get back to Buenas Tierras. Here comes that capstan-footed lubber with
the chewin'. I ought to've weighed anchor an hour ago."
"Is that your ship out there?" asked the Kid.
"Why, yes," answered the captain, "if you want to call a schooner a
ship, and I don't mind lyin'. But you better say Miller and Gonzales,
owners, and ordinary, plain, Billy-be-damned old Samuel K. Boone,
skipper."
"Where are you going to?" asked the refugee.
"Buenas Tierras, coast of South America--I forget what they called the
country the last time I was there. Cargo--lumber, corrugated iron, and
machetes."
"What kind of a country is it?" asked the Kid--"hot or cold?"
"Warmish, buddy," said the captain. "But a regular Paradise Lost for
elegance of scenery and be-yooty of geography. Ye're wakened every
morning by the sweet singin' of red birds with seven purple tails, and
the sighin' of breezes in the posies and roses. And the inhabitants
never work, for they can reach out and pick steamer baskets of the
choicest hothouse fruit without gettin' out of bed. And there's no
Sunday and no ice and no rent and no troubles and no use and no nothin'.
It's a great country for a man to go to sleep with, and wait for
somethin' to turn up. The bananys and oranges and hurricanes and
pineapples that ye eat comes from there."
"That sounds to me!" said the Kid, at last betraying interest. "What'll
the expressage be to take me out there with you?"
"Twenty-four dollars," said Captain Boone; "grub and transportation.
Second cabin. I haven't got a first cabin."
"You've got my company," said the Kid, pulling out a buckskin bag.
With three hundred dollars he had gone to Laredo for his regular
"blowout." The duel in Valdo's had cut short his season of hilarity, but
it had left him with nearly $200 for aid in the flight that it had made
necessary.
"All right, buddy," said the captain. "I hope your ma won't blame me for
this little childish escapade of yours." He beckoned to one of the
boat's crew. "Let Sanchez lift you out to the skiff so you won't get
your feet wet."
II
Thacker, the United States consul at Buenas Tierras, was not yet drunk.
It was only eleven o'clock; and he never arrived at his desired state
of beatitude--a state wherein he sang ancient maudlin vaudeville songs
and pelted his screaming parrot with banana peels--until the middle of
the afternoon. So, when he looked up from his hammock at the sound of a
slight cough, and saw the Kid standing in the door of the consulate, he
was still in a condition to extend the hospitality and courtesy due from
the representative of a great nation.
"Don't disturb yourself," said the Kid easily. "I just dropped in. They
told me it was customary to light at your camp before starting in to
round up the town. I just came in on a ship from Texas."
"Glad to see you, Mr. ----," said the consul.
The Kid laughed.
"Sprague Dalton," he said. "It sounds funny to me to hear it. I'm called
the Llano Kid in the Rio Grande country."
"I'm Thacker," said the consul. "Take that cane-bottom chair. Now if
you've come to invest, you want somebody to advise you. These dingies
will cheat you out of the gold in your teeth if you don't understand
their ways. Try a cigar?"
"Much obliged," said the Kid, "but if it wasn't for my corn shucks and
the little bag in my back pocket, I couldn't live a minute." He took out
his "makings," and rolled a cigarette.
"They speak Spanish here," said the consul. "You'll need an interpreter.
If there's anything I can do, why, I'd be delighted. If you're buying
fruit lands or looking for a concession of any sort, you'll want
somebody who knows the ropes to look out for you."
"I speak Spanish," said the Kid, "about nine times better than I do
English. Everybody speaks it on the range where I come from. And I'm
not in the market for anything."
"You speak Spanish?" said Thacker thoughtfully. He regarded the Kid
absorbedly.
"You look like a Spaniard, too," he continued. "And you're from Texas.
And you can't be more than twenty or twenty-one. I wonder if you've got
any nerve."
"You got a deal of some kind to put through?" asked the Texan, with
unexpected shrewdness.
"Are you open to a proposition?" said Thacker.
"What's the use to deny it?" said the Kid. "I got into a little gun
frolic down in Laredo and plugged a white man. There wasn't any Mexican
handy. And I come down to your parrot-and-monkey range just for to smell
the morning-glories and marigolds. Now, do you _sabe_?"
