAPTER XX.--THE GERMAN GIRL’S DIAMONDS. - -It cannot be said, my friends, that I liked my position in that sink of -evil, the New York Customs. I was on good terms with my comrades, but I -founded no friendships among them. It has been and still is a belief of -mine, and one formed at an early age, that everybody wears suggestive -resemblance to some bird or fish or beast. I’ve seen a human serpent’s -face, triangular, poisonous, menacing with ophidian eyes; I’ve seen a -dove’s face, soft, gentle, harmless, and with lips that cooed as they -framed and uttered words. And there are faces to remind one of dogs, of -sheep, of apes, of swine, of eagles, of pike--ravenous, wide-mouthed, -swift. I’ve even encountered a bear’s face on Broadway--one full of a -window-peering curiosity, yet showing a contented, sluggish sagacity -withal. And every face about me in the Customs would carry out my -theory. As I glanced from Lorns to Quin, and from Quin to another, and -so to the last upon the list, I beheld reflected as in a glass, a hawk, -or an owl, or a wolf, or a fox, or a ferret, or even a cat. But each -rapacious; each stamped with the instinct of predation as though the -word “Wolf” were written across his forehead. Even Betelnut Jack gave -one the impression that belongs with some old, rusty black-eagle with -worn and tumbled plumage. I took no joy of my comrades; saw no more of -them than I might; despised my trade of land-pirate--for what better -could it be called?--and following that warning from “Josephus” was -ever haunted of a weird fear of what might come. Still, I remained and -claimed my loot with the rest. And you ask why? When all is said, I -was as voracious as the others; I clinked the coins in my pocket, and -consoled myself against the foul character of such profits with that -thought of Vespasian: “The smell of all money is sweet.” - -Following my downfall of tobacco, I had given up my rich apartments in -Twenty-second Street; and while I retained my membership, I went no more -to the two or three clubs into which I’d been received. In truth, these -Custom House days I seldom strolled as far northward as Twenty-third -Street; but taking a couple of moderate rooms to the south of Washington -Square, I stuck to them or to the park in front as much as ever I might; -passing a lonely life and meeting none I’d known before. - -One sun-filled September afternoon, being free at that hour, I was -occupying a bench in Washington Square, amusing my idleness with the -shadows chequered across the walk by an overspreading tree. A sound -caught my ear; I looked up to be mildly amazed by the appearance of -Betelnut Jack. It was seldom my chief was found so far from his eyrie -in the Bowery; evidently he was seeking me. His first words averred as -much. - -“I was over to your rooms,” remarked Betelnut Jack; “they told me you -were here.” - -Then he gave me a pure Havana--for we of the Customs might smoke what -cigars we would--lighted another and betook himself to a few moments of -fragrant, wordless tranquility. I was aware, of course, that Betelnut -Jack had a purpose in coming; but curiosity was never among my vices, -and I did not ask his mission. With a feeling of indifference, I awaited -its development in his own good way and time. - -Betelnut Jack was more apt to listen than talk; but upon this Washington -Square afternoon, he so far departed those habits of taciturnity -commonly his own as to furnish the weight of conversation. He did not -hurry to his business, but rambled among a score of topics. He even -described to me by what accident he arrived at his by-name of Betelnut -Jack. He said he was a sailor in his youth. Then he related how he went -on deep water ships to India and to the China seas; how he learned to -chew betel from the Orientals; how after he came ashore he was still -addicted to betel; how a physician, ignorant of betel and its crimson -consequences, fell into vast excitement over what he concevied to be a -perilous hemorrhage; and how before Jack could explain, seized on -him and hurried him into a near-by drug shop. When he understood his -mistake, the physician took it in dudgeon, and was inclined to blame -Jack for those sanguinary yet fraudulent symptoms. One result of -the adventure was to re-christen him “Betelnut Jack,” the name still -sticking, albeit he had for long abandoned betel as a taste outgrown. - -Betelnut Jack continued touching his career in New York; always with -caution, however, slurring some parts and jumping others; from which I -argued that portions of my chief’s story were made better by not being -divulged. It occurred, too, as a deduction drawn from his confidences -that Betelnut Jack had been valorous as a Know-Nothing; and he spoke -with rapture of the great prize-fighter, Tom Hyer, who beat Yankee -Sullivan; and then of the fistic virtues of the brave Bill Poole, coming -near to tears as he set forth the latter’s murder in Stanwix Hall. - -Also, I gathered that Betelnut Jack had been no laggard at hurling -stones and smashing windows in the Astor Place riot of 1849. - -“And the soldiers killed one hundred and thirty-four,” sighed Betelnut -Jack, when describing the battle; “and wounded four times as many more. -And all, mind you! for a no-good English actor with an Irish name!” This -last in accents of profound disgust. - -In the end Betelnut Jack began to wax uneasy; it was apparent how he -yearned for his nest in the familiar Bowery. With that he came bluntly -to the purpose. - -“To-morrow, early,” he said, “take one of the women inspectors and go -down to quarantine. Some time in the course of the day, the steamship -‘Wolfgang,’ from Bremen, will arrive. Go aboard at once. In the second -cabin you will find a tall, gray, old German; thin, with longish hair. -He may have on dark goggles; if he hasn’t, you will observe that he is -blind of the right eye. His daughter, a girl of twenty-three, will -be with him. Her hair will be done up in that heavy roll which -hair-dressers call the ‘waterfall,’ and hang in a silk close-meshed -net low on her neck. Hidden in the girl’s hair are diamonds of a Berlin -value of over one hundred and twenty thousand dollars. You will search -the old man, and have the woman inspector search the girl. Don’t conduct -yourselves as though you knew what you were looking for. Tell your -assistant to find the girl’s diamonds naturally; let her work to them by -degrees, not swoop on them.” - -Then Betelnut Jack disposed himself for homeward flight. I asked how he -became aware of the jewels and the place of their concealment. - -“Never mind that now,” was his reply; “you’ll know later. But get the -diamonds; they’re there and you must not fail. I’ve come for you, as -you’re more capable of doing the gentleman than some of the others, and -this is a case where a dash of refinement won’t hurt the trick.” - -With that Betelnut Jack lounged over to Fourth Street and disappeared -towards Broadway and the Bowery further east. - -Following my chief’s departure, I continued in idle contemplation of the -shadows. This occupation did not forbid a mental looking up and down of -what would be my next day’s work. The prospect was far from refreshing. -When one is under thirty, a proposal to plunder a girl--a beautiful -girl, doubtless--of her diamonds, does not appeal to one. There would be -woe, tears, lamentations, misery with much wringing of hands. I began to -call myself a villain. - -Then, as against her, and defensive of myself, I argued the outlaw -character of the girl’s work. Be she beautiful or be she favored ill, -still she is breaking the law. It was our oath to seize the gems; -whatever of later wrong was acted, at best or worst, it was no wrong -done her. In truth! when she was at last left free and at liberty, she -would be favored beyond her deserts; for those Customs laws which she -was cheating spoke of grates and keys and bars and bolts. - -In this wise, and as much as might be, I comforted myself against the -disgrace of an enterprise from which I naturally recoiled, hardening -myself as to the poor girl marked to be our prey. I confess I gained no -great success; say what I might, I contemned myself. - -While thus ruminating that dishonor into which I conceived myself to -have fallen, I recalled a story written by Edgar Allen Poe. It is a -sketch wherein a wicked man is ever followed and thwarted by one -who lives his exact semblance in each line of face and form. This -doppel-ganger, as the Germans name him, while the same with himself -in appearance and dress, is his precise opposite in moral nature. This -struggle between the haunted one and his weird, begins in boyhood -and continues till middle age. At the last, frantic under a final -opposition, the haunted one draws sword and slays his enemy. Too late, -as he wipes the blood from his blade, he finds that he has killed -his better self; too late he sees that from that time to the end, the -present will have no hope, the future hold no heaven; that he must sink -and sink and sink, until he is grasped by those hands outstretched of -hell to forever have him for their horrid own. I wondered if I were not -like that man unhappy; I asked if I did not, by these various defenses -and apologies which I made ever for my wickedness, work towards the -death of my better nature whose destruction when it did come would mean -the departure forever of my soul’s chance. - -I stood up and shook myself in a canine way. Decidedly, loneliness was -making me morbid! However that may have been, I passed a far from happy -afternoon. - -Fairly speaking, these contentions shook me somewhat in my resolves. -There were moments when I determined to refuse my diamond-hunting -commission and resign my place. I even settled the style of my -resignation; it should be full of sarcasm. - -But alas! these white dreams faded; in the end I was ready to execute -the orders of Betelnut Jack; and that which decided me was surely the -weakest thought of all. Somehow, I had in my thoughts put down the -coming German maiden as beautiful; Betelnut Jack had said her age was -twenty-three, which helped me to this thought of girlish loveliness. -Thus, my imaginings worked in favor of the girl. - -But next the thought fell blackly that she would some day--probably a -near day--love some man unknown and marry him. Possibly this lover she -already knew; perhaps he was here and she on her way to meet him! This -will sound like jest; it will earn derision from healthful, balanced -spirits; and yet I tell but the truth. - -I experienced a vague, resentful jealousy, hated this imagined lover -of a girl I’d never met, and waxed contemptuous of aught of leniency -towards one or both. I would do as Betelnut Jack ordered; I would go -down to quarantine on the morrow; and I would find the diamonds. - -It was late in the afternoon when with a woman assistant, I boarded the -“Wolfgang” in the Narrows. My aged German was readily picked up; his -daughter was with him. And her beauty was as I’d painted on the canvas -of my thoughts. Yet when I beheld the loveliness which should have -melted me, I recalled that lover to whose arms she might be coming and -was hardened beyond recall. I told the inspectress to take her into -her private room and find the diamonds. With that, I turned my back and -strolled to the forward deck. Even at that distance I heard the shriek -of the girl when her treasure was discovered. - -“There will be less for the lover!” I thought. - -When my woman assistant--accomplice might be the truer term--joined -me, she had the jewels. They were in a long eel-skin receptacle, sewed -tightly, and had been secreted in the girl’s hair as described by -Betelnut Jack. I took the gems, and buttoning them in my coat, told my -aide--who with a feminine fashion of bitterness seemed exultant over -having deprived another of her gew-gaws--to arrest the girl, hold her -until the boat docked, frighten her with tales of fetters and dungeons -and clanging bars, and at the last to lose her on the wharf. It would -be nine o’clock of the night by then, and murk dark; this loss of her -prisoner would seem to come honestly about. - -If I were making a romance, rather than bending to a relation of cold, -gray, hard, untender facts, I would at this crisis defy Betelnut Jack, -rescue the beautiful girl, restore her jewels, love her, win her, wed -her, and with her true, dear arms about me, live happy ever after. As it -was, however, I did nothing of that good sort. My aide obeyed directions -in a mood at once thorough, blithe, and spiteful, and never more did I -set eyes on the half-blind father or the tearful, pretty, poor victim -of our diamond hunting. Lost in the crush and bustle of the wharf, they -were never found, never looked for, and never rendered themselves. - -I had considered what profit from these jewels might accrue to the ring -and the means by which it would be arrived at. I took it for granted -that some substitutional arts--when paste would take the places of old -mine gems--would be resorted to as in the excellent instance of The -Emperor’s Cigars. But Betelnut Jack shook his careful head; there would -be no hokus-pokus of substitution; there were good reasons. Also, there -was another way secure. If our profits were somewhat shaved, our safety -would be augmented; and Betelnut Jack’s watchword was “Safety first!” I -was bound to acquiesce; I the more readily did so since, like Lorns and -Quin, I had grown to perfect confidence in the plans of Betelnut Jack. -However, when now I had brushed aside etiquette and broken the ice -of the matter with my chief, I asked how he meant to manoeuver in the -affair. - -“Wait!” retorted Betelnut Jack, and that was the utmost he would say. - -In due time came the usual auction and the gems were sold. They were -snapped up by a syndicate of wise folk of Maiden Lane who paid therefor -into the hands of the government the even sum of one hundred thousand -dollars. - -Still I saw not how our ring would have advantage; no way could open for -us to handle those one hundred thousand dollars in whole or in part. -I was in error; a condition whereof I was soon to be made pleasantly -aware. - -On the day following the sale, and while the price paid still slept -unbanked in the Customs boxes of proof-steel, there came one to see our -canny chief. It is useless to waste description on this man. Suffice it -that he was in fact and in appearance as skulkingly the coward scoundrel -as might anywhere be met. This creeping creature was shown into the -private rooms of Betelnut Jack. A moment later, I was sent for. - -Betelnut Jack was occupying a chair; he wore an air of easy confidence; -and over that, a sentiment of contempt for his visitor. This latter was -posed in the middle of the room; and while an apprehension of impending -evil showed on his face, he made cringing and deprecatory gestures with -shoulders hunched and palms turned outward. - -“Sit down,” observed Betelnut Jack, pushing a chair towards me. When -I was seated, he spoke on. “Since it was you who found the diamonds, I -thought it right to have you present now. You asked me once how I knew -in advance of those gems and their scheme of concealment. To-day you may -learn. This is the gentleman who gave me the information. He did it -to obtain the reward--to receive that great per cent, of the seizure’s -proceeds which is promised the informer by the law. His information was -right; he is entitled to the reward. That is what he is here for; he has -come to be paid.” Then to the hangdog, cringing one: “Pretty good day’s -work for you, eh? Over fifty thousand dollars for a little piece of -information is stiff pay!” The hangdog one bowed lower and a smirk of -partial confidence began to broaden his face. “And now you’ve come for -your money--fifty odd thousand!” - -“If you please, sir! yes, sir!” More and wider smirks. - -“All right!” retorted Betelnut Jack. “You shall have it, friend; but not -now--not to-day.” - -“Then when?” and the smirk fled. - -“To-morrow,” said Betelnut Jack. “To-morrow, next day, any day in fact -when you bring before me to be witnesses of the transaction the father, -the sister, and your wife.” - -Across the face of the hangdog one spread a pallor that was as the -whiteness of death. There burned the fires of a hot agony in his eyes as -though a dirk had slowly pierced him. His voice fell in a husky whisper. - -“You would cheat me!” - -“No; I would do you perfect justice,” replied Betelnut Jack. “Not a -splinter do you finger until you bring your people. Your wife and her -sister and their father shall know this story, and stand here while the -money is paid. Not a stiver else! Now, go!” - -Betelnut Jack’s tones were as remorseless as a storm; they offered -nothing to hope; the hangdog one heard and crept away with a look on -his face that was but ill to see. Once the door was closed behind him, -Betelnut Jack turned with a cheerful gleam to me. - -“That ends him! It’s as you guess. This informer is the son-in-law of -the old German. He married the elder daughter. They came over four years -ago and live in Hoboken. Then the father and the younger sister were to -come. They put their whole fortune into the diamonds, aiming to cheat -the Customs and manage a profit; and the girl wrote their plans and -how they would hide the jewels to her sister. It was she who told her -husband--this fellow who’s just sneaked out. He came to me and betrayed -them; he was willing to ruin the old man and the girl to win riches for -himself. But he’s gone; he’ll not return; we’ve seen and heard the last -of them; one fears the jail, the other the wrath of his wife; and that’s -the end.” Then Betelnut Jack, as he lighted a cigar, spoke the word -which told to folk initiate of a division of spoil on the morrow. As I -arose, he said: “Ask Lorns to come here.” - -***** - -“Well,” remarked the Old Cattleman when the Sour Gentleman was done, “I -don’t want to say nothin’ to discourage you-all, but if I’d picked up -your hand that time I wouldn’t have played it. I shorely would have let -that Dutch girl keep her beads. Didn’t the thing ha’nt you afterwards?” - -“It gave me a deal of uneasiness,” responded the Sour Gentleman. “I am -not proud of my performance. And yet, I don’t see what else I might have -done. Those diamonds were as good as in the hands of Betelnut Jack from -the moment the skulking brother-in-law brought him the information.” - -“It’s one relief,” observed the Red Nosed Gentleman, “to know how that -scoundrel came off no richer by his treachery.” - -“What I observes partic’lar in the narration,” said the Old Cattleman, -“is how luck is the predominatin’ feacher throughout. The girl an’ her -old pap has bad luck in losin’ the gewgaw’s. You-all customs sharps -has good luck in havin’ the news brought to your hand as to where them -diamonds is hid, by a coyote whom you can bluff plumb outen the play at -the finish. As for the coyote informer, why he has luck in bein’ allowed -to live. - -“An’ speakin’ of luck, seein’ that in this yere story-tellin’ -arrangement that seems to have grown up in our midst, I’m the next -chicken on the roost, I’ll onfold to you gents concernin’ ‘The Luck of -Cold-sober Simms.