WEBSTER--MAN'S MAN
By Peter B. Kyne
Author Of “Cappy Ricks”
“The Three Godfathers,” Etc.
Illustrated By Dean Cornwell
[Illustration:ustration: 0006]
[Illustration:ustration: 0007]
New York
Doubleday, Page & Company
1917
WEBSTER-MAN'S MAN
CHAPTER I
|WHEN John Stuart Webster, mining engineer and kicker-up-of-dust on
distant trails, flagged the S. P., L. A. & S. L. Limited at a blistered
board station in Death Valley, California, he had definitely resolved to
do certain things. To begin, he would invade the dining car at the first
call to dinner and order approximately twenty dollars' worth of ham and
eggs, which provender is, as all who know will certify, the pinnacle of
epicurean delight to an old sour-dough coming out of the wilderness with
a healthy bankroll and a healthier appetite; for even as the hydrophobic
dog avoids water, so does the adventurer of the Webster type avoid
the weird concoctions of high-priced French chefs until he has first
satisfied that void which yawns to receive ham and eggs.
Following the ham and eggs, Mr. Webster planned to saturate himself from
soul to vermiform appendix with nicotine, which he purposed obtaining
from tobacco with nicotine in it. It was a week since he had smoked
anything, and months since he had tasted anything with an odour even
remotely like tobacco, for the August temperature in Death Valley is no
respecter of moisture in any man or his tobacco. By reason of the fact
that he had not always dwelt in Death Valley, however, John Stuart
Webster knew the dining-car steward would have in the ice chest some
wonderful cigars, wonderfully preserved.
Webster realized that, having sampled civilization thus far, his debauch
would be at an end until he reached Salt Lake City-unless, indeed, he
should find aboard the train something fit to read or somebody worth
talking to. Upon arrival in Salt Lake City, however, his spree would
really begin. Immediately upon leaving the train he would proceed to
a clothing shop and purchase a twenty-five-dollar ready-to-wear suit,
together with the appurtenances thereunto pertaining or in any wise
belonging. These habiliments he would wear just long enough to shop in
respectably and without attracting the attention of the passing throng;
and when later his “tailor-mades” and sundry other finery should be
delivered, he would send the store clothes to one Ubehebe Henry, a
prospector down in the Mojave country, who would appreciate them and
wear them when he came to town in the fall to get drunk.
Having arranged for the delivery of his temporary attire at the best
hotel in town, Webster designed chartering a taxicab and proceeding
forthwith to that hotel, where he would engage a sunny room with a bath,
fill the bathtub, climb blithely in and soak for two hours at least,
for it was nearly eight months since he had had a regular bath and he
purposed making the most of his opportunity. His long-drawn ablutions at
length over, he would don a silken dressing gown and slippers, order up
a barber, and proceed to part with enough hair and whiskers to upholster
an automobile; and upon the completion of his tonsorial adventures he
would encase his person in a suit of mauve-coloured silk pajamas, climb
into bed and stay there for forty-eight hours, merely waking long enough
to take another bath, order up periodical consignments of ham and
eggs and, incidentally, make certain that a friendly side-winder or
chuck-walla hadn't crawled under the blankets with him.
So much for John Stuart Webster's plans. Now for the gentleman himself.
No one--not even the Pullman porter, shrewd judge of mankind that he
was--could have discerned in the chrysalis that flagged the Limited
the butterfly of fashion that was to be. As the ebony George raised
the vestibule platform, opened the car door and looked out, he had no
confidence in the lean, sun-baked big man standing by the train. Plainly
the fellow was not a first-class passenger but a wandering prospector,
for he was dog-dirty, a ruin of rags and hairy as a tarantula. The only
clean thing about him was a heavy-calibred automatic pistol of the army
type, swinging at his hip.
“Day coach an' tourist up in front,” the knight of the whiskbroom
announced in disapproving tones and started to close down the platform.
“So I perceived,” John Stuart Webster replied blandly. “I also observed
that you failed to employ the title _sir_ when addressing a white man.
Put that platform back and hop out here with your little stool, you
saddle-coloured son of Senegambia, or I'll make you a hard porter to
catch.”
“Yassah, yassah!” the porter sputtered, and obeyed instantly. Mr.
Webster handed him a disreputable-looking suitcase and stepped aboard
in state, only to be informed by the sleeping-car conductor that there
wasn't a vacant first-class berth on the train.
“Yes, I know I'm dirty,” the late arrival announced cheerfully, “but
still, as Bobby Burns once remarked, 'a man's a man for a' that'--and
I'm _not_ unsanitary. I sloshed around some in Furnace Creek the night
before last, and while of course I got the top layer off, still, a
fellow can't accomplish a great deal without hot water, soap, a good
scrubbing-brush and a can of lye.”
“I'm very sorry,” the conductor replied perfunctorily and endeavoured to
pass on, but Webster secured a firm grip on his lapel and frustrated the
escape.