Thacker got up and closed the door.
"Let me see your hand," he said.
He took the Kid's left hand, and examined the back of it closely.
"I can do it," he said excitedly. "Your flesh is as hard as wood and as
healthy as a baby's. It will heal in a week."
"If it's a fist fight you want to back me for," said the Kid, "don't put
your money up yet. Make it gun work, and I'll keep you company. But no
barehanded scrapping, like ladies at a tea-party, for me."
"It's easier than that," said Thacker. "Just step here, will you?"
Through the window he pointed to a two-story white-stuccoed house with
wide galleries rising amid the deep green tropical foliage on a wooded
hill that sloped gently from the sea.
"In that house," said Thacker, "a fine old Castilian gentleman and his
wife are yearning to gather you into their arms and fill your pockets
with money. Old Santos Urique lives there. He owns half the gold-mines
in the country."
"You haven't been eating loco weed, have you?" asked the Kid.
"Sit down again," said Thacker, "and I'll tell you. Twelve years ago
they lost a kid. No, he didn't die--although most of 'em here do from
drinking the surface water. He was a wild little devil, even if he
wasn't but eight years old. Everybody knows about it. Some Americans who
were through here prospecting for gold had letters to Señor Urique, and
the boy was a favorite with them. They filled his head with big stories
about the States; and about a month after they left, the kid
disappeared, too. He was supposed to have stowed himself away among the
banana bunches on a fruit steamer, and gone to New Orleans. He was seen
once afterward in Texas, it was thought, but they never heard anything
more of him. Old Urique has spent thousands of dollars having him looked
for. The madam was broken up worst of all. The kid was her life. She
wears mourning yet. But they say she believes he'll come back to her
some day, and never gives up hope. On the back of the boy's left hand
was tattooed a flying eagle carrying a spear in his claws. That's old
Urique's coat of arms or something that he inherited in Spain."
The Kid raised his left hand slowly and gazed at it curiously.
"That's it," said Thacker, reaching behind the official desk for his
bottle of smuggled brandy. "You're not so slow. I can do it. What was I
consul at Sandakan for? I never knew till now. In a week I'll have the
eagle bird with the frog-sticker blended in so you'd think you were
born with it. I brought a set of the needles and ink just because I was
sure you'd drop in some day, Mr. Dalton."
"Oh, hell," said the Kid. "I thought I told you."
"All right, 'Kid,' then. It won't be that long. How does Señorito Urique
sound, for a change?"
"I never played son any that I remember of," said the Kid. "If I had any
parents to mention they went over the divide about the time I gave my
first bleat. What is the plan of your round-up?"
Thacker leaned back against the wall and held his glass up to the light.
"We've come now," said he, "to the question of how far you're willing to
go in a little matter of the sort."
"I told you why I came down here," said the Kid simply.
"A good answer," said the consul. "But you won't have to go that far.
Here's the scheme. After I get the trade-mark tattooed on your hand I'll
notify old Urique. In the meantime I'll furnish you with all of the
family history I can find out, so you can be studying up points to talk
about. You've got the looks, you speak the Spanish, you know the facts,
you can tell about Texas, you've got the tattoo mark. When I notify them
that the rightful heir has returned and is waiting to know whether he
will be received and pardoned, what will happen? They'll simply rush
down here and fall on your neck, and the curtain goes down for
refreshments and a stroll in the lobby."
"I'm waiting," said the Kid. "I haven't had my saddle off in your camp
long, pardner, and I never met you before; but if you intend to let it
go at a parental blessing, why, I'm mistaken in my man, that's all."
"Thanks," said the consul. "I haven't met anybody in a long time that
keeps up with an argument as well as you do. The rest of it is simple.
If they take you in only for a while it's long enough. Don't give 'em
time to hunt up the strawberry mark on your left shoulder. Old Urique
keeps anywhere from $50,000 to $100,000 in his house all the time in a
little safe that you could open with a shoe buttoner. Get it. My skill
as a tattooer is worth half the boodle. We go halves and catch a tramp
steamer for Rio Janeiro. Let the United States go to pieces if it can't
get along without my services. _Que dice, señor?_"
"It sounds to me!" said the Kid, nodding his head. "I'm out for the
dust."