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XXI.--THE LUCK OF COLD-SOBER SIMMS. - -Which this yere tale is mighty devious, not to say disjointed, because, -d’you see! from first to last, she’s all the truth. Now, thar is -folks sech as Injuns an’ them sagacious sports which we-all terms -philosophers, who talks of truth bein’ straight. Injuns will say a -liar has a forked tongue, while philosophers will speak of a straight -ondeviatin’ narrative, meanin’ tharby to indooce you to regyard said -story as the emanation of honesty in its every word. For myse’f I don’t -subscribe none to these yere phrases. In my own experience it’s the lies -that runs in a straight line like a bullet, whereas the truth goes onder -an’ over, an’ up an’ down, doubles an’ jumps sideways a dozen times -before ever it finally finds its camp in what book-sharps call the -“climax.” Which I says ag’in that this tale, bein’ troo, has nacherally -as many kinks in it as a new lariat. - -Bein’ thoughtful that a-way, an’ preyed on by a desire to back-track -every fact to its fountain-head, meanwhile considerin’ how different the -kyards would have fallen final if something prior had been done or left -on done, has ever been my weakness. It’s allers so with me. I can recall -as a child how back in Tennessee I deevotes hours when fish-in’ or -otherwise uselessly engaged, to wonderin’ whoever I’d have been personal -if my maw had died in her girlhood an’ pap had wedded someone else. -It’s plumb too many for me; an’ now an’ then when in a sperit of onusual -cog’tation, I ups an’ wonders where I’d be if both my maw an’ pap had -cashed in as colts, I’d jest simply set down he’pless, on-qualified to -think at all. It’s plain that in sech on-toward events as my two parents -dyin’, say, at the age of three, I sort o’ wouldn’t have happened none. -This yere solemn view never fails to give me the horrors. - -I fixes the time of this story easy as bein’ that eepock when Jim -East an’ Bob Pierce is sheriffs of the Panhandle, with headquarters -in Tascosa, an’ Bob Roberson is chief of the LIT ranch. These yere -evidences of merit on the parts of them three gents has not, however, -anything to do with how Cold-sober Simms gets rich at farobank; how two -hold-ups plots to rob him; how he’s saved by the inadvertent capture of -a bob-cat who’s strange to him entire; an’ how the two hold-ups in their -chagrin over Cold-sober’s escape an’ the mootual doubts it engenders, -pulls on each other an’ relieves the Stranglers from the labor of -stringin’ ’em to a cottonwood. - -These doin’s whereof I gives you a rapid rehearsal, has their start when -Old Scotty an’ Locoed Charlie gets drunk in Tascosa prior to startin’ -west on their buckboard with the mailbags of the Lee-Scott ranch. Locoed -Charlie an’ Old Scotty is drunk when they pulls out; Cold-sober Simms -is with ’em as a passenger. At their night camp half way to the -Lee-Scott, Locoed Charlie, whose head can’t stand the strain of Jenkins’ -nose-paint, makes war-medicine an’ lays for Old Scotty all spraddled -out. As the upcome of these yere hostilities, Old Scotty confers a most -elab’rate beatin’ on Locoed Charlie; after which they-all cooks their -grub, feeds, an’ goes to sleep. - -But Locoed Charlie don’t go to sleep; he lays thar drunk an’ disgruntled -an’ hungerin’ to play even. As a good revengeful scheme, Locoed Charlie -allows he’ll get up an’ secrete the mailbag, thinkin’ tharby to worry -Old Scotty till he sweats blood. Locoed Charlie packs the mailbag over -among some rocks which is thick grown with cedar bresh. When it comes -sun-up an’ Locoed Charlie is sober an’ repents, an’ tells Old Scotty -of his little game, neither he nor Scotty can find that mailbag nohow. -Locoed Charlie shore hides her good. - -Locoed Charlie an’ Scotty don’t dare go on without it, but stays an’ -searches; Cold-sober Simms--who is given this yere nom-de-guerre, as -Colonel Sterett terms it, because he’s the only sport in the Panhandle -who don’t drink--stays with ’em to help on the hunt. At last, failin’ -utter to discover the missin’ mail, Locoed Charlie an’ Old Scotty -returns to Tascosa in fear an’ tremblin’, not packin’ the nerve to -face McAllister, who manages for the Lee-Scott, an’ inform him of the -yoonique disposition they makes of his outfit’s letters. This return -to Tascosa is, after all, mere proodence, since McAllister is a mighty -emotional manager, that a-way, an’ it’s as good as even money he hangs -both of them culprits in that first gust of enthoosiasm which would -be shore to follow any explanation they can make. So they returns; an’ -because he can’t he’p himse’f none, bein’ he’s only a passenger on that -buckboard, Cold-sober Simms returns with ’em. No, the mailbag is -found a week later by a Lee-Scott rider, an’ for the standin’ of Locoed -Charlie an’ Scotty it’s as well he does. - -Cold-sober is some sore at bein’ baffled in his trip to the Lee-Scott -since he aims to go to work thar as a rider. To console himse’f, he -turns in an’ bucks a faro game that a brace of onknown black-laigs who -shows in Tascosa from Fort Elliot the day prior, has onfurled in -James’ s’loon. As sometimes happens, Cold-sober plays in all brands -an’ y’earmarks of luck, an’ in four hours breaks the bank. It ain’t -overstrong, no sech institootion of finance in fact as Cherokee Hall’s -faro game in Wolfville, an’ when Cold-sober calls the last nine-king -turn for one hundred, an’ has besides a hundred on the nine, coppered, -an’ another hundred open on the king, tharby reapin’ six hundred dollars -as the froots of said feat, the sharp who’s deal-in’ turns up his box -an’ tells Cold-sober to set in his chips to be cashed. Cold-sober sets -’em in; nine thousand five hundred dollars bein’ the roundup, an’ the -dealer-sharp hands over the dinero. Then in a sperit of resentment the -dealer-sharp picks up the faro-box an’ smashes it ag’in the wall. - -“Thar bein’ nothin’ left,” he says to his fellow black-laig, who’s -settin’ in the look-out’s chair, “for you an’ me but to prance out an’ -stand up a stage, we may as well dismiss that deal-box from our affairs. -I knowed that box was a hoodoo ever since Black Morgan gets killed over -it in Mobeetie; an’ so I tells you, but you-all wouldn’t heed.” - -Cold-sober is shore elated about his luck; them nine thousand odd -dollars is more wealth than he ever sees; an’ how to dispose of it, now -he’s got it, begins to bother Cold-sober a heap. One gent says, “Hive -it in Howard’s Store!” another su’gests he leave it with old man Cohn; -while still others agrees it’s Cold-sober’s dooty to blow it in. - -“Which if I was you-all,” says Johnny Cook of the LIT outfit, “I’d -shore sally forth an’ buy nose-paint with that treasure while a peso -remained.” But Cold-sober turns down these divers proposals an’ allows -he’ll pack said roll in his pocket a whole lot, which he accordin’ does. - -Cold-sober hangs ’round Tascosa for mighty near a week, surrenderin’ all -thought of gettin’ to the Lee-Scott ranch, feelin’ that he’s now -too rich to punch cattle. Doorin’ this season of idleness art’ease, -Cold-sober bunks in with a jimcrow English doctor who’s got a ’doby in -Tascosa an’ who calls himse’f Chepp. He’s a decent form of maverick, -however, this yere Chepp, an’ him an’ Cold-sober becomes as thick as -thieves. - -Cold-sober’s stay with Chepp is brief as I states; in a week he gets -restless ag’in for work; whereupon he hooks up with Roberson, an’ goes -p’intin’ south across the Canadian on a L I T hoss to hold down one of -that brand’s sign-camps in Mitchell’s canyon. It’s only twenty miles, -an’ lie’s thar in half a day--him an’ Wat Peacock who’s to be his mate. -An’ Cold-sober packs with him that fortune of ninety-five hundred. - -The two black-laigs who’s been depleted that away still hankers about -Tascosa; but as mighty likely they don’t own the riches to take ’em -out o’ town, not much is thought. Nor does it ruffle the feathers of -commoonal suspicion when the two disappears a few days after Cold-sober -goes ridin’ away to assoome them LIT reesponsibilities in Mitchell’s -canyon. The public is too busy to bother itse’f about ’em. It comes -out later, however, that the goin’ of Cold-sober has everything to do -with the exodus of them hold-ups, an’ that they’ve been layin’ about -since they loses their roll on a chance of get-tin’ it back. When -Cold-sober p’ints south for Mitchell’s that time, it’s as good as these -outlaws asks. They figgers on trailin’ him to Mitchell’s an’ hidin’ out -ontil some hour when Peacock’s off foolin’ about the range; when they -argues Cold-sober would be plumb easy, an’ they’ll kill an’ skelp him -an’ clean him up for his money, an’ ride away. - -“In fact,” explains the one Cold-sober an’ Peacock finds alive, “it’s -our idee that the killin’ an’ skelpin’ an’ pillagin’ of Cold-sober would -get layed to Peacock, which would mean safety for us an’ at the same -time be a jest on Peacock that would be plumb hard to beat.” That was -the plan of these outlaws; an’ the cause of its failure is the followin’ -episode, to wit: - -It looks like this Doc Chepp is locoed to collect wild anamiles that -a-way. - -“Which I wants,” says this shorthorn Chepp, “a speciment of every sort -o’ the fauna of these yere regions, savin’ an’ exceptin’ polecats. I -knows enough of the latter pungent beast from an encounter I has with -one, to form notions ag’in ’em over which not even the anxious cry of -science can preevail. Polecats is barred from my c’llec-tions. But,” - an’ said Chepp imparts this last to Cold-sober as the latter starts for -Mitchell’s, “if by any sleight or dexterity you-all accomplishes the -capture of a bob-cat, bring the interestin’ creature to me at once. An’ -bring him alive so I may observe an’ note his pecooliar traits.” - -It’s the third mornin’ in Mitchell’s when a bobcat is seen by Cold-sober -an’ Peacock to go sa’nter-in’ up the valley. Mebby this yere bob-cat’s -homeless; mebby he’s a dissoloote bob-cat an’ has been out all night -carousin’ with other bob-cats an’ is simply late gettin’ in; be the -reason of his appearance what it may, Cold-sober remembers about Doc -Chepp’s wish to own a bob-cat, an’ him an’ Peacock lets go all holds, -leaps for their ponies an’ gives chase. Thar’s a scramblin’ run up the -canyon; then Peacock gets his rope onto it, an’ next Cold-sober fastens -with his rope, an’ you hear me, gents, between ’em they almost rends -this yere onhappy bobcat in two. They pauses in time, however, an’ after -a fearful struggle they succeeds in stuffin’ the bob-cat into Peacock’s -leather laiggin’s, which the latter gent removes for that purpose. -Bound hand an’ foot, an’ wropped in the laiggin’s so tight he can hardly -squawl, that bob-cat’s put before Cold-sober on his saddle; an’ -this bein’ fixed, Cold-sober heads for Tascosa to present him to his -naturalist friend, Chepp, Peacock scamperin’ cheerfully along like a -drunkard to a barbecue regyardin’ the racket as a ondeniable excuse for -gettin’ soaked. - -This adventure of the bob-cat is the savin’ clause in the case of -Cold-sober Simms. As the bobcat an’ him an’ Peacock rides away, them two -malefactors is camped not five miles off, over by the Serrita la Cruz, -an’ arrangin’ to go projectin’ ’round for Cold-sober an’ his ninety-five -hundred that very evenin’. In truth, they execootes their scheme; but -only to find when they jumps his camp in Mitchell’s that Cold-sober’s -done vamosed a whole lot. - -It’s then trouble begins to gather for the two rustlers. The one who -deals the game that time is so overcome by Cold-sober’s absence, he -peevishly puts it up that his pard gives Cold-sober warnin’ with the -idee of later whackin’ up the roll with him by way of a reward for his -virchoo. Nacherally no se’f-respectin’ miscreant will submit to sech -impeachments, an’ the accoosed makes a heated retort, punctuatin’ his -observations with his gun. Thar-upon the other proceeds to voice his -feelin’s with his six-shooter; an’ the mootual remarks of these yere -dispootants is so well aimed an’ ackerate that next evenin’ when -Cold-sober an’ Peacock returns, they finds one dead an’ t’other dyin’ -with even an’ exact jestice broodin’ over all. - -As Cold-sober an’ Peacock is settin’ by their fire that night, restin’ -from their labors in plantin’ the two hold-ups, Cold-sober starts up -sudden an’ says: - -“Yereafter I adopts a bob-cat for my coat-o’-arms. Also, I changes my -mind about Howard, an’ to-morry I’ll go chargin’ into Tascosa an’ leave -said ninety-five hundred in his iron box. Thar’s more ‘bad men’ at Fort -Elliot than them two we plants, an’ mebby some more of ’em may come -a-weavin’ up the Canadian with me an’ my wealth as their objective -p’int.” - -Peacock endorses the notion enthoosiastic, an’ declar’s himse’f in on -the play as a body-guard; for he sees in this yere second expedition a -new o’casion for another drunk, an’ Peacock jest nacherally dotes on a -debauch. - -***** - -“And what did your Cold-sober Simms,” asked the Sour Gentleman, “finally -do with his money? Did he go into the cattle business?” - -“Never buys a hoof,” returned the Old Cattleman. “No, indeed; he loses -it ag’in monte in Kelly’s s’loon in Dodge. Charley Bassett who’s marshal -at the time tries to git Cold-sober to pass up that monte game. But thar -ain’t no headin’ him; he would buck it, an’ so the sharp who’s deal-in’, -Butcher Knife Bill it is--turns in an’ knocks Cold-sober’s horns plumb -off.” - -The sudden collapse of the volatile Cold-sober’s fortunes was quite a -dampener to the Sour Gentleman; he evidently entertained a hope that the -lucky cow-boy was fated to a rise in life. The news of his final losses -had less effect on the Red Nosed Gentleman who, having witnessed no -little gambling in his earlier years, seemed better prepared. In truth, -a remark he let fall would show as much. - -“I was sure he would lose it,” said the Red Nosed Gentleman. “Men win -money only to lose it to the first game they can find. However, to -change the subject:” Here the Red Nosed Gentleman beamed upon the Jolly -Doctor. “Sir, the hour is young. Can’t you aid us to finish the evening -with another story?” - -“There is one I might give you,” responded the Jolly Doctor. “It is of -a horse-race like that Rescue of Connelly you related and was told me by -an old friend and patient who I fear was a trifle wild as a youth. This -is the story as set forth by himself, and for want of a more impressive -title, we may call it ‘How Prince Rupert Lost.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XXII.