“You're not sorry,” the ragged wanderer declared, “not one little bit.
You're only apprehensive. However, you needn't be. There is no wild
life on me, brother, I assure you. If you can prove it, I'll give you
a thousand-dollar bill for each and every bit of testimony you can
adduce.”
“But I tell you, the train is full up. You'll have to roost in the
daycoach or the tourist. I'm very sorry----”
“So am I, for I know what daycoaches and tourist-cars smell like in the
middle of August, because, as the poet says, I've been there many a
time and oft.' Nevertheless, despite your deep grief, something tells me
you're spoofing, so while I must, of necessity, accept your suggestion,
said acceptance will be but temporary. In about two hours, young fellow,
you're going to make the alarming discovery that you have bats in your
belfry.” And with a whiskery grin which, under the circumstances, was
charming in its absolute freedom from malice, Mr. Webster departed for
the daycoach.
Two hours later the conductor found him in the aforementioned daycoach,
engaged in a mild game of poker with a mule-skinner, a Chinaman, an aged
prospector, and a half-breed Indian, and waited until Mr. Webster, on a
bob-tailed club flush, bluffed the Chinaman out of a dollar-and-a-half
pot.
“Maud, Lily, and Kate!” Webster murmured, as the Celestial laid down
three queens and watched his ragged opponent rake in the pot. “Had I
held those three queens and had you made a two-card draw as I did, only
death could have stopped me from seeing what you held! Hello! Here's
Little Boy Blue again. All right, son. Blow your horn.”
“Are you Mr. John S. Webster?”
“Your assumption that I am that person is so eminently correct that
it would be a waste of time for me to dispute it,” Webster replied
quizzically. “However, just to prove that you're not the only
clairvoyant on this train, I'm going to tell _you_ something about
_yourself_. In your pocket you have a telegram; it is from
Chicago, where your pay-check originates; it is a short, sweet, and
comprehensive, containing an order which you are going to obey. It reads
somewhat as follows:
“'My friend, John S. Webster, wires me from Blank that he boarded train
at Blank and was refused first-class accommodation because he looked
like a hobo. Give him the best you have in stock, if you have to throw
somebody off the train to accommodate him. Unless you see your way clear
to heed this suggestion your resignation is not only in order but has
already been accepted.' Signed, 'Sweeney.'
“Do I hit the target?”
The conductor nodded. “You win, Mr. Webster,” he admitted.
“Occasionally I lose, old-timer. Well?”
“Who the devil is Sweeney?”
John Stuart Webster turned to his cosmopolitan comrades of the national
game. “Listen to him,” he entreated them. “He has worked for the
company, lo, these many years, and he doesn't know who Sweeney is?” He
eyed the conductor severely. “Sweeney,” he declared, “is the man who
is responsible for the whichness of the why-for. Ignorance of the man
higher up excuses no sleeping-car conductor, and if your job is gone
when you reach Salt Lake, old-timer, don't blame it on me, but rather
on your distressing propensity to ask foolish questions. _Vamos, amigo_,
and leave me to my despair. Can't you see I'm happy here?”
“No offense, Mr. Webster, no offense. I can let you have a
stateroom----”
“That's trading talk. I'll take it.”
The conductor gave him his receipt and led him back to the stateroom in
the observation-car. At the door Webster handed him a five-dollar bill.
“For you, son,” he said gently, “just to take the sting out of what I'm
about to tell you. Now that I possess your receipt and know that ten men
and a boy cannot take it away from me, I'm going to tell you who Sweeney
is.”
“Who is he?” the conductor queried. Already he suspected he had been
outgeneralled.
“Sweeney,” said Mr. Webster, “is the chief clerk in one of Chicago's
most pretentious hotels and a young man who can find all the angles of a
situation without working it out in logarithms. I wired him the details
of my predicament; he heard the Macedonian cry and kicked in. Neat, is
it not?”
The conductor grinned. “I hate to take your money,” he declared.
“Don't. Just at present I'm very flush. Yes, sir, I'm as prosperous as
a yearling burro up to his ears in alfalfa, and the only use I have ever
found for money is to make other people happy with it, thereby getting
some enjoyment out of it myself. Just as soon as I get a little chunk
together, some smarter man than I takes it all away from me again--so
the cleaning process might just as well start here. When I'm broke I'll
make some more.”
“How?”
“By remembering that all a man needs in this world, in order to excel,
is about two per cent, more courage than a jack-rabbit; also that an
ounce of promotion in a world of boobs is worth a ton of perspiration.
Thank you for falling for my bluff.”
And having wotted the which, Mr. Webster retired to his hard-won
sanctuary, where he removed as much alkali and perspiration as he could,
carded his long hair and whiskers, manicured his finger nails with a
jack-knife, changed his shirt, provided five minutes of industry for
George, with