"All right, then," said Thacker. "You'll have to keep close until we get
the bird on you. You can live in the back room here. I do my own
cooking, and I'll make you as comfortable as a parsimonious Government
will allow me."
Thacker had set the time at a week, but it was two weeks before the
design that he patiently tattooed upon the Kid's hand was to his notion.
And then Thacker called a _muchacho_, and despatched this note to the
intended victim:
EL SEÑOR DON SANTOS URIQUE,
LA CASA BLANCA.
_My Dear Sir:_ I beg permission to inform you that there is in my
house as a temporary guest a young man who arrived in Buenas
Tierras from the United States some days ago. Without wishing to
excite any hopes that may not be realized, I think there is a
possibility of his being your long-absent son. It might be well for
you to call and see him. If he is, it is my opinion that his
intention was to return to his home, but upon arriving here, his
courage failed him from doubts as to how he would be received.
Your true servant,
THOMPSON THACKER.
Half an hour afterward--quick time for Buenas Tierras--Señor Urique's
ancient landau drove to the consul's door, with the barefooted coachman
beating and shouting at the team of fat, awkward horses.
A tall man with a white mustache alighted, and assisted to the ground a
lady who was dressed and veiled in unrelieved black.
The two hastened inside, and were met by Thacker with his best
diplomatic bow. By his desk stood a slender young man with clear-cut,
sun-browned features and smoothly brushed black hair.
Señora Urique threw back her heavy veil with a quick gesture. She was
past middle age, and her hair was beginning to silver, but her full,
proud figure and clear olive skin retained traces of the beauty peculiar
to the Basque province. But, once you had seen her eyes, and
comprehended the great sadness that was revealed in their deep shadows
and hopeless expression, you saw that the woman lived only in some
memory.
She bent upon the young man a long look of the most agonized
questioning. Then her great black eyes turned, and her gaze rested upon
his left hand. And then with a sob, not loud, but seeming to shake the
room, she cried "_Hijo mio!_" and caught the Llano Kid to her heart.
III
A month afterward the Kid came to the consulate in response to a message
sent by Thacker.
He looked the young Spanish _caballero_. His clothes were imported, and
the wiles of the jewelers had not been spent upon him in vain. A more
than respectable diamond shone on his finger as he rolled a shuck
cigarette.
"What's doing?" asked Thacker.
"Nothing much," said the Kid calmly. "I eat my first iguana steak
to-day. They're them big lizards, you _sabe_? I reckon, though, that
frijoles and side bacon would do me about as well. Do you care for
iguanas, Thacker?"
"No, nor for some other kinds of reptiles," said Thacker.
It was three in the afternoon, and in another hour he would be in his
state of beatitude.
"It's time you were making good, sonny," he went on, with an ugly look
on his reddened face. "You're not playing up to me square. You've been
the prodigal son for four weeks now, and you could have had veal for
every meal on a gold dish if you'd wanted it. Now, Mr. Kid, do you think
it's right to leave me out so long on a husk diet? What's the trouble?
Don't you get your filial eyes on anything that looks like cash in the
Casa Blanca? Don't tell me you don't. Everybody knows where old Urique
keeps his stuff. It's U. S. currency, too; he don't accept anything
else. What's doing? Don't say 'nothing' this time."
"Why, sure," said the Kid, admiring his diamond, "there's plenty of
money up there. I'm no judge of collateral in bunches, but I will
undertake for to say that I've seen the rise of $50,000 at a time in
that tin grub box that my adopted father calls his safe. And he lets me
carry the key sometimes just to show me that he knows I'm the real
little Francisco that strayed from the herd a long time ago."
"Well, what are you waiting for?" asked Thacker angrily. "Don't you
forget that I can upset your apple cart any day I want to. If old Urique
knew you were an impostor, what sort of things would happen to you? Oh,
you don't know this country, Mr. Texas Kid. The laws here have got
mustard spread between 'em. These people here'd stretch you out like a
frog that had been stepped on, and give you about fifty sticks at every
corner of the plaza. And they'd wear every stick out, too. What was left
of you they'd feed to alligators."