--HOW PRINCE RUPERT LOST. - -And now I’ll tell you how I once threw stones at Hartford and thereby -gained queer money to carry me to the bedside of my mother at her death. - -My father, you should know, was a lawyer of eminence and wide practice -at the New York bar. His income was magnificent; yet--thriftless and -well living--he spent it with both hands. My mother, who took as little -concern for the future as himself, aided pleasantly in scattering the -dollars as fast as they were earned. - -With no original estate on either side, and not a shilling saved, it was -to be expected that my father’s death should leave us wanting a penny. I -was twenty-two when the blow fell; he died stricken of an apoplexy, his -full habit and want of physical exercise marking him to that malady as a -certain prey. - -I well recall how this death came upon us as a bolt from the blue. And -while his partner stood over our affairs like a brother, when the debts -were paid there remained no more than would manage an annuity for -my mother of some six hundred dollars. With that she retreated to -Westchester and lived the little balance of her years with a maiden -sister who owned a starved farm, all chequered of stone fences, in that -region of breath-taking hills. - -It stood my misfortune that I was bred as the son of a wealthy man. -Columbia was my school and the generosity of my father gilded those -college days with an allowance of five thousand a year. I became -proficient--like many another hare-brain--in everything save books, and -was a notable guard on the University Eleven and pulled the bow oar -in the University Eight. When I came from college the year before my -father’s death I could write myself adept of a score of sciences, -each physical, not one of which might serve to bring a splinter of -return--not one, indeed, that did not demand the possession of largest -wealth in its pursuit. I was poor in that I did not have a dollar when -brought to face the world; I was doubly poor with a training that had -taught me to spend thousands. Therefore, during the eighteen years to -succeed my father’s going, was I tossed on the waves of existence -like so much wreckage; and that I am not still so thrown about is the -offspring of happy exigency rather than a condition due to wisdom of my -own. - -My ship of money did not come in until after I’d encountered my fortieth -year. For those eighteen years next prior, if truth must out, I’d picked -up intermittent small money following the races. Turf interest of -that day settled about such speedy ones as Goldsmith Maid, Lucy, Judge -Fullerton and American Girl, while Budd Doble, Dan Mace and Jack Splan -were more often in the papers than was the President. I followed the -races, I say; sometimes I was flush of money, more often I was poor; but -one way or another I clung to the skirts of the circuits and managed to -live. - -Now, since age has come to my head and gold to my fingers, and I’ve had -time and the cooled blood wherewith to think, I’ve laid my ill courses -of those eighteen evil years to the doors of what vile ideals of life -are taught in circles of our very rich. What is true now, was true -then. Among our “best people”--if “best” be the word where “worst” might -better fit the case--who is held up to youthful emulation? Is it the -great lawyer, or writer, or preacher, or merchant, or man of medicine? -Is it he of any trade or calling who stands usefully and profitably at -the head of his fellows? Never; such gentry of decent effort and clean -dollars to flow therefrom are not mentioned; or if they be, it is not -for compliment and often with disdain. - -And who has honor in the social conventions of our American aristocrats? -It is young A, who drives an automobile some eighty miles an hour; or -young B, who sails a single-sticker until her canvas is blown from the -bolt ropes; or young C, who rides like an Arab at polo; or young D, -who drives farthest at golf; or young E, who is the headlong first in a -paper chase. These be the ideals; these the promontories to steer by. Is -it marvel then when a youth raised of those “best circles” falls out -of his nest of money that he lies sprawling, unable to honestly aid -himself? Is it strange that he afterward lives drunken and precariously -and seldom in walks asking industry and hard work? His training has been -to spend money, while his contempt was reserved for those who labored -its honorable accumulation. Such wrong-taught creatures, bereft of bank -accounts, are left to adopt the races, the gambling tables, or the -wine trade; and with all my black wealth of experience, I sit unable to -determine which is basest and most loathly of the three. - -During those eighteen roving, race-course years I saw my mother but -seldom; and I never exposed to her my methods of life. I told her that -I “traveled;” and she, good, innocent girl! gained from the phrase a -cloudy notion that I went the trusted ambassador to various courts of -trade of some great manufactory. I protected her from the truth to -the end, and she died brightly confident that her son made a brilliant -figure in the world. - -While on my ignoble wanderings I kept myself in touch with one whom I -might trust, and who, dwelling near my mother, saw her day by day. He -was ever in possession of my whereabouts. Her health was a bit perilous -from heart troubles, and I, as much as I might, maintained arrangements -to warn me should she turn seriously ill. - -At first I looked hourly for such notice; but as month after month -went by and no bad tidings--nothing save word at intervals that she was -passing her quiet, uneventful days in comfort, and as each occasional -visit made to Westchester confirmed such news, my apprehension became -dulled and dormant. It was a surprise then, and pierced me hideously, -when I opened the message that told how her days were down to hours and -she lay dying. - -The telegram reached me in Hartford. When I took it from the messenger’s -hand I was so poor I could not give him a dime for finding me; and as he -had been to some detective pains in the business, he left with an ugly -face as one cheated of appreciation. I could not help it; there dwelt -not so much as one cheap copper in my pocket. Also, my clothes were none -of the best; for I’d been in ill fortune, and months of bankruptcy had -dealt unkindly with my wardrobe. But there should be no such word as -fail; I must find the money to go to her--find it even though it arrive -on the tides of robbery. - -Luck came to me. Within the minute to follow the summons, and while the -yellow message still fluttered between my fingers, I was hailed from -across the street. The hail came from a certain coarse gentleman who -seemed born to horse-races as to an heritage and was, withal, one of the -few who reaped a harvest from them. This fortunate one was known to the -guild as Sure-thing Pete. - -It was fairly early of the morning, eight o’clock, and Surething Pete -in the wake of his several morning drinks--he was a celebrated sot--was -having his boots cleaned. It is a curious thing that half-drunken folk -are prone to this improvement. That is why a boot-black’s chair is found -so frequently just outside the portals of a rum shop. The prospect of -a seat allures your drunkard fresh from his latest drink; he may sit -at secure ease and please his rum-contented fancy with a review of the -passing crowds; also, the Italian digging and brushing about his soles -gives an impression that he is subject of concern to some one and this -nurses a sense of importance and comes as vague tickle to his vanity. - -Surething Pete, as related, was under the hands of a boot-black when I -approached. He was much older than I and regarded me as a boy. - -“Broke, eh?” said Surething Pete. His eye, though bleary, was keen. -Then he tendered a quarter. “Take this and go and eat. I’ll wait for you -here. Come back in fifteen minutes and I’ll put you in line to make some -money. I’d give you more, but I’m afraid you wouldn’t return.” - -Make money! I bolted two eggs and a cup of coffee and was back in ten -minutes. Surething’s second shoe was receiving its last polish. He -paid the artist, and then turning led me to a rear room of the nearby -ginmill. - -“This is it,” said Surething. His voice was rum-husky but he made -himself clear. “There’s the special race between Prince Rupert and -Creole Belle. You know about that?” - -Of course I knew. These cracks had been especially matched against -each other. It would be a great contest; the odds were five to three on -Prince Rupert; thousands were being wagered; the fraternity had talked -of nothing else for three weeks. Of course I knew! - -“Well,” went on Surething, “I’ve been put wrong, understand! I’ve got -my bundle on Creole Belle and stand to win a fortune if Prince Rupert -is beaten. I supposed that I’d got his driver fixed. I paid this crook -a thousand cold and gave him tickets on Creole Belle which stand him to -win five thousand more to throw the race. But now, with the race to be -called at two o’clock, I get it straight he’s out to double-cross me. -He’ll drive Rupert to win; an’ if he does I’m a gone fawnskin. But I’ve -thought of another trick.” - -Then suddenly: “I’ll tell you what you do; get into this wagon outside -and come with me.” - -With the last word, Surething again headed for the street. We took -a carriage that stood at the door. In thirty minutes we were on the -Charter ‘Oak track. At this early hour, we had the course to ourselves. -Surething walked up the homestretch until we arrived at a point midway -between the half mile post and the entrance to the stretch. - -“See that tree?” said Surething, and he pointed to a huge buttonwood--a -native--that stood perhaps twenty feet inside the rail. “Come over and -take a look at it.” - -The great buttonwood was hollow; or rather a half had been torn away -by some storm. What remained, however, was growing green and strong -and stood in such fashion towards the course that it offered a perfect -hiding place. By lying close within the hollow one was screened from any -who might drive along. - -“This is the proposition,” continued Surething, when I had taken in -the convenient buttonwood and its advantages. “This Rupert can beat the -Belle if he’s driven. But he’s as nervous as a girl. If a fly should -light on him he’d go ten feet in the air--understand? Here now is what -I want of you. I’ll tell you what you’re to do; then I’ll tell you what -you’re to get. I want you to plant yourself behind this tree--better -come here as early as the noon hour. The track ’ll be clear and no -one’ll see you go under cover, understand! As I say, I want you to plant -yourself in the sheltering hollow of this buttonwood. You ought to -have three rocks--say as big as a guinea’s egg--three stones, d’ye see, -’cause the race is heats, best three in five. You must lay dead so no -one’ll get on. As Rupert and the Belle sweep ’round the curve for the -stretch, you want to let ’em get a trifle past you. Then you’re to -step out and nail Rupert--he’ll have the pole without a doubt--and nail -Rupert, I say, with a rock. That’ll settle him; he’ll be up in the air -like a swallow-bird. It’ll give the Belle the heat.” Having gotten thus -far, Surething fell into a mighty fit of coughing; his face congested -and his eyes rolled. For a moment I feared that apoplexy--my father’s -death--might take him in the midst of his hopeful enterprise and deprive -me of this chance of riches. I was not a little relieved therefore when -he somewhat recovered and went on: “That trick’s as safe as seven-up,” - continued Surething. “You’ll be alone up here, as everybody else will -be down about the finish. The drivers, driving like mad, won’t see -you--won’t see anything but their horses’ ears. You must get Rupert--get -him three times--every time he comes’round--understand?” - -I understood. - -“Right you are,” concluded Surething. “And to make it worth your while, -here are tickets on the Belle that call for five hundred dollars if she -wins. And here’s a dollar also for a drink and another feed to steady -your wrists for the stonethrowing.” - -It will seem strange and may even attract resentment that I, a college -graduate and come of good folk, should accept such commission from a -felon like Surething Pete. All I say is that I did accept it; was glad -to get it; and for two hours before the great contest between Prince -Rupert and Creole Belle was called, I lay ensconced in my buttonwood -ambush, armed of three stones like David without the sling, ready to -play my part towards the acquirement of those promised hundreds. -And with that, my thoughts were on my mother. The money would count -handsomely to procure me proper clothes and take me home. To me the -proposed bombardment of the nervous Rupert appeared an opportunity -heaven-sent when my need was most. - -For fear of discovery and woe to follow, I put my tickets in the hands -of one who, while as poor as I, could yet be trusted. He was, if the -Belle won, to cash them; and should I be observed at my sleight of hand -work and made to fly, he would meet me in a near-by village with the -proceeds. - -At prompt two o’clock the race was called. There were bustling crowds -of spectators; but none came near my hiding place, as Surething Pete -had foreseen. The horses got off with the second trial. They trotted as -steadily as clockwork. As the pair rounded the second curve they were -coming like the wind; drivers leaning far forward in their sulkies, -eagle of glance, steady of rein, soothing with encouraging words, and -“sending them,” as the phrase is, for every inch. It was a splendid race -and splendidly driven, with Rupert on the pole and a half length to the -good. They flashed by my post like twin meteors. - -As they passed I stepped free of my buttonwood; and then, as unerringly -as one might send a bullet--for I had not been long enough from school -to forget how to throw--my first pebble, full two ounces, caught the -hurrying Rupert in mid-rib. - -Mighty were the results. Prince Rupert leaped into the -air--stumbled--came almost to a halt--then into the air a second -time--and following that, went galloping and pitching down the course, -his driver sawing and whipping in distracted alternation. Meanwhile, -Creole Belle slipped away like a spirit in harness and finished a wide -winner. I took in results from my buttonwood. There was no untoward -excitement about the grandstand or among the judges. Good; I was not -suspected! - -There ensued a long wait; planted close to my tree I wearied with the -aching length of it. Then Rupert and the Belle were on the track again. -The gong sounded; I heard the word “Go!” even in my faraway hiding; -the second heat was on. It was patterned of the first; the two took the -curve and flew for the head of the stretch as they did before; Rupert on -the pole and leading with half a length. I repeated the former success. -The stone struck poor Rupert squarely. He shot straight toward the skies -and all but fell in the sulky when he came down. It was near to ending -matters; for Rupert regained his feet in scantiest time to get inside -the distance flag before the Belle streamed under the wire. - -Creole Belle! two straight heats! What a row and a roar went up about -the pools! What hedging was done! From five to three on Rupert the -odds shifted to seven to two on Creole Belle. I could hear the riot and -interpret it. I clung closely to the protecting buttonwood; there was -still a last act before the play was done. - -It was the third heat. The pace, comparatively, was neither hot nor -hard; the previous exertions of both Rupert and the Belle had worn -away the wire edge and abated their appetites for any utmost speed. -Relatively, however, conditions were equal and each as tired as the -other; and as Rupert was the quicker in the get-away and never failed of -the pole in the first quarter, the two as they neared me offered the old -picture of Rupert on the rail and leading by half his length. - -Had I owned a better chance of observation, I might have noted as -Prince Rupert drew near the buttonwood that his mind was not at ease. He -remembered those two biting flints; they were lessons not lost on -him. As I stepped from concealment to hurl my last stone, it is to -be believed that Rupert--his alarmed eyes roving for lions in his -path--glimpsed me. Certain it is that as the missile flew from my hand, -Rupert swerved across the track, the hub of his sulky narrowly missing -the shoulder of the mare. - -The sudden shift confused my markmanship, and instead of Rupert, the -stone smote the driver on the ear and all but swept him from his seat. -It did the work, however; whether from the stone, the whip, or that -state of general perturbation wherein his fell experiences had left his -nerves, Rupert went fairly to pieces. Before he was on his feet again -and squared away, the Belle had won. - -Peeping from my hiding place I could tell that my adroit interference -in the late contest was becoming the subject of public concern. Rupert’s -driver, still sitting in his sulky, was holding high his whip in -professional invocation of the judges’ eyes. And that ill-used horseman -was talking; at intervals he pointed with the utmost feeling towards my -butonwood. Nor was his oratory without power; he had not discoursed long -when amid an abundance of shouts and oaths and brandished canes, one -thousand gentlemen of the turf were under head in my direction. - -It was interesting, but I did not stay in contemplation of the -spectacle; I out and bolted. I crossed the track and ran straight for -the end fence. This latter barrier looked somewhat high; I made no essay -to climb, but, picking a broadest board, launched myself against it, -shoulder on. The board fell and I was through the gap and in an open -field. - -But why waste time with that hustling hue and cry? It was futile for -all its indignant energy; I promise you, I made good my distance. Young, -strung like a harp, with a third of a mile start and able to speed like -a deer, I ran the hunt out of sight in the first ten minutes. It was all -earnestness, that flight of mine. I fled through three villages and a -puny little river that fell across my path. I welcomed the river, for I -knew it would cool the quest. - -Of a verity! I got my money, and my stone throwing was not to be in -vain. True, the driver and the owner of Rupert both protested, but the -track statutes were inexorable. The judges could take no cognizance of -that cannonading from the buttonwood and gave the race--three straight -heats--to Creole Belle. Surething Pete won his thousands; and as for me, -my friend and I encountered according to our tryst and he brought me my -money safe. Within fifteen hours from that time when I dealt disaster to -Rupert from the sheltering buttonwood, clothed and in respectable tears, -I was kneeling by my mother’s side and taking what sorrowful joy I -might for having arrived while she was yet equal to the bestowal of her -blessing. - -***** - -It was to be our last evening about the great stone fireplace; the last -of our stories would be told. The roads were now broken, and though a -now-and-then upset was more than likely to enliven one’s goings about, -sleighs and sleds as schemes of conveyance were pronounced to be among -things possible. As we drew our chairs about the blaze, the jangle of -an occasional leash of bells showed how some brave spirit was even then -abroad. - -Under these inspiring conditions, the Sour Gentleman and the Red Nosed -Gentleman declared their purpose of on the morrow pressing for the -railway station eighteen miles away. To this end they had already -chartered a sleigh, and the word was out that it be at the Inn door by -ten of the morning clock. - -For myself, nothing was driving me of business or concern, and I was in -no haste to leave; and the Old Cattleman and his ward, Sioux Sam, were -also of a mind to abide where they were for a farther day or two at -least. But the going of the Sour Gentleman and the Red Nosed Gentleman -would destroy our circle, wherefore we were driven to regard this as -“our last evening,” and to crown it honorably the Jolly Doctor brewed a -giant bowl of what he described as punch. The others, both by voice -and the loyalty wherewith they applied themselves to its disappearance, -avowed its excellencies, and on that point Sioux Sam and I were content -to receive their words. - -The Red Nosed Gentleman--who had put aside his burgundy in compliment to -the Jolly Doctor and his punch, and seemed sensibly exhilarated by this -change of beverage--was the first to give the company a story. It was of -his younger, green-cloth days, and the title by which he distinguished -it was “When I Ran the Shotgun.