“Honesty should be tinged with a certain degree of self-preservation.”
I has a hard time getting him to see things my way, Hank. Not that I had
a dishonest thought, though, ’cause you know the latter-day Daltons are
as honest as a hot day is long.
He asks me if I knowed what “salting” meant, and I told him I knowed a
plenty about it. There ain’t no place where a feller can buy gold; so he
went over to the bank and got fifty dollars worth of five-dollar
gold-pieces.
“Dobie,” says he, handing me the money, “use your own judgment but be
discreet. _Sabe?_ Don’t make her look too rich nor too poor. Use your
own judgment.”
I sure did, Hank. It don’t do to make it too rich; so I held out
twenty-five dollars for a rainy day. Not that I intended to keep any of
it, but suppose anything should happen to Bedrock, who ain’t got no will
made out nor nothing! Where would I be for all my trouble? I’ve been in
business long enough to see that a man has got to look out for his own
interests or lose trade.
Well, Hank, I fixed that mine and then notifies Bedrock. We has a drink
while we waits for Archibald to show up.
“Dobie,” says he, “this may not be knowed as a honest way to do
business, but I ain’t done no wrong. I handed you the gold, and, if you
want to plant it on my property, it ain’t no funeral of mine, is it?”
“No,” says I, “and it don’t reflect on my character either. It ain’t me
what is selling the mine. If I wants to cache gold, that’s my business,
and I never showed him the place. It’s just a coincidence, Bedrock.”
Me and Bedrock has clean minds over it, which is a rare thing for men
who sell mines. Bedrock met Archibald, and I went over to the Palace and
horned into a poker game.
See how the deal was going, Hank? Here was a chance to clean up all my
debts and not worry you any more about finances. I sure felt so good
that, when I got cleaned like a shirt in a Chink laundry, I didn’t even
have remorse. When you got a lot of money coming, you don’t worry about
a few measly dollars. Well, I set there for quite a long time watching
the game, when all to once I seen Bedrock stick his head into the back
door and motion for me to come out. I follers him out back of a corral.
“Quick work,” says I. “How much do I get out of the deal, and how soon
do I get what is coming to me, Bedrock?”
He takes off his coat and vest and hangs them over the corral fence.
Then he spits on his hands and says:
“Dobie, you’re going to get yours right now. I ain’t a young man any
more, and I’m a heap stiff in the knees, but I sure am willing to fight
any man what ain’t got no more sense than to stick five-dollar
gold-pieces into the cracks in a mine and expect a man to buy the
property. First I’m going to lick you, and then I’m going to make you
give back the money you held out on me.”
Well, Hank, there ain’t much going on around here. Bedrock was wrong
about getting that money back, ’cause I lost it in that poker game. I’m
glad, too, because he lied to me about his physical condition when he
said he was stiff.
A dollar ain’t much, Hank, but a few of them would feel good around me
right now. There’s a sign on the wall of the post-office what says that
a money-order is the proper way to send same. Remind me to all the boys
and tell them I’m doing the same as usual.
Y’rs obediently and sincerely,
Dobie Dalton.
* * * * *
Mesquite, June 20.