"I might as well tell you now, pardner," said the Kid, sliding down low
on his steamer chair, "that things are going to stay just as they are.
They're about right now."
"What do you mean?" asked Thacker, rattling the bottom of his glass on
his desk.
"The scheme's off," said the Kid. "And whenever you have the pleasure of
speaking to me address me as Don Francisco Urique. I'll guarantee I'll
answer to it. We'll let Colonel Urique keep his money. His little tin
safe is as good as the time-locker in the First National Bank of Laredo
as far as you and me are concerned."
"You're going to throw me down, then, are you?" said the consul.
"Sure," said the Kid cheerfully. "Throw you down. That's it. And now
I'll tell you why. The first night I was up at the colonel's house they
introduced me to a bedroom. No blankets on the floor--a real room, with
a bed and things in it. And before I was asleep, in comes this
artificial mother of mine and tucks in the covers. 'Panchito,' she says,
'my little lost one, God has brought you back to me. I bless his name
forever.' It was that, or some truck like that, she said. And down comes
a drop or two of rain and hits me on the nose. And all that stuck by me,
Mr. Thacker. And it's been that way ever since. And it's got to stay
that way. Don't you think that it's for what's in it for me, either,
that I say so. If you have any such ideas, keep 'em to yourself. I
haven't had much truck with women in my life, and no mothers to speak
of, but here's a lady that we've got to keep fooled. Once she stood it;
twice she won't. I'm a low-down wolf, and the devil may have sent me on
this trail instead of God, but I'll travel it to the end. And now, don't
forget that I'm Don Francisco Urique whenever you happen to mention my
name."
"I'll expose you to-day, you--you double-dyed traitor," stammered
Thacker.
The Kid arose and, without violence, took Thacker by the throat with a
hand of steel, and shoved him slowly into a corner. Then he drew from
under his left arm his pearl-handled .45 and poked the cold muzzle of it
against the consul's mouth.
"I told you why I come here," he said, with his old freezing smile. "If
I leave here, you'll be the reason. Never forget it, pardner. Now, what
is my name?"
"Er--Don Francisco Urique," gasped Thacker.
From outside came a sound of wheels, and the shouting of some one, and
the sharp thwacks of a wooden whipstock upon the backs of fat horses.
The Kid put up his gun, and walked toward the door. But he turned again
and came back to the trembling Thacker, and held up his left hand with
its back toward the consul.
"There's one more reason," he said slowly, "why things have got to stand
as they are. The fellow I killed in Laredo had one of them same pictures
on his left hand."
Outside, the ancient landau of Don Santos Urique rattled to the door.
The coachman ceased his bellowing. Señora Urique, in a voluminous gay
gown of white lace and flying ribbons, leaned forward with a happy look
in her great soft eyes.
"Are you within, dear son?" she called, in the rippling Castilian.
"_Madre mio, yo vengo_ [mother, I come]," answered the young Don
Francisco Urique.
AN OLD-TIME SINGER
BY FRANK L. STANTON
I don't want any hymnbook when the Methodists is nigh,
A-linin' out the ol' ones that went thrillin' to the sky
In the ol' campmeetin' seasons, when 'twuz "Glory hallelu!"
An' "Brother, rise an' tell us what the Lord has done fer you!"
Fer I know them songs so perfect that when I git the swing
O' the tune they want to go to I kin shet my eyes an' sing!
"On Jordan's stormy banks," an' ol' "Amazin' Grace"--they seem
So nat'ral, I'm like some one that's singin' in a dream!
Oh, when it comes to them ol' songs I allus does my part;
An' I've got the ol'-time Bible down, as you might say, "by heart!"
When the preacher says the fust word in the givin' of his text
I smile with satisfaction, kaze I know what's comin' next!
The wife says: "That's amazin'!" an' the preacher says--says he,
With lots o' meanin' in his voice, an' lookin' queer at me "Sence
you know more o' the Bible than the best o' us kin teach,
Don't you think you orter practice what you're payin' us to preach?"