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXIII.--WHEN I RAN THE SHOTGUN. - -About this time the city of Providence fell midspasm in a fit of -civic morality. Communities, like individuals, are prone to starts of -strenuous virtue, and Providence, bewailing her past iniquities, was -pushing towards a pure if not a festive life. And because in this new -mood to be excellent it was the easiest, nearest thing, Providence smote -upon the gambling brotherhood with the heavy hand of the police. The -faro games and wheels of roulette were swept away and more than one -who had shared their feverish profits were sent into captivity. Yea -forsooth! the gay fraternity of fortune whose staff of life was cards -found themselves borne upon with the burden of bad days. - -For myself I conceived this to be the propitious moment to open a faro -room of my own. I had been for long of the guild of gamblers yet had -never soared to the brave heights of proprietorship. I had bucked the -games, but never dealt them. It came to me as a thought that in the -beating midst of this moral tempest dwelt my opportunity. Had I chosen -a day of police apathy--an hour of gambling security--for such a move, I -would have been set upon by every established proprietor. He would -have resented my rivalry as a game warden would the intromissions of a -poacher. And I’d have been wiped out--devoured horn and hide and hoof as -by a band of wolves. - -Under these new conditions of communal virtue, however, and with the -clan of former proprietors broken and dispersed, the field was free -of menace from within; I would face no risk more grievous than the -constabulary. These latter I believed I might for a season avoid; -particularly if I unveiled my venture in regions new and not theretofore -the home of such lawless speculation. - -Filled with these thoughts, I secured apartments sufficiently obscure -and smuggled in the paraphernalia under cloud of night. The room was -small--twenty feet square; there was space for no more than one faro -table, and with such scant furnishing I went to work. For reasons which -now escape me I called my place “The Shotgun.” - -Heretofore I gave you assurance of the lapse of years since last I -gambled at any game save the Wall Street game of stocks. I quit cards -for that they were disreputable and the gains but small. Stocks, on -the contrary, are endorsed as “respectable;” at stocks one may gamble -without forfeiture of position; also, there exist no frontiers to the -profits which a cunning stock plan well executed may bring. - -In my old simpler days, I well recall those defences of the pure gambler -wherein my regard indulged. Elia once separated humanity into two -tribes--those who borrow and those who lend. In my younger philosophy I -also saw two septs: those who lose and those who win. To me all men were -gamblers. Life itself was one continuous game of chance; and the stakes, -that shelter and raiment and food and drink to compose the body’s -bulwark against an instant conquest by Death. Of the inherent morality -of gambling I nurtured no doubts. Or, at the worst, I felt certain of -its comparative morality when laid beside such commerces as banks and -markets and fields of plain barter and sale. There is no trade (I said) -save that of the hands which is held by the tether of any honesty. The -carpenter sawing boards, the smith who beats out a horseshoe, the -mason busy with trowel and mortar on sun-blistered scaffolds, hoarsely -shouting “More bricks!” they in their way of life are honest. They are -bound to integrity because they couldn’t cheat if they would. But is the -merchant selling the false for the real--the shoddy for the true--is the -merchant whose advertisements are as so many false pretences paid for by -the line--is he more honest than the one who cheats with cards? Is the -lawyer looking looks of wisdom to hide the emptiness of his ignorance? -Is the doctor, profound of mien, who shakes portentous head, medicining -a victim not because he has a malady but because he has a million -dollars? - -And if it become a question of fashion, why then, age in and age out, -the gambler has been often noble and sometimes royal. In the days of the -Stuarts, or later among the dull ones of Hanover, was it the peasant or -the prince who wagered his gold at cards? Why man! every royal court was -a gambling house; every king, save one--and he disloved and at the -last insane--a gambler. Are not two-thirds of the homes of our American -nobility--our folk of millions and Fifth Avenue--replete of faro and -roulette and the very hotbed of a poisonous bridge whist? Fy, man, fy! -you who denounce gambling but preach your own plebeianism--proclaim your -own vulgarity! The gambler has been ever the patrician. - -With but one table, whereat I would preside as dealer, I required no -multitude to man The Shotgun. I called to my aid three gentlemen of -fortune--seedy and in want they were and glad to earn a dollar. One was -to be sentinel at the door, one would perch Argus-like on the -lookout’s stool, while the third,--an old suspicious camp-follower of -Chance,--kept the case. This latter, cautious man! declined my service -unless I put steel bars on the only door, and as well on the only -window. These he conceived to be some safeguard against invasions. They -were not; but I spent money to put them in place to the end that his -fluttered nerves be stilled and he won to my standard. And at that, he -later pursued his business as case-keeper with an ear on the door and -an eye on the small barred window, sitting the while half aloof from the -table and pushing the case-buttons as the cards fell from the box with -a timid forefinger and as though he proposed no further immersion in -current crime than was absolutely demanded by the duties of his place. -He sat throughout the games a picture of apprehension. - -For myself, and to promote my profits, I gave both my people and my -customers every verbal bond of safety. The story went abroad that I was -“protected;” that no wolf of the police dared so much as glance at flock -of mine. The Shotgun was immune of arrest, so ran the common tale, and -as much as leer and look and smile and shrug of shoulder might furnish -them I gave the story wings. - -This public theory of safety was necessary to success. In the then -hectic conditions, and briskly in the rear of a stern suppression of -resorts that had flourished for decades unshaken of the law, wanting -this feeling of security there would have come not one dollar to take -its hopeful chances at The Shotgun. As it was, however, the belief that -I lived amply “protected” took prompt deep root. And the fact that -The Shotgun opened in the face of storms which smote without pity upon -others, was itself regarded as proof beyond dispute. No one would -court such dangers unless his footing were as unshakable as Gibraltar. -Thereupon folk with a heart for faro came blithely and stood four deep -about my one table; vast was the business I accomplished and vast were -the sums changed in. And behold! I widely prospered. - -When I founded The Shotgun, I was richer of hope than of money; but -fortune smiled and within a fortnight my treasure was told by thousands. -Indeed, my patrons played as play those who are starved to gamble; that -recess of faro enforced of the police had made them hawk-hungry. And my -gains rolled in. - -While I fostered the common thought that no interference of the law -would occur and The Shotgun was sacred ground, I felt within my own -breast a sense of much unsafety. Damocles with his sword--hung of a hair -and shaken of a breeze--could have been no more eaten of unease. I knew -that I was wooing disaster, challenging a deepest peril. The moment The -Shotgun became a part of police knowledge, I was lost. - -Still, I dealt on; the richness of my rewards the inducement and the -optimism of the born gambler giving me courage to proceed. It fed my -vanity, too, and hugely pleased my pride to be thus looked upon as -eminent in my relations with the powers that ruled. They were proud, -even though parlous days, those days when I ran The Shotgun. - -While I walked the field of my enterprise like a conqueror, I was not -without the prudence that taketh account in advance and prepareth for a -fall. Aside from the table whereon dwelt the layout, box and check rack, -and those half-dozen chairs which encircled it, the one lone piece of -furniture which The Shotgun boasted was a rotund lounge. Those who -now and then reposed themselves thereon noted and denounced its nard -unfitness. There was neither softness nor spring to that lounge; to sit -upon it was as though one sat upon a Saratoga trunk. But it was in -a farthest corner and distant as much as might be from the game; and -therefore there arose but few to try its indurated merits and complain. - -That lounge of unsympathetic seat was my secret--my refuge--my last -resort. I alone was aware of its construction; and that I might be thus -alone, I had been to hidden and especial pains to bring it from New York -myself. That lounge was no more, no less than a huge, capacious box. -You might lift the seat and it would open like a trunk. Within was ample -room for one to lie at length. Once in one could let down the cover and -lock it on the inside; that done, there again it stood to the casual -eye, a lounge, nothing save a lounge and neither hint nor token of the -fugitive within. - -My plan to save myself when the crash should come was plain and sure. -There were but two lights--gas jets, both--in The Shotgun; these were -immediately above the table, low hung and capped with green shades to -save the eyes of players. The light was reflected upon the layout; -all else was in the shadow. This lack of light was no drawback to my -popularity. Your folk who gamble cavil not at shadows for themselves so -long as cards and deal-box are kept strongly in the glare. In event of -a raid, it was my programme to extinguish the two lights--a feat easily -per-formable from the dealer’s chair--and seizing the money in the -drawer, grope my way under cover of darkness for that excellent lounge -and conceal myself. It would be the work of a moment; the folk would be -huddled about the table and not about the lounge; the time lost by the -police while breaking through those defences of bars and bolts would be -more than enough. - -By the time the lights were again turned on and the Goths in possession, -I would have disappeared. No one would know how and none know where. -When the blue enemy, despairing of my apprehension, had at last -withdrawn with what prisoners had been made, I would be left alone. I -might then uncover myself and take such subsequent flight as best became -my liberty and its continuance. - -Often I went over this plan in my thoughts--a fashion of mental -rehearsal, as it were--and the more I considered the more certain I -became that when the pinch arrived it would not fail. As I’ve stated, -none shared with me my secret of that hinged and hollow couch; it was -my insurance--my cave of retreat in any tornado of the law; and the -knowledge thereof steadied me and aided my courage to compose those airs -of cheerful confidence which taught others safety and gave countenance -to the story of my unqualified and sure “protection!” Alas! for the hour -that unmasked me; from that moment The Shotgun fell away; my stream -of golden profits ran dry; from a spectacle of reverence and respect I -became the nine-day byword of my tribe! - -It was a crowded, thriving midnight at The Shotgun. I had been running -an uninterrupted quartette of months; and having had good luck to the -point of miracles, my finances were flourishing with five figures -in their plethoric count. From a few poor hundreds, my “roll” when I -snapped the rubber band about it and planted it deep within the safety -of my pocket, held over fifty thousand dollars. Quite a fortune; and so -I thought myself. - -It was, I repeat, a busy, winning midnight at The Shotgun. There were -doubtless full forty visitors in the cramped room. These were crowded -about the table, for the most part playing, reaching over each other’s -shoulders or under each other’s elbows, any way and every way to get -their wagers on the layout. I was dealing, while to right and left sat -my henchmen of the lookout and the case. - -As on every evening, I lived on the feather-edge of apprehension, -fearing a raid. My eye might be on the thirteen cards and the little -fortunes they carried, but my ear was ever alert for a first dull -footfall that would tell of destruction on its lowering way. - -There had been four hours of brisk, remunerative play--for the game -began at eight--when, in the middle of a deal, there came the rush of -heavy feet and a tumult of stumblings and blunderings on the stair. -It was as if folk unaccustomed to the way--it being pitch dark on the -stairway for caution’s sake--and in vast eagerness to reach the door, -had tripped and fallen. Also, if one might judge from the uproar and -smothered, deep profanity of many voices there were a score engaged. - -To my quick intelligence, itself for long on the rack of expectancy and -therefore doubly keen, there seemed but one answer to the question, of -that riot on the stair. It was the police; the Philistines were upon me; -my gold mine of The Shotgun had become the target of a raid! - -It was the labor of an instant. With both hands I turned out the lights; -then stuffing my entire fortune into my pockets I began to push through -the ranks of bewildered gentlemen who stood swearing in frightened -undertones expecting evil. Silently and with a cat’s stealth, I found my -way in the pitch blackness to the lounge. As I had foreseen, no one was -about it to discover or to interfere. Softly I raised the cover; in a -moment I was within. Lying on my side for comfort’s sake, I again turned -ear to passing events. I had locked the lounge and believed myself -insured. - -Meanwhile, within the room and in the hall beyond my grated door, the -tumult gathered and grew. There came various exclamations. - -“Who doused those glims?” - -“Light up, somebody.” - -Also, there befell a volley of blows and kicks and thumps on The -Shotgun’s iron portals; and gruff commands: - -“Open the door!” - -Then some one produced a match and relighted the gas. I might tell that -by a ray about the size and color of a wheat-straw which suddenly bored -its yellow way through a hole in my shelter. The clamor still proceeded -at the door; it seemed to augment. - -Since there could be no escape--for every soul saw himself caught like a -rat in a trap--the door was at last unbarred and opened, desperately. Of -what avail would it be to force the arresting party to break its way? In -despair the door was thrown wide and each of those within braced himself -to meet his fate. After all, to visit a gambling place was not the -great crime; the cornered ones might feel fairly secure. It was the -“proprietor” for whom the law kept sharpest tooth! - -When the door opened, it opened to the admission of a most delightful -disappointment. There appeared no police; no grim array of those -sky-hued watch-dogs of the city’s peace and order rushed through -in search of quarry. Instead came innocently, deviously, and with -uncertain, shuffling steps, five separate drunken gentlemen. There -had been a dinner; they had fed deeply, drunk deeply; it was now their -pleasure to relax themselves at play. That was all; they had sought The -Shotgun with the best of motives; the confusion on the stair was the -offspring of darkness and drink when brought to a conjunction. Now they -were within, and reading in the faces about them--even through the mists -of their condition--the terrors their advent inspired, the visiting -sots were much abashed; they stood silent, and like the lamb before the -shearer, they were dumb and opened not their mouths. - -But discovering a danger past, the general mood soon changed. There was -a space of tacit staring; then came a rout of laughter. Every throat, -lately so parched, now shouted with derision. The common fear became the -common jeer. - -Then up started the surprised question: - -“Where’s Jack?” - -It had origin with one to be repeated by twenty. - -“Where’s Jack?” - -The barred window was still barred; I had not gone through the door; how -had I managed my disappearance? It was witchery!