Well, _that_ gits me in a _corner_--an' I sorter raise my eyes
An' the tune about them titles to the "mansions in the skies"!
I want the benediction then--I'm ready to depart!
But when it comes to singin'--well, I've got the hymns by heart!
BREITMANN IN POLITICS
SHOWING HOW MR. HIRAM TWINE "PLAYED OFF" ON SMITH
BY CHARLES GODFREY LELAND
VIDE LICET: Dere vas a fillage
Whose vode alone vouldt pe
Apout enoof to elegdt a man,
Und gife a mayority;
So de von who couldt scoop dis seddlement
Vould make a pully hit;
Boot dough dey vere Deutschers, von und all,
Dey all go von on Schmit.
Now it happenet to gome to bass
Dat in dis liddle town
De Deutsch vas all exshpegdin
Dat Mishder Schmit coom down,
His brinciples to fore-setzen
Und his ideés to deach,
(Dat is, fix oop de brifate pargains)
Und telifer a pooblic sbeech.
Now Twine vas a gyrotwistive cuss,
Ash blainly ish peen shown,
Und vas alfays an out-findin
Votefer might pe known;
Und mit some of his circumswindles
He fix de matter so
Dat he'd pe himself at dis meetin
And see how dings vas go.
Oh shtrangely in dis leben
De dings kits vorked apout!
Oh voonderly Fortuna
Makes toorn us insite out!
Oh sinkular de luck-wheel rolls!
Dis liddle meeding dere
Fixt Twine _ad perpendiculum_--
Shoost suit him to a hair!
Now it hoppenit on dis efenin
De Deutschers, von und all,
Vere avaitin mit impatience
De openin of de ball;
Und de shates of nite vere fallin
Und de shdars begin to plink,
Und dey vish dat Schmit vouldt hoorry,
For 'dvas dime to dake a trink.
Dey hear some hoofs a-dramplin,
Und dey saw, und dinked dey knowed,
Der bretty greature coomin,
On his horse along de road;
Und ash he ride town in-ward
De likeness vas so plain
Dey donnered out, "Hooray for Schmit!"
Enough to make it rain.
Der Twine vas shtart like plazes;
Boot oopshtarted too his wit,
Und he dinks, "Great Turnips! what if I
Could bass for Colonel Schmit?
Gaul dern my heels! _I'll do it_,
Und go the total swine!
Oh, Soap-balls! what a chance!" said dis
Dissembulatin Twine.
Den 'twas "Willkomm! willkomm, Mishder Schmit!"
Ringsroom on efery site;
Und "First-rate! How dy-do yourself?"
Der Hiram Twine replied.
Dey ashk him, "Come und dake a trink?"
But dey find it mighdy queer
Ven Twine informs dem none boot hogs
Vould trink dat shtinkin bier;
Dat all lager vas nodings boot boison;
Und ash for Sherman wein,
He dinks it vas erfounden
Exshbressly for Sherman schwein;
Dat he himself vas a demperanceler--
Dat he gloria in de name;
Und atfise dem all, for tecency's sake,
To go und do de same.
Dese bemarks among de Deutschers
Vere apout ash vell receife
Ash a cats in a game of den-bins,
Ash you may of coorse peliefe:
De heat of de reception
Vent down a dootzen tegrees,
Und in place of hurraws dere vas only heardt
De rooslin of de drees.
Und so in solemn stille
Dey scorched him to de hall,
Vhere he maket de oradion
Vitch vas so moosh to blease dem all;
Und dis vay he pegin it:
"Pefore I furder go,
I vish dat my obinions
You puddin-het Dootch should know.
"Und ere I norate to you,
I think it only fair
We should oonderstand each other
Prezactly, chunk and square.
Dere are boints on vhich ve tisagree,
And I will plank de facts--
I don't go round slanganderin
My friendts pehind deir packs.
"So I beg you dake it easy
If on de raw I touch,
Vhen I say I can't apide de sound
Of your groontin, shi-shing Dutch.