--or like the flitting -of a ghost! Even in my refuge I could feel the awe and the chill that -began to creep about my visitors as they looked uneasily and repeated, -as folk who touch some graveyard mystery: - -“Where’s Jack?” - -There was no help; fate held me in a corner and never a crack of escape! -Shame-faced, dust-sprinkled and perspiring like a harvest hand--for my -hiding place was not Nova Zembla--I threw back the top of the lounge and -stood there--the image of confusion--the “man with a pull”--the ally -of the powers--the “protected” proprietor of The Shotgun! There was a -moment of silence; and next fell a whirlwind of mirth. - -There is no argument for saying more. I was laughed out of Providence -and into New York. The Shotgun was laughed out of existence. And with -it all, I too, laughed; for was it not good, even though inadvertent -comedy? Also, was it not valuable comedy to leave me better by half a -hundred thousand dollars--that comedy of The Shotgun? And thereupon, -while I closed my game, I opened my mouth widely and laughed with the -others. In green-cloth circles the story is still told; and whenever -I encounter a friend of former days, I’m inevitably recalled to my -lounge-holdout and that midnight stampede of The Shotgun. - -***** - -“That’s where the west,” observed the Old Cattleman, who had given -delighted ear to the Red Nosed Gentleman’s story, “that’s where the -west has the best of the east. In Arizona a passel of folks engaged -in testin’ the demerits of farobank ain’t runnin’ no more resks of the -constables than they be of chills an’ fever.” - -“There are laws against gambling in the west?” This from the Jolly -Doctor. - -“Shore, thar’s laws.” - -“Why, then, aren’t they enforced?” - -“This yere’s the reason,” responded the Old Cattleman. “Thar’s so much -more law than force, that what force exists is wholly deevoted to a -round-up of rustlers an’ stage hold-ups an’ sech. Besides, it’s the -western notion to let every gent skin his own eel, an’ the last thing -thought of is to protect you from yourse’f. No kyard sharp can put a -crimp in you onless you freely offers him a chance, an’ if you-all is -willin’, why should the public paint for war? In the east every gent is -tryin’ to play some other gent’s hand; not so in that tolerant -region styled the west. Which it ain’t too much to say that folks get -killed--an’ properly--in the west for possessin’ what the east calls -virchoos.” And here the Old Cattleman shook his head sagely over a -western superiority. “The east mixes itse’f too much in a gent’s private -affairs. Now if Deef Smith an’ Colonel Morton” he concluded, “had -ondertook to pull off their dooel in the east that Texas time, the east -would have come down on ’em like a failin’ star an’ squelched it.” - -“And what was this duel you speak of?” asked the Sour Gentleman. “I, for -one, would be most ready to hear the story.1’ - -“Which it’s the story of ‘When the Capitol Was Moved.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XXIV.--WHEN THE CAPITOL WAS MOVED. - -When the joobilant Texans set down to kyarve out the destinies of that -empire they wrests from the feeble paws of the Mexicans an’ Santa Anna, -they decides on Austin for the Capitol an’ Old Houston to be President. -An’ I’ll say right yere, Old Houston, by all roomer an’ tradition, is -mighty likely the most presidential president that ever keeps a republic -guessin’ as to whatever is he goin’ to do next. Which he’s as full of -surprises as a night in Red Dog. - -About the first dash outen the box, Old Houston gets himse’f into -trouble with two Lone Star leadin’ citizens whose names, respective, is -Colonel Morton an’ jedge Webb. - -Old Houston himse’f on the hocks of them vict’ries he partic’pates in, -an’ bein’ selected president like I say, grows as full of vanity as -a prairie dog. Shore! he’s a hero; the drawback is that his notion of -demeanin’ himse’f as sech is to spread his tail feathers an’ strut. -Old Houston gets that puffed up, an’ his dignity is that egreegious, he -feels crowded if a gent tries to walk on the same street with him. - -Colonel Morton an’ Jedge Webb themse’fs wades through that carnage from -soda to hock freein’ Texas, an’ they sort o’ figgers that these yere -services entitles them to be heard some. Old Houston, who’s born with a -notion that he’s doo’ to make what public uproar every o’casion demands, -don’t encourage them two patriots. He only listens now an’ then to -Morton; an’ as for Jedge Webb, he jest won’t let that jurist talk at -all. - -“An’ for these yere followin’ reasons to wit,” explains Old Houston, -when some Austin sports puts it to him p’lite, but steadfast, that he’s -onjust to Webb. “I permits Morton to talk some, because it don’t make a -splinter of difference what Morton says. He can talk on any side of any -subject an’ no one’s ediot enough to pay the least attention to them -remarks. But this sityooation is changed when you-all gets to Webb. He’s -a disaster. Webb never opens his mouth without subtractin’ from the sum -total of hooman knowledge.” - -[Illustration: 0369] - -When Morton hears of them remarks he re-gyards himse’f as wronged. - -“An’ if Old Houston,” observes Morton, who’s a knife fighter an’ has -sliced offensive gents from time to time; “an’ if Old Houston ain’t more -gyarded in his remarks, I’ll take to disapprovin’ of his conduct with a -bowie.” - -As I intimates, Old Houston is that pride-blown that you-all couldn’t -stay on the same range where he is. An’ he’s worried to a standstill for -a openin’ to onload on the Texas public a speciment of his dignity. At -last, seein’ the chances comin’ some slow, he ups an’ constructs the -opportunity himse’f. - -Old Houston’s home-camp, that a-way, is at a hamlet named Washin’ton -down on the Brazos. It’s thar he squanders the heft of his leesure when -not back of the game as President over to Austin. Thar’s a clause in -the constitootion which, while pitchin’ onto Austin as the public’s -home-ranche or capitol, permits the President in the event of perils -onforeseen or invasions or sech, to round up the archives an’ move the -capitol camp a whole lot. Old Houston, eager to be great, seizes onto -this yere tenet. - -“I’ll jest sort o’ order the capitol to come down, yere where I live -at,” says Old Houston, “an’ tharby call the waverin’ attention of the -Lone Star public to who I be.” - -As leadin’ up to this atrocity an’ to come within the constitootion, -Old Houston allows that Austin is menaced by Comanches. Shore, it -ain’t menaced none; Austin would esteem the cleanin’ out of that -entire Comanche tribe as the labors of a holiday. But it fills into Old -Houston’s hand to make this bluff as a excuse. An’ with that, he issues -the order to bring the whole gov’ment layout down to where he lives. - -No, as I tells you-all before, Austin ain’t in no more danger of -Comanches than she is of j’inin’ the church. Troo, these yere rannikaboo -savages does show up in paint an’ feathers over across the Colorado once -or twice; but beyond a whoop or two an’ a little permiscus shootin’ into -town which nobody minds, them vis’tations don’t count. - -To give you-all gents a idee how little is deemed of Comanches by them -Texas forefathers, let me say a word of Bill Spence who keeps a store -in Austin. Bill’s addin’ up Virg Horne’s accounts one afternoon in his -books. - -“One pa’r of yaller-top, copper-toe boots for Virg, joonior, three -dollars; one red cal’co dress for Missis Virg, two dollars,” goes on -Bill. - -At this epock Bill hears a yowl; glancin’ out of the winder, he counts a -couple of hundred Injuns who’s proselytin’ about over on t’other side of -the river. Bill don’t get up none; he jests looks annoyed on account of -that yellin’ puttin’ him out in his book-keepin’. - -As a bullet from them savages comes singin’ in the r’ar door an’ buries -itse’f in a ham, Bill even gets incensed. - -“Hiram,” he calls to his twelve-year old son, who’s down cellar drawin’ -red-eye for a customer; “Hiram, you-all take pop’s rifle, raise the -hindsight for three hundred yards, an’ reprove them hostiles. Aim low, -Hiram, an’ if you fetches one, pop’ll give you a seegyar an’ let you -smoke it yourse’f.” - -Bill goes back to Virg Horne’s account, an’ Hiram after slammin’ away -with Bill’s old Hawkins once or twice comes in an’ gets his seegyar. - -No; Old Houston does wrong when he flings forth this yere ukase about -movin’ the capitol. Austin, even if a gent does have to dodge a arrer -or duck a bullet as he prosecootes his daily tasks, is as safe as a -camp-meetin’. - -When Old Houston makes the order, one of his Brazos pards reemonstrates -with him. - -“Which Austin will simply go into the air all spraddled out,” says this -pard. - -“If Austin sails up in the air an’ stays thar,” says Old Houston, “still -you-all can gamble that this yere order goes.” - -“You hears,” says another, “Elder Peters when he tells of how a Mexican -named Mohammed commands the mountain to come to him? But the mountain -calls his bluff; that promontory stands pat, an’ Mohammed has to go to -the mountain.” - -“My name’s Sam Houston an’ it ain’t Mo-hommed,” retorts Old Houston. -“Moreover, Mohammed don’t have no written constitootion.” - -Nacherally, when Austin gets notice of Old Houston’s plan, that -meetropolis r’ars back an’ screams. The faro-bank folks an’ the tavern -folks is speshul malignant, an’ it ain’t no time before they-all -convenes a meetin’ to express their views on Old Houston. Morton an’ -Jedge Webb does the oratory. An’ you hear me! that assembly is shore -sultry. Which the epithets they applies to Old Houston kills the grass -for twenty rods about. - -Austin won’t move. - -Austin resolves to go to war first; a small army is organized with -Morton in command to gyard the State House an’ the State books that -a-way, an’ keep Old Houston from romancin’ over an’ packin’ ’em off a -heap. - -Morton is talkin’ an’ Webb is presidin’ over this yere -convocation--which the said meetin’ is that large an’ enthoosiastic it -plumb chokes up the hall an’ overflows into the street--when all of a -sudden a party comes swingin’ through the open winder from the top of -a scrub-oak that grows alongside the buildin’, an’ drops light as a -cat onto the platform with Morton an’ Webb. At this yere interruption, -affairs comes to a halt, an’ the local sports turns in to consider an’ -count up the invader. - -This gent who swoops through the winder is dark, big, bony an’ tall; his -ha’r is lank an’ long as the mane of a hoss; his eyes is deep an’ black; -his face, tanned like a Injun’s, seems hard as iron. He’s dressed -in leather from foretop to fetlock, is shod with a pa’r of Comanche -moccasins, an’ besides a ’leven inch knife in his belt, packs a rifle -with a 48-inch bar’l. It will weigh twenty pounds, an’ yet this stranger -handles it like it’s a willow switch. - -As this darksome gent lands in among Morton an’ Webb, he stands thar -without sayin’ a word. Webb, on his part, is amazed, while Morton -glowers. - -“Whatever do you-all regyard as a market price for your skelp?’” says -Morton to the black interloper, at the same time loosenin’ his knife. - -The black stranger makes no reply; his hand flashes to his bowie, while -his face still wears its iron look. - -Webb, some hurried, pushes in between Morton an’ the black stranger. -Webb is more for peace an’ don’t believe in beginnin’ negotiations with -a knife. - -Webb dictates a passel of p’lite queries to this yere black stranger. -Tharupon, the black stranger bows p’lite an’ formal, an’ goin’ over to -the table writes down in good English, “I’m deef an’ dumb.” Next, he -searches outen his war-bags a letter. It’s from Old Houston over on the -Brazos. Old Houston allows that onless Austin comes trailin’ in with -them records within three days, he’ll ride over a whole lot an’ make the -round-up himse’f. Old Houston declar’s that Austin by virchoo of them -Comanches is as on-safe as a Christian in Mississippi, an’ he don’t aim -to face no sech dangers while performin’ his dooties as President of the -Commonwealth. - -After the black stranger flings the letter on the table, he’s organizin’ -to go out through the winder ag’in. But Morton sort o’ detains him. -Morton writes on the paper that now the black stranger is through his -dooties as a postman, he will, if he’s a dead game sport, stay over a -day, an’ him an’ Morton will entertain themse’fs by pullin’ off a war of -their own. The idee strikes the black stranger as plenty good, an’ -while his face still wears its ca’m, hard look, he writes onder Morton’s -bluff: - -“Rifles; no’th bank of the Colorado; sun-down, this evenin’.” - -The next moment he leaps from the platform to the winder an’ from thar -to the ground, an’ is gone. - -“But Colonel Morton,” reemonstrates Webb, who’s some scand’lized at -Morton hookin’ up for blood with this yere black stranger; “you-all -shorely don’t aim to fight this party? He’s deef an’ dumb, which is next -to bein’ locoed outright. Moreover, a gent of your standin’ can’t afford -to go ramblin’ about, lockin’ horns with every on-known miscreant who -comes buttin’ in with a missif from President Houston, an’ then goes -stampedin’ through a winder by way of exit.” - -“Onknown!” retorts Morton. “That letterpackin’ person is as well known -as the Rio Grande. That’s Deef Smith.” - -“Colonel Morton,” observes Webb, some horrified when he learns the name -of the black stranger, “this yere Deef Smith is a shore shot. They -say he can empty a Comanche saddle four times in five at three hundred -yards.” - -“That may be as it may,” returns Morton. “If I downs him, so much the -more credit; if he gets me, at the worst I dies by a famous hand.” - -The sun is restin’ on the sky-line over to the west. Austin has done -crossed the Colorado an’ lined up to witness this yere dooel. Deef Smith -comes ridin’ in from some’ers to the no’th, slides outen the saddle, -pats his hoss on the neck, an’ leaves him organized an’ ready fifty -yards to one side. Then Deef Smith steps to the center an’ touches his -hat, mil’tary fashion, to Morton an’ Webb. - -These yere cavaliers is to shoot it out at one hundred yards. As they -takes their places, Morton says: - -“Jedge Webb, if this Deef Smith party gets me, as most like he will, -send my watch to my mother in Looeyville.” - -Then they fronts each other; one in brown leather, the other in cloth -as good as gold can buy. No one thinks of any difference between ’em, -however, in a day when courage is the test of aristocracy. - -Since one gent can’t hear, Webb is to give the word with a handkerchief. -At the first flourish the rifles fall to a hor’zontal as still -an’ steady as a rock. Thar’s a brief pause; then Webb drops his -handkerchief. - -Thar is a crack like one gun; Deef Smith’s hat half turns on his head -as the bullet cuts it, while Morton stands a moment an’ then, without -a sound, falls dead on his face. The lead from Deef Smith’s big rifle -drills him through the heart. Also, since it perforates that gold -repeater, an’ as the blood sort o’ clogs the works, the Austin folks -decides it’s no use to send it on to Looeyville, but retains it that -a-way as a keepsake. - -With the bark of the guns an’ while the white smoke’s still hangin’ to -mark the spot where he stands, Deef Smith’s hoss runs to him like a -dog. The next instant Deef Smith is in the saddle an’ away. It’s jest -as well. Morton’s plenty pop’lar with the Austin folks an’ mebby some -sharp, in the first hysteria of a great loss, overlooks what’s doo to -honor an’ ups an’ plugs this yere Deef Smith. - -***** - -The Old Cattleman made a long halt as indicative that his story was at -an end. There was a moment of silence, and then the Jolly Doctor spoke -up. - -“But how about the books and papers?” asked the Jolly Doctor. - -“Oh, nothin’ partic’lar,” said the Old Cattleman. “It turns out like Old -Houston prophesies. Three days later, vain an’ soopercilious, he rides -in, corrals them archives, an’ totes ’em haughtily off to the Brazos.” - -Following the Old Cattleman’s leaf from Lone Star annals, the Sour -Gentleman prepared himself to give us his farewell page from the -unwritten records of the Customs. - -“On this, our last evening,” observed the Sour Gentleman, “it seems the -excellent thing to tell you what was practically my final act of service -or, if you will, disservice with the Customs. We may call the story ‘How -the Filibusterer Sailed.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XXV.--HOW THE FILIBUSTERER SAILED. - -It will come to you as strange, my friends, to hear objection--as -though against an ill trait--to that open-handed generosity which -is held by many to be among the marks of supreme virtue. Generosity, -whether it be evidenced by gifts of money, of sympathy, of effort or of -time, is only another word for weakness. If one were to go into careful -consideration of the life-failure of any man, it would be found most -often that his fortunes were slain by his generosity; and while, without -consideration, he gave to others his countenance, his friendship, his -money, his toil or whatever he conferred, he in truth but parted with -his own future--with those raw materials wherewith he would otherwise -have fashioned a victorious career. Generosity, in a commonest -expression, is giving more than one receives; it is to give two hundred -and get one hundred; he is blind, therefore, who does not see that any -ardor of generosity would destroy a Rothschild. - -From birth, and as an attribute inborn, I have been ever too quick to -give. For a first part of my life at least, and until I shackled -my impulse of liberality, I was the constant victim of that natural -readiness. And I was cheated and swindled with every rising sun. I gave -friendship and took pretense; I parted with money for words; ever I -rendered the real and received the false, and sold the substance for the -shadow to any and all who came pleasantly to smile across my counter. -I was not over-old, however, when these dour truths broke on me, and I -began to teach myself the solvent beauty of saying “No.” - -During those months of exile--for exile it was--which I spent in -Washington Square, I cultivated misanthropy--a hardness of spirit; -almost, I might say, I fostered a hatred of my fellow man. And more or -less I had success. I became owner of much stiffness of sentiment and a -proneness to be practical; and kept ever before me like a star that, no -matter how unimportant I might be to others, to myself at least I was -most important of mankind. Doubtless, I lost in grace by such studies; -but in its stead I succeeded to safety, and when we are at a final word, -we live by what we keep and die by what we quit, and of all loyalties -there’s no loyalty like loyalty to one’s self. - -While I can record a conquest of my generosity and its subjugation to -lines of careful tit-for-tat, there were other emotions against which -I was unable to toughen my soul. I became never so redoubtable that I -could beat off the assaults of shame; never so puissant of sentiment but -I was prey to regrets. For which weaknesses, I could not think on the -affairs of The Emperor’s Cigars and The German Girl’s Diamonds, nor on -the sordid money I pouched as their fruits, without the blush mounting; -nor was I strong enough to consider the latter adventure and escape a -stab of sore remorse. Later could I have found the girl I would have -made her restitution. Even now I hear again that scream which reached me -on the forward deck of the “Wolfgang” that September afternoon. - -But concerning the Cuban filibusterer, his outsailing against Spain; and -the gold I got for his going--for these I say, I never have experienced -either confusion or sorrow. My orders were to keep him in; I opened the -port’s gate and let him out; I pocketed my yellow profits. And under -equal conditions I would do as much again. It was an act of war against -Spain; yet why should one shrink from one’s interest for a reason like -that? Where was the moral wrong? Nations make war; and what is right for -a country, is right for a man. That is rock-embedded verity, if one will -but look, and that which is dishonest for an individual cannot be honest -for a flag. You may--if you so choose--make war on Spain, and with -as much of justice as any proudest people that ever put to sea. The -question of difference is but a question of strength; and so you be -strong enough you’ll be right enough, I warrant! For what says the -poet? - - “Right follows might - Like tail follows kite.” - -It is a merest truism; we hear it in the storm; the very waves are its -witnesses. Everywhere and under each condition, it is true. The proof -lies all about. We read it on every page of history; behold it when -armies overthrow a throne or the oak falls beneath the axe of the -woodman. Do I disfavor war? On the contrary, I approve it as an -institution of greatest excellence. War slays; war has its blood. But -has peace no victims? Peace kills thousands where war kills tens; and if -one is to consider misery, why then there be more starvation, more cold, -more pain, and more suffering in one year of New York City peace than -pinched and gnawed throughout the whole four years of civil war. And -human life is of comparative small moment. We say otherwise; we believe -otherwise; but we don’t act otherwise. Action is life’s text. Humanity -is itself the preacher; in that silent sermon of existence--an existence -of world’s goods and their acquirement--we forever show the thing of -least consequence to be the life of man. However, I am not myself to -preach, I who pushed forth to tell a story. It is the defect of age to -be garrulous, and as one’s power to do departs, its place is ever taken -by a weakness to talk. - -This filibusterer whom I liberated to sail against Spain, I long ago -told you was called Ryan. That, however, is a fictitious name; there was -a Ryan, and the Spaniards took his life at Santiago. And because he with -whom I dealt was also put up against a wall and riddled with Spanish -lead, and further, because it is not well to give his true name, I call -him Ryan now. His ship rode on her rope in New York bay; I was given the -Harriet Lane to hold him from sailing away; his owners ashore--merchants -these and folk on ’change--offered me ten thousand dollars; the gold -was in bags, forty pounds of it; I turned my back at evening and in the -morning he was gone. - -You have been told how I never thought on those adventures of The -Emperor’s Cigars, and The German Girl’s Diamonds, without sensations of -shame, and pain. Indeed! they were engagements of ignobility! Following -the latter affair I felt a strongest impulse to change somewhat my -occupation. I longed for an employment a bit safer and less foul. I -counted my fortunes; I was rich with over seventy thousand dollars; that -might do, even though I gained no more. And so it fell that I was almost -ready to leave the Customs, and forswear and, if possible, forget, those -sins I had helped commit in its name. - -In the former days, my home tribe was not without consequence in Old -Dominion politics. And while we could not be said to have strengthened -ourselves by that part we took against the Union, still, now that peace -was come, the family began little by little to regather a former weight. -It had enough at this time to interfere for my advantage and rescue me -from my present duty. I was detailed from Washington to go secretly to -Europe, make the careless tour of her capitols, and keep an eye alive to -the interests of both the Treasury and the State Department. - -It was a gentleman’s work; this loafing from London to Paris, and from -Paris to Berlin, with an occasional glance into Holland and its diamond -cutting. And aside from expenses--which were paid by the government--I -drew two salaries; one from the Customs and a second from the Secret -Service. My business was to detect intended smuggling and cable the -story, to the end that Betelnut Jack and Lorns and Quin and the others -make intelligent seizures when the smugglers came into New York. The -better to gain such news, I put myself on closest terms--and still keep -myself a secret--with chief folk among houses of export; I went about -with them, drank with them, dined with them; and I wheedled and lay in -ambush for information of big sales. I sent in many a good story; and -many a rich seizure came off through my interference. Also I lived -vastly among legation underlings, and despatched what I found to the -Department of State. There was no complaint that I didn’t earn my money -from either my customs or my secret service paymaster. In truth! I stood -high in their esteem. - -At times, too, I was baffled. There was a lady, the handsome wife of -a diamond dealer in Maiden Lane. She came twice a year to Europe. -Obviously and in plain view--like the vulgarian she was not--this -beautiful woman, as she went aboard ship in New York, would wear at -throat and ears and on her hands full two hundred thousand dollars’ -worth of stones--apparently. And there they seemed to be when she -returned; and, of course, never a dime of duty. We were morally sure -this beautiful woman was a beautiful smuggler; we were morally sure -those stones were paste when she sailed from New York; we were morally -sure they were genuine, of purest water, when she returned; we were -morally sure the shift was made in Paris, and that a harvest of -thousands was garnered with every trip. But what might we do? We had no -proof; we could get none; we could only guess. - -And there were other instances when we slipped. More than once I tracked -a would-be smuggler to his ship and saw him out of port. And yet, when -acting on my cables, the smuggler coming down the New York gang-plank -was snapped up by my old comrades and searched, nothing was found. -This mystery, for mystery it was, occurred a score of times. At last -we learned the trick. The particular room occupied by the smuggler was -taken both ways for a round dozen trips ahead. There were seven members -of the smuggling combine. When one left the room, his voyage ended, and -came ashore in New York, another went duly aboard and took possession -for the return trip. The diamonds had not gone ashore. They were hidden -in a sure place somewhere about the room; he who took it to go to Europe -knew where. And in those several times to follow when the outgoer was on -and off the boat before she cleared, he found no difficulty in carrying -the gems ashore. The Customs folk aren’t watching departures; their -vigilance is for those who arrive. However, after a full score of -defeats, we solved this last riddle, and managed a seizure which lost -the rogues what profits they had gathered on all the trips before. - -Also, as I pried about the smuggling industry, I came across more -than one interesting bit of knowledge. I found a French firm making -rubies--actual rubies. It was a great secret in my time, though more -is known of it now. The ruby was real; stood every test save the one -test--a hard one to enforce--of specific gravity. The made ruby was a -shadow lighter, bulk for bulk, than the true ruby of the mines. -This made ruby was called the “scientific ruby;” and indeed! it was -scientific to such a degree of delusion that the best experts were for -long deceived and rubies which cost no more than two hundred dollars to -make, were sold for ten thousand dollars. - -As a curious discovery of my ramblings, I stumbled on a diamond, the one -only of its brood. It was small, no more than three-quarters of a carat. -But of a color pure orange and--by day or by night--blazing like a spark -of fire. That stone if lost could be found; it is the one lone member of -its orange house. What was its fate? Set in the open mouth of a little -lion’s head, one may now find it on the finger of a prince of the -Bourse. - -It was while in Madrid, during my European hunting, that those seeds -were sown which a few months later grew into a smart willingness to let -down the bars for my filibusterer’s escape. I was by stress of duty held -a month in Madrid. And, first to last, I heard nothing from the natives -when they spoke of America but malediction and vilest epithet. It kept -me something warm, I promise, for all I had once ridden saber in hand to -smite that same American government hip and thigh. I left Madrid when my -work was done with never a moment’s delay; and I carried away a profound -hate for Spain and all things Spanish. - -As I was brought home by commands from my superiors at the end of my -Madrid work, these anti-Spanish sentiments had by no means cooled when I -made the New York wharf. Decidedly if I’d been searched for a sentiment, -I would have been discovered hostile to Spanish interest when, within -three weeks following my home-coming, I was given the Harriet Lane, -shown the suspect and his ship, and told to have a sleepless eye and -seize him if he moved. - -It’s the Norse instinct to hate Spain; and I was blood and lineage, -decisively Norse. That affair of instinct is a mighty matter. It is -curious to note how one’s partisanship will back-track one’s racial -trail and pick up old race feuds and friendships; hating where one’s -forbears hated, loving where they loved. Even as a child, being then a -devourer of history, I well recall how--while loathing England as the -foe of this country--I still went with her in sympathy was she warring -with France or Spain. I remember, too, that, in England’s civil wars, I -was ever for the Roundhead and against the King. This, you say, sounds -strangely for my theory, coming as I do from Virginia, that state of -the Cavalier. One should reflect that Cavalierism--to invent a word--is -naught save a Southern boast. Virginia, like most seaboard Southern -states, was in its time a sort of Botany Bay whereunto, with other -delinquents, political prisoners were condemned; my own ancestors -coming, in good truth! by edict of the Bloody Jeffreys for the hand they -took in Monmouth’s rebellion. It is true as I state, even as a child, -too young for emotions save emotions of instinct, I was ever the -friend, as I read history, first of my own country; and next of England, -Germany, Holland, Denmark and Sweden-Nor-way--old race-camps of my -forefathers, these--and like those same forefathers the uncompromising -foe of France, Spain, Italy, and the entire Latin tribe, as soon as ever -my reading taught me their existence. - -My filibusterer swung on his cable down the bay from Governor’s Island. -During daylight I held the Harriet Lane at decent distance; when night -came down I lay as closely by him as I might and give the ships room as -they swept bow for stern with the tide. Also, we had a small-boat patrol -in the water. - -It was the fourth day of my watch. I was ashore to stretch my legs, and -at that particular moment, grown weary of walking, on a bench in Battery -Park, from which coign I had both my filibusterer and the Harriet Lane -beneath my eye, and could signal the latter whenever I would. - -On the bench with me sat a well-dressed stranger; I had before observed -him during my walk. With an ease that bespoke the trained gentleman, -and in manner unobtrusive, my fellow bencher stole into talk with me. -Sharpened of my trade, he had not discoursed a moment before I felt and -knew his purpose; he was friend to my filibusterer whose black freeboard -showed broadside on as she tugged and strove with her cable not a mile -away. - -He carried the talk to her at last. - -“I don’t believe she’s a filibusterer,” he said. Her character was -common gossip, and he had referred to that. “I don’t believe she’s a -filibusterer. I’d be glad to see her get out if I thought she were,” and -he turned on me a tentative eye. - -Doubtless he observed a smile, and therein read encouragement. I told -him my present business; not through vain jauntiness of pride, but I -was aware that he well knew my mission before ever he sat down, and I -thought I’d fog him up a bit with airs of innocence, and lead him to -suppose I suspected him not. - -After much tacking and going about, first port and then starboard--to -use the nautical phrase--he came straight at me. - -“Friend,” he said; “the cause of liberty--Cuban liberty, if you will--is -dear to me. If that ship be a filibusterer and meant for Cuba’s aid, -speaking as a humanitarian, I could give you ten thousand reasons, the -best in the world, why you should let her sail.” This last, wistfully. - -Thereupon I lighted a cigar, having trouble by reason of the breeze. -Then getting up, I took my handkerchief and wig-wagged the Harriet Lane -to send the gig ashore. As I prepared to go down to the water-front, I -turned to my humanitarian who so loved liberty. - -“Give your reasons to Betelnut Jack,” I said; “he delights in abstract -deductions touching the rights of man as against the rights of states as -deeply as did that Thetford Corset maker, Thomas Paine.” - -“Betelnut Jack!” said my humanitarian. “He shall have every reason -within an hour.” - -“Should you convince him,” I retorted, “tell him as marking a fact in -which I shall take the utmost interest to come to this spot at five -o’clock and show me his handkerchief.” - -Then I joined the Harriet Lane. - -At the hour suggested, Betelnut Jack stood on the water’s edge and flew -the signal. I put the captain’s glass on him to make sure. He had been -given the reasons, and was convinced. There abode no doubt of it; the -humanitarian was right and Cuba should be free. Besides, I remembered -Madrid and hated Spain. - -“Captain,” I observed, as I handed that dignitary the glasses, “we will, -if you please, lie in the Narrows to-night. If this fellow leave--which -he won’t--he’ll leave that way. And we’ll pinch him.” - -The Captain bowed. We dropped down to the Narrows as the night fell -black as pitch. The Captain and I cracked a bottle. As we toasted each -other, our suspect crept out through the Sound, and by sunrise had long -cleared Montauk and far and away was southward bound and safe on the -open ocean. - -***** - -“I believe,” observed the Jolly Doctor to the Sour Gentleman when the -latter paused, “I believe you said that the Filibusterer was in the end -taken and shot.” - -“Seized when he made his landing,” returned the Sour Gentleman, “and -killed against a wall in the morning.” - -“It was a cheap finish for a 10,000-dollar start,” remarked the Red -Nosed Gentleman, sententiously. “But why should this adventurer, Ryan, -as you call him, go into the business of freeing Cuba? Where would lie -his profit? I don’t suppose now it was a love of liberty which put him -in motion.” - -“The Cuban rebellionists,” said the Sour Gentleman, “were from first to -last sustained by certain business firms in New York who had arranged to -make money by their success. It is a kind of piracy quite common, this -setting our Spanish-Americans to cutting throats that a profit may flow -in Wall and Broad streets. Every revolution and almost every war in -South and Central America have their inspirations in the counting-rooms -of some great New York firm. I’ve known rival houses in New York to set -a pair of South American republics to battling with each other like a -brace of game cocks. Thousands were slain with that war. Sure, it is the -merest blackest piracy; the deeds of Kidd or Morgan were milk-white by -comparison.” - -“It shows also,” observed the Jolly Doctor, “how little the race has -changed. In our hearts we are the same vikings of savage blood and -pillage, and with no more of ruth, we were in the day of Harold -Fairhair.” - -Sioux Sam, at the Old Cattleman’s suggestion, came now to relate the -story of “How Moh-Kwa Saved the Strike Axe.