Should I in the Legisladure
As your slumgullion shtand,
I'll have a bill forbidding Dutch
Troo all dis 'versal land.
"Should a husband talk it to his frau,
To deat' he should pe led;
If a mutter breat' it to her shild,
I'd bunch her in de head;
Und I'm sure dat none vill atfocate
Ids use in public schools,
Oonless dey're peastly, nashdy, prutal,
Sauerkraut-eaten vools."
Here Mishder Twine, to gadder breat,
Shoost make a liddle pause,
Und see sechs hundert gapin eyes,
Sechs hundert shdarin chaws,
Dey shtanden erstarrt like frozen;
Von faindly dried to hiss;
Und von set: "Ish it shleeps I'm treamin?
Gottausend! vat ish dis?"
Twine keptet von eye on de vindow,
Boot poldly went ahet:
"Of your oder shtinkin hobits
No vordt needt hier pe set.
Shtop goozlin bier--shtop shmokin bipes--
Shtop rootin in de mire;
Und shoost _un-Dutchify_ yourselfs:
Dat's all dat I require."
Und _denn_ dere coomed a shindy,
Ash if de shky hat trop:
"Trow him mit ecks, py doonder!
Go shlog him on de kop!
Hei! Shoot him mit a powie-knifes;
Go for him, ganz and gar!
Shoost tar him mit some fedders!
Led's fedder him mit tar!"
Sooch a teufel's row of furie
Vas nefer oop-kickt before:
Soom roosh to on-climb de blatform--
Soom hoory to fasten te toor:
Von veller vired his refolfer,
Boot de pullet missed her mark:
She coot de cort of de shandelier:
It vell, und de hall vas tark!
Oh, vell was it for Hiram Twine
Dat nimply he couldt shoomp;
Und vell dat he light on a misthauf,
Und nefer feel de boomp;
Und vell for him dat his goot cray horse
Shtood sattled shoost outside;
Und vell dat in an augenblick
He vas off on a teufel's ride.
Bang! bang! de sharp pistolen shots
Vent pipin py his ear,
Boot he tortled oop de barrick road
Like any mountain deer:
Dey trowed der Hiram Twine mit shteins,
But dey only could be-mark
Von climpse of his vhite obercoadt,
Und a clotterin in de tark.
So dey all versembled togeder,
Ein ander to sprechen mit,
Und allow dat sooch a rede
Dey nefer exshpegd from Schmit--
Dat he vas a foorst-glass plackguard,
And so pig a Lump ash ran;
So, _nemine contradicente_,
Dey vented for Breitmann.
Und 'twas annerthalb yar dereafter
Before der Schmit vas know
Vot maket dis rural fillage
Go pack oopon him so;
Und he schvored at de Dootch more schlimmer
Ash Hiram Twine had tone.
_Nota bene_: He tid it in earnesht,
Vhile der Hiram's vas pusiness fun.
Boot vhen Breitmann heard de shdory,
How de fillage hat peen dricked,
He shvore bei Leib und Leben
He'd rader hafe been licked
Dan be helped bei sooch shumgoozlin;
Und 'twas petter to pe a schwein
Dan a schwindlin honeyfooglin shnake,
Like dat lyin Yankee Twine.
Und pegot so heafy disgoosted
Mit de boledicks of dis land,
Dat his friendts couldn't barely keep him
From trowin oop his hand,
Vhen he helt shtraidt flush, mit an ace in his poot;
Vich phrase ish all de same,
In de science of de pokerology,
Ash if he got de game.
So Breitmann cot elegtet,
Py vollowin de vay
Dey manage de elegdions
Unto dis fery day;
Vitch shows de Deutsch _Dummehrlichkeit_,
Also de Yankee "wit":
Das ist Abenteuer
How Breitmann lick der Schmit.
LOVE SONG
BY CHARLES GODFREY LELAND
Overe mine lofe a sugar-powl,
De fery shmallest loomp
Vouldt shveet de seas from bole to bole,
Und make de shildren shoomp.
Und if she vere a clofer-fieldt,
I'd bet mine only pence,
It vouldn't pe no dime at all
Pefore I'd shoomp de fence.