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVI.--HOW MOH-KWA SAVED STRIKE-AXE. - -This shall be the story of how Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, saved Strike Axe -from the medicine of Yellow Face, the bad medicine man, who would take -his life an’ steal the Feather, his squaw. An’ it is a story good to -show that you should never lose a chance to do a kind deed, since kind -deeds are the steeps up which the Great Spirit makes you climb to reach -the happiness at the top. When you do good, you climb up; when you do -bad, you climb down; an’ at the top is happiness which is white, an’ at -the bottom is pain which is black, an’ the Great Spirit says every man -shall take his choice. - -Strike Axe is of the war-clan an’ is young. Also he is a big fighter -next to Ugly Elk who is the war chief. An’ Strike Axe for all he is only -a young man an’ has been but four times on the war trail, has already -taken five skelps--one Crow, one Blackfoot, three Pawnees. This makes -big talk among all the Sioux along the Yellowstone, an’ Strike Axe is -proud an’ gay, for he is held a great warrior next to Ugly Elk; an’ -it is the Pawnees an’ Crows an’ Blackfeet who say this, which makes it -better than if it is only the talk of the Sioux. - -When Ugly Elk sets up the war-pole, an’ calls to his young men to make -ready to go against the Pawnees to take skelps an’ steal ponies, Strike -Axe is the first to beat the war-pole with his stone club, an’ his war -pony is the first that is saddled for the start. - -Strike Axe has a squaw an’ the name of the squaw is the Feather. Of the -girls of the Sioux, the Feather is one of the most beautiful. Yet she is -restless an’ wicked, an’ thinks plots an’ is hungry <an’ thirsty to do -evil. But that is not the Feather’s fault. - -Yellow Face, the bad medicine man, has made a spell over the Feather. -Yellow Face hates Strike Axe because of so much big talk about him. -Also, he loves the Feather an’ would have her for his squaw. He tells -her she is like the sunset, but she will not hear; then he says she -is like the sunrise, but still she shakes her head, only she shakes it -slow; so at last Yellow Face tells her she is like the Wild Rose, an’ at -that she laughs an’ listens. - -[Illustration: 0397] - -But the Feather will not leave Strike Axe an’ go with Yellow Face, -for Strike Axe is a big fighter; an’ moreover, he kills many elk an’ -buffalo, an’ his lodge is full of beef an’ robes, an’ the Feather is no -fool. Besides, at this time her heart is not bad, but only restless. - -Then Yellow Face sees he must give her a bad heart or he will never win -the Feather. So Yellow Face kills the Great Rattlesnake of the Rocks, -who is his brother medicine, an’ cooks an’ feeds his heart to the -Feather. Then she loves Yellow Face an’ hates Strike Axe, an’ would help -the Yellow Face slay him. For the heart of the Great Rattlesnake of -the Rocks is evil, an’ evil breeds evil where it touches, an’ so the -Feather’s heart turns black like the snake’s heart which she swallowed -from the hand of Yellow Face. - -Strike Axe does not know what the Feather an’ Yellow Face say an’ do, -for he is busy sharpening his lance an’ making arrows to shoot against -the Pawnees, an’ his ears an’ eyes have no time to run new trails. But -Strike Axe can tell that the Feather’s heart is against him; an’ this -makes him to wonder, because he is a big fighter; an’ besides he has -more than any Sioux, meat an’ furs an’ beads an’ blankets an’ paint an’ -feathers, all of which are good to the eyes of squaws, an’ the Feather -is no fool. An’, remembering these things, Strike Axe wonders an’ -wonders; but he cannot tell why the heart of the Feather is against him. -An’ at last Strike Axe puts away the puzzle of the Feather’s heart. - -“It is a trail in running water,” says Strike Axe, “an’ no one may -follow it. The heart of a squaw is a bird an’ flies in the air an’ no -one may trace it.” With that, Strike Axe washes his memory free of the -puzzle of the Feather’s heart an’ goes away to the big trees by the -Yellowstone to hunt. - -Strike Axe tells the Feather he will be gone one moon; for now while -her heart is against him his lodge is cold an’ his blankets hard an’ the -fire no longer burns for Strike Axe, an’ his own heart is tired to be -alone. - -It is among the big trees by the Yellowstone that Strike Axe meets -Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, while Moh-Kwa is hunting for a bee tree. But he -can’t find one, an’ he is sad an’ hungry an’ tells Strike Axe he fears -the bees have gone far away to live with the Pawnees. - -But Strike Axe says “No!” an’ takes Moh-Kwa to a bee-tree he has found; -an’ Moh-Kwa sings in his joy, an’ climbs an’ eats until he is in pain; -while Strike Axe stands a long way off, for the bees are angry an’ their -knives are out. - -Moh-Kwa is grateful to Strike Axe when his pain from much honey is gone, -an’ says he will come each day, an’ eat an’ fight with the bees while -there is honey left. An’ Moh-Kwa asks Strike Axe to remember that he -is the Great Wise Bear of the Yellowstone, an’ to tell him what is evil -with him so Moh-Kwa can do him good. - -Strike Axe thinks very hard; then he tells Moh-Kwa how the Feather’s -heart is against him an’ has left him; he would know what the Feather -will do an’ where her heart has gone. - -Moh-Kwa puts his paw above his eyes to keep out the sun so he can -think better; an’ soon Moh-Kwa remembers that the wife of the Great -Rattlesnake of the Rocks, when he met her hunting rats among the cliffs, -told him she was now a widow, for Yellow Face had killed the Great -Rattlesnake of the Rocks--who was his brother medicine--an’ fed his -heart to the Feather. - -Moh-Kwa tells Strike Axe how the Feather was bewitched by Yellow Face. - -“Come now with me,” said Moh-Kwa to Strike Axe, “an’ I will show you -what the Feather an’ Yellow Face do while you are gone. You are a young -buck an’ a good buck, an’ because of your youth an’ the kind deed you -did when you found for me the bees--to whom I shall go back an’ fight -with for more honey to-morrow and every day while it lasts--I will show -you a danger like a lance, an’ how to hold your shield so you may come -safe from it.” - -Moh-Kwa took Strike Axe by the hand an’ led him up a deep canyon an’ -into his cavern where a big fire burned in the floor’s middle for light. -An’ bats flew about the roof of Moh-Kwa’s cavern an’ owls sat on points -of rock high up on the sides an’ made sad talks; but Strike Axe being -brave an’ with a good heart, was not afraid an’ went close to the fire -in the floor’s middle an’ sat down. - -Moh-Kwa got him a fish to eat; an’ when it was baked on the coals an’ -eaten, brought him a pipe with kinnikinick to smoke. When that was done, -Moh-Kwa said: - -“Now that your stomach is full an’ strong to stand grief, I will show -you what the Feather an’ Yellow Face do while you are gone; for they -make medicine against you an’ reach out to kill you an’ take your life.” - Moh-Kwa then turned over a great stone with his black paws an’ took -out of a hole which was under the stone, a looking glass. Moh-Kwa gave -Strike Axe the looking glass an’ said, “Look; for there you shall see -the story of what the Feather an’ the wicked Yellow Face do.” - -Strike Axe looked, an’ saw that Yellow Face was wrapping up a log in a -blanket. When he had done this, he belted it with the belts of Strike -Axe; an’ then he put on its head the war-bonnet of Strike Axe which hung -on the lodge pole. An’ now that it was finished, Yellow Face said the -log in the blanket an’ wearing the belts an’ war-bonnet was Strike -Axe--as Strike Axe saw truly in the looking glass--an’ Yellow Face stood -up the log in its blanket an’ belts an’ war-bonnet, an’ made his bow -ready to kill it with an arrow. As Yellow Face did these things, the -Feather stood watching him with a smile on her face while the blood-hope -shone in her eyes; for she had eaten the snake’s heart an’ all her -spirit was black. - -Strike Axe saw what went on with the Feather an’ Yellow Face, an’ told -it as the glass told it, word for word to Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear, who -sat by his side to listen. - -Then Moh-Kwa, when he knew that now Yellow Face with three arrows in -his left hand was stringing a bow to shoot against the log which he -had dressed up an’ named “Strike Axe,” said there was little time to be -lost; an’ Moh-Kwa hurried Strike Axe to the round deep spring of clear -water which was in the cavern, an’ told him to stand on the edge of the -spring an’ look hard in the looking glass an’ take sharp notice just as -Yellow Face was to shoot the arrow against the log. - -“An’ you must dive in the spring when Yellow Face shoots,” said Moh-Kwa -to Strike Axe; “you must dive like the loon dives when you shoot at him -on the river.” - -Strike Axe looked hard in the looking glass like Moh-Kwa said, an’ dived -in the spring when the arrow left the bow of Yellow Face. - -When he came up, he looked again in the glass an’ saw that Yellow Face -had missed the log. Yellow Face had a half-fear because he had missed, -an’ Strike Axe looking in Moh-Kwa’s glass could see the half-fear -rising up as a mist in his eyes like a morning fog lifts up from the -Yellowstone. Also, the Feather stood watching Yellow Face, an’ her eyes, -which were grown hard an’ little an’ bright, like a snake’s eyes, showed -that she did not care what happened only so that it was evil. - -But Moh-Kwa told Strike Axe to still watch closely, an’ would not let -his mind pull up its pickets an’ stray; because Yellow Face would shoot -twice more with the arrows which were left; an’ he must be quick an’ -ready each time to dive like the loon dives, or he would surely die by -the log’s wound. - -Strike Axe, because he had eaten the fish an’ smoked, an’ had a full -stomach an’ was bold an’ steady with a heart made brave with much food, -again looked hard in the glass; an’ when the second arrow left the bow -of Yellow Face he dived sharply in the spring like a loon; an’ when he -came up an’ held the looking glass before his eyes he saw that Yellow -Face had missed the log a second time. - -An’ now there was a whole-fear in the eyes of Yellow Face--a white fear -that comes when a man sees Pau-guk, the Death, walk into the lodge; an’ -the hand of Yellow Face trembled as he made ready his last third arrow -on the bow. But in the eyes of the Feather shone no fear; only she -lapped out her tongue like the snake does, with the black pleasure of -new evil at the door. - -Moh-Kwa warned Strike Axe to look only at Yellow Face that he might be -sure an’ swift as the loon to dive from the last arrow. Strike Axe did -as Moh-Kwa counselled; an’ when the last arrow flew from the bow, -Strike Axe with a big splash was safe an’ deep beneath the waters of the -spring. - -“An’ now,” said Moh-Kwa to Strike Axe, “look in the glass an’ laugh, -for a blessing of revenge has been bestowed on you through the Great -Spirit.” - -Strike Axe looked an’ saw that not only did Yellow Face miss the log, -but the arrow flew back an’ pierced the throat of Yellow Face, even up -to the three eagle feathers on the arrow’s shaft. As Strike Axe looked, -he saw Yellow Face die; an’ a feeling like the smell of new grass came -about the heart of Strike Axe, for there is nothing so warm an’ sweet -an’ quick with peace as revenge when it sees an’ smells the fresh blood -of its enemy. - -Moh-Kwa told Strike Axe to still look in the glass; for while the danger -was gone he would know what the Feather did when now that Yellow Face -was killed by the turning of his own medicine. - -Strike Axe looked, an’ saw how the Feather dammed up the water in a -little brook near the lodge; an’ when the bed of the brook was free of -water the Feather dug a hole in the soft ground with her hands like a -wolf digs with his paws. An’ the Feather made it deep an’ long an’ wide; -an’ then she put the dead Yellow Face in this grave in the brook’s -bed. When she had covered him with sand an’ stones, the Feather let the -waters free; an’ the brook went back to its old trail which it loved, -an’ laughed an’ ran on, never caring about the dead Yellow Face who lay -under its wet feet. - -Then the Feather went again into the lodge an’ undressed the log of its -blankets, belts an’ war-bonnet; an’ the Feather burned the bow an’ the -arrows of Yellow Face, an’ made everything as it was before. Only now -Yellow Face lay dead under the brook; but no one knew, an’ the brook -itself already had forgot--for the brook’s memory is slippery an’ thin -an’ not a good memory, holding nothing beyond a moment--an’ the Feather -felt safe an’ happy; for her heart fed on evil an’ evil had been done. - -Strike Axe came out from the cave with Moh-Kwa, the Wise Bear. - -“You have given me life,” said Strike Axe. - -“You have given me honey,” said Moh-Kwa. - -Then Strike Axe was troubled in his mind, an’ he told Moh-Kwa that he -knew not what he must do with the Feather when he returned. But Moh-Kwa -said that he should make his breast light, an’ free his thought of the -Feather as a burden, for one would be in his lodge before him with the -answer to his question. - -“It is the Widow,” said Moh-Kwa, “who was the wife of the Great -Rattlesnake of the Rocks; she will go to your tepee to be close to the -heart of her husband. In her mouth the Widow will bring a message from -Yellow Face to the Feather for whom he died an’ was hid beneath the -careless brook.” - -Thus said Moh-Kwa. An’ Strike Axe found that Moh-Kwa spoke with but one -tongue; for when he stood again in his lodge the Feather lay across the -door, dead an’ black with the message of Yellow Face which was sent to -her in the mouth of the Widow. An’ as Strike Axe looked on the Feather, -the Widow rattled joyfully where she lay coiled on the Feather’s breast; -for the Widow was glad because she was near to her husband’s heart. - -But Moh-Kwa was not there to look; Moh-Kwa had gone early to the -bee-tree, an’ now with his nose in a honey comb was high an’ hearty up -among the angry bees. - -There arose no little approbative comment on the folk-lore tales of -Sioux Sam, and it was common opinion that his were by odds and away the -best stories to be told among us. These hearty plaudits were not without -pleasant effect on Sioux Sam, and one might see his dark cheek flush to -a color darker still with the joy he felt. - -And yet someone has said how the American Indian is stolid and cold. - -It was the Red Nosed Gentleman, as the clock struck midnight on this our -last evening and we threw our last log on the coals, who suggested that -the Jolly Doctor, having told the first story, should in all propriety -close in the procession by furnishing the last. There was but one voice -for it, and the Jolly Doctor, who would have demurred for that it seemed -to lack of modesty on his side, in the end conceded the point with -grace. - -“This,” said the Jolly Doctor, composing himself to a comfortable -position in his great chair, “this, then, shall be the story of ‘The -Flim Flam Murphy.’” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVII.--THE FLIM FLAM MURPHY. - -Chicken Bill was not beautiful with his shock of coarse hair and foul -pipe in mouth. Doubtless, Chicken Bill was likewise an uncompromising -villain. Indeed, Pike’s Peak Martin, expert both of men and mines, one -evening in the Four Flush saloon, casually, but with insulting fullness, -set these things forth to Chicken Bill himself; and while Pike’s Peak -Martin was always talking, he was not always wrong. - -On this occasion of Pike’s Peak Martin’s frankness, Chicken Bill, albeit -he carried contradiction at his belt in the shape of a six-shooter, -walked away without attempting either denial or reproof. This conduct, -painful to the sentiment of Timberline, had the two-fold effect of -confirming Pike’s Peak Martin’s utterances in the minds of men, and -telling against the repute of Chicken Bill for that personal courage -which is the great first virtue the Southwest demands. - -Old Man Granger found the earliest gold in Arizona Gulch. And hot on the -news of the strike came Chicken Bill. It was the latter’s boast about -the bar-rooms of Timberline that he was second to come into the canyon; -and as this was the only word of truth of which Chicken Bill was guilty -while he honored the camp with his presence, it deserves a record. - -Following Old Man Granger’s discovery of his Old Age mine, came not only -Chicken Bill, but others; within a week there arose the bubbling camp -of Timberline. There were saloons and hurdy-gurdies and stores and -restaurants and a bank and a corral and a stage station and an express -office and a post-office and an assay office and board sidewalks and red -lights and many another plain evidence of civilization. Even a theatre -was threatened; and, to add to the gayety as well as the wealth of -the baby metropolis, those sundry cattlemen having ranges and habitats -within the oak-brushed hills about, began to make Timberline their -headquarters and transact their business and their debauches in its -throbbing midst. - -[Illustration: 0411] - -Chicken Bill was reasonably perfect in all accomplishments of the -Southwest. He could work cattle; he could rope, throw, and hog-tie his -steer; he could keep up his end at flanking, branding, and ear-marking -in a June corral; he could saddle and ride a wild, unbroken bronco; he -could make baking-powder biscuit so well flavored and light as to compel -the compliments of those jealous epicures of the cow-camps who devoured -them. - -Yet Chicken Bill would not work on the ranges. There were no cards -permitted in the camps, and whiskey was debarred as if each bottle held -a rattlesnake. Altogether a jovial soul, and one given to revelry, would -fly from them in disgust. - -“It’s too lonesome a play for me, this punchin’ cattle,” observed -Chicken Bill, and so eschewed it. - -While Pike’s Peak Martin expounded this aversion on the part of Chicken -Bill, as well as the latter’s refusal to pick and dig and drill and -blast in the Timberline mines, as mere laziness, public feeling, -though it despised the culprit, was inclined to tolerate him in his -shiftlessness. American independence in the Southwest is held to be -inclusive of the personal right to refuse all forms of labor. Wherefore -Chicken Bill was safe even from criticism as he hung about the saloons -and faro rooms and lived his life of chosen vagabondage. - -Our low-flung hero made shift in various ways. Did he find a tenderfoot -whom he could cheat at cards, he borrowed a stake--sometimes, when the -subject was uncommonly tender, from the victim himself--and therewith -took a small sum at poker or seven-up. Another method of trivial fraud, -now and then successful with Chicken Bill, was to plant a handful -of brass nuggets, each of about an ounce in weight, under a little -waterfall that broke into the canyon just below the windmill. There -was a deal of mineral in this feeble side-stream, and the brass nuggets -became coated and queer of color. - -One of these Chicken Bill was able at intervals to impose at a profit -upon a stranger, by swearing doughtily that it was virgin gold. - -It came to pass, however, that Chicken Bill, despairing of fortune by -the cheap processes of penny-ante and spurious nuggets, decided on a -coup. He would stake out a claim, drift it and timber it, and then -salt it to the limit of all that was possible in the science of -claim-salting. Then would he sell it to the first Christian with more -money than sagacity who came moved to buy a mine. - -Chicken Bill was no amateur of mines. He knew the business as he knew -the cow trade, and avoided it for the same reason of indolence. In his -time, and after some windfall at faro-bank, Chicken Bill had grub-staked -prospectors who were to “give him half” and who never came back. In his -turn Chicken Bill was grub-staked by others, in which event he never -came back. But it went with other experiences to teach him the trade, -and on the morning when with pick and paraphernalia Chicken Bill pitched -camp in Arizona Gulch a mile beyond the farthest, and where it was known -to all no mineral lurked, he brought with him a knowledge of the miner’s -art, and began his digging with intelligent spirit. Moreover, the -heart of Chicken Bill was stout for the work; for was he not planning -a swindle? and did not that thought of itself swell his bosom with a -mighty peace? - -Once upon a time Chicken Bill had had a partner. - -This partner was frequently on the lips of Chicken Bill, especially when -our hero was in his cups. He was always mentioned with a gush of tears, -this partner, and his name as furnished by Chicken Bill was Flim Flam -Murphy. Flim Flam had met death somewhere in the Gunnison country while -making good his name, and passed with the smoke of the Colt’s-44 that -dismissed him. But Chicken Bill reverenced the memory of this talented -man and was ready to honor him, and, having staked out his claim with -the fraudulent purpose aforesaid, filed on it appropriately as “The Flim -Flam Murphy.” - -It would be unjust to the intelligence of Timberline to permit one for -a moment to suppose that the dullest of her male citizenry lived unaware -of the ignoble plans of Chicken Bill. That he proposed to salt a claim -and therewith ensnare the stranger within the local gates were truths -which all men knew. But all men cared not; and mention of the enterprise -when the miracle of Chicken Bill at work found occasional comment -over the bars, aroused nothing save a sluggish curiosity as to whether -Chicken Bill would succeed. No thought of warning the unwary arose in -the Timberline heart. - -“It’s the proper play,” observed Pike’s Peak Martin, representative of -Timberline feeling, “to let every gent seelect his own licker an’ hobble -his own hoss. If Chicken Bill can down anybody for his bankroll without -making a gun play to land the trick, thar’s no call for the public to -interfere.” - -It was about this time that Chicken Bill added to his ornate scheme of -claim-salting--a plain affair of the heart. The lady to thus cast her -spell over Chicken Bill was known as Deadwood Maggie and flourished a -popular waitress in the Belle Union Hotel. Timberline thought well of -Deadwood Maggie, and her place in general favor found suggestion in a -remark of Pike’s Peak Martin. - -“Deadwood Maggie,” observed that excellent spirit, as he replaced his -glass on the Four Flush bar and turned to an individual who had been -guilty of words derogatory to the lady in question; “Dead-wood Maggie -is a virchoous young female, an’ it shore frets me to hear her lightly -allooded to.” - -As Pike’s Peak Martin’s disapproval took the violent form of smiting the -maligner upon the head with an 8-inch pistol, the social status of the -lady was ever after regarded as fixed. - -Chicken Bill was not the one to eat his heart in silence, and his -passion was but one day old when he laid hand and fortune at Deadwood -Maggie’s feet. That maiden for her part displayed a suspicious front, -born perhaps of an experience of the perfidy of man. Deadwood Maggie was -inclined to a scorn of Chicken Bill and his proffer of instant wedlock. - -“Not on your life!” was Deadwood Maggie’s reply. - -But Chicken Bill persisted; he longed more ardently because of this -rebuff. To soften Deadwood Maggie he threw a gallant arm about her and -drew her to his bosom. - -“Don’t be in sech a hurry to lose me,” said Chicken Bill on this -sentimental occasion. - -Deadwood Maggie was arranging tables at the time for those guests who -from mine and store and bar-room would come, stamping and famishing, -an hour later. Chicken Bill and she for the moment had the apartment -to themselves. Goaded by her lover’s sweet persistency, and unable to -phrase a retort that should do her feelings justice, Deadwood Maggie -fell to the trite expedient of breaking a butter-dish on the head of -Chicken Bill. - -“Now pull your freight,” said she, “or I’ll chunk you up with all the -crockery in the camp.” - -Finding Deadwood Maggie obdurate, Chicken Bill for the nonce withdrew -to consider the situation. He was in no sort dispirited; he regarded -the butter-dish and those threats which came after it as marks of maiden -coyness; they were decisive of nothing. - -“She wasn’t in the mood,” said Chicken Bill, as he explained his repulse -to the bar-keeper of the Four Flush Saloon; “but I’ll get my lariat on -her yet. Next time I’ll rope with a larger loop.” - -“That’s the racket!” said the bar-keeper. - -Chicken Bill in a small way was a gifted rascal. After profound -contemplation of Deadwood Maggie in her obstinacy, he determined to -win her with the conveyance of a one-quarter interest in The Flim Flam -Murphy. Deadwood Maggie knew nothing of the worthlessness of The Flim -Flam Murphy. Chicken Bill would represent it to her as a richer strike -than Old Man Granger’s Old Age Mine. He would give her one-quarter. -There would be no risk; Deadwood Maggie, when once his wife and getting -a good figure for the mine, would make no demur to selling to whatever -tenderfoot he might dupe. This plan had merit; at least one must suppose -so, for the soul of Deadwood Maggie was visibly softened thereby. - -“I must have you, Maggie,” wooed Chicken Bill, when he had put forth -the sterling character of The Flim Flam Murphy and expressed himself -as determined to bestow on her the one-fourth interest, a conveyance -whereof in writing he held then in his hand; “I can’t live without you. -When you busted me with that yootensil you made me yours forever. I -swear by this gun I pack, I’ll not outlive your refusal to wed me longer -than to jest get good an’ drunk an’ put a bullet through my head.” - -Who could resist such love and such hyperbole? Deadwood Maggie wept; -then she took the deed to the one-fourth interest in The Flim Flam -Murphy, kissed Chicken Bill, and said she would drift into his arms as -his wife at the end of two months. Chicken Bill objected strenuously to -such a recess for his affections, but with the last of it was driven to -yield. - -There came a time when The Flim Flam Murphy salted to the last degree -of salt was as perfect a trap for a tenderfoot as any ever set. And as -though luck were seeking Chicken Bill, a probable prey stepped from the -stage next day. - -Chicken Bill and the stranger were seen in prompt and lengthy -conference. Timberline, looking on, grinned in a tolerant way. For two -days Chicken Bill and the stranger did nothing but explore the drift, -inspect the timbering, and consider specimens taken from The Flim Flam -Murphy. - -At last the stranger filled ten small canvas sacks with specimens of ore -and brought them into camp on a buckboard to be assayed. Chicken Bill -was with him; and pleading internal pains that made it impossible to -ride upright, our wily one lay back with the bags of specimens while -the stranger drove. From time to time the astute Chicken Bill, having -advantage of rough places in the canyon’s bed which engaged the -faculties of the stranger, emptied some two or three quills of powdered -gold into each specimen sack by the ingenius process of forcing the -sharpened point of the quill through the web of the canvas, and blowing -the treasure in among the ore. - -“It’s a cinch!” ruminated Chicken Bill, when he had completed these -improvements. Then he refreshed himself from a whiskey flask, said that -he felt better, and climbed back beside the stranger on the buckboard’s -seat. - -There came the assay next day. With that ceremony Chicken Bill had -nothing to do, and could only wait. But he owned no misgivings; there -would come but one result; the ore would show a richness not to be -resisted. - -Chicken Bill put in his time preparing Deadwood Maggie for the sale. -He told her that not a cent less than sixty thousand dollars would be -accepted. - -“It’s worth more,” declared Chicken Bill, “but me an’ you, Maggie, ain’t -got the long green to develop it. Our best play is to cash in if we can -get the figure.” - -But disaster was striding on the trail of Chicken Bill. That evening, as -Deadwood Maggie was returning to the Belle Union from the Dutch Woman’s -Store, to which mart she had been driven for a tooth-brush, she was -blasted with the spectacle of Chicken Bill and a Mexican girl in -confidential converse just ahead. Deadwood Maggie, a bit violent of -nature, had been in no wise calmed by her several years on the border. -While not wildly in love, still her impulse was to dismantle, if not -dismember, the senorita thus softly whispering and being whispered to -by the recreant Chicken Bill. But on second thought Deadwood Maggie -restrained herself. She would observe the full untruth of Chicken Bill. - -[Illustration: 0421] - -The next day, when Chicken Bill called on Dead-wood Maggie, he was met -with a smothering flight of table furniture and told never to come back. - -It was a crisis with Chicken Bill. The assay had been a victory and the -stranger stood ready, cash in hand, to pay the sixty thousand dollars -demanded for The Flim Flam Murphy. Chicken Bill felt the necessity of -getting the money without delay. Any marplot, whether from drink or that -mean officiousness which hypocrites call “conscience,” might say the -word that would arm the tenderfoot with a knowledge of his peril. But -Chicken Bill could not come to speech with Dead-wood Maggie. In a blaze -of jealousy, that wronged woman would begin throwing things the moment -he appeared. As a last resort, Chicken Bill dispatched the bar-keeper of -the Four Flush to Dead-wood Maggie. This diplomat was told to set forth -the crying needs of the hour, Chicken Bill promising friendship for life -and five hundred dollars if he made Deadwood Maggie see reason. - -Ten minutes later the bar-keeper returned, bleeding from a cut over his -eye. - -“Did it with a stove-lifter,” he explained, as he laved the wound in a -basin at the corner of the bar. “Say! you can’t get near enough to that -lady to give her a diamond ring.” - -Chicken Bill made a gesture of despair; he saw that Deadwood Maggie was -lost to him forever. - -But the sale of The Flim Flam Murphy must go on. Chicken Bill sought the -tenderfoot. He found him with a smile on his face reading the report of -The Flim Flam Murphy assay. Chicken Bill guardedly explained that he had -a partner, name not given, who objected to the sale. The partner held a -one-quarter share in The Flim Flam Murphy. The stranger, who knew it all -along from the records, pondered briefly. Finally he broke the silence: - -“Would Chicken Bill sell his three-quarters?” - -Chicken Bill composed his face. Chicken Bill would sell. - -Nothing is big in the Southwest; transactions of millions are disposed -of while one eats a flap-jack. In an hour the stranger had acquired The -Flim Flam Murphy interest which was vested in Chicken Bill; in two hours -that immoralist was speeding by vague trails to regions new, forty-five -thousand dollars in his belt and a soreness in his heart. - -Timberline felt a quiet amusement in the situation. It leaned back and -waited in a superior way for the stranger to set up the low wail of the -robbed. The outcry couldn’t be long deferred; the fraud must be soon -unmasked since the development of The Flim Flam Murphy was gone about -with diligence and on a dazzling scale. - -But the stranger did not complain. - -Two weeks were added to that vast eternity which had preceded them -and the sobered sentiment of Timberline began to think it might better -investigate. Timberline, however, would proceed with caution; missing -its laugh, it must now guard itself against being laughed at. - -It turned as the wise ones had begun to apprehend. The Flim Flam -Murphy was a two-million dollar wonder. The talented Chicken Bill had -overreached himself. With no hope beyond a plan to salt a claim, he had -not thought to secure an assay for himself. The Flim Flam Murphy loomed -upon mankind as Timberline’s richest strike. - -Pike’s Peak Martin was the first to collect himself. Crawling from -beneath that landslide of amazement which had caught and covered -Timberline, he visited the Belle Union with a resolved air. Pointedly -but fully Pike’s Peak Martin tendered himself in marriage to Dead wood -Maggie. That lady did not hurl a butter-dish; such feats would seem too -effervescent on the part of a gentlewoman worth five hundred thousand -dollars. - -Deadwood Maggie blushed with drooping lids as she heard the words of -Pike’s Peak Martin. - -“Which your offer shore makes a hit with me,” murmured Deadwood Maggie. -Then, when a moment later, her head lay on Pike’s Peak Martin’s shoulder -like some tired flower at rest, Deadwood Maggie gave a sigh, and -lifting her eyes to the deep inquiring gaze of Pike’s Peak Martin, she -whispered: “You’re the only gent I ever loved.” - - -THE END. - - - - - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Black Lion Inn, by Alfred Henry Lewis - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BLACK LION INN *** - -***** This file should be named 55471-0.txt or 55471-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/4/7/55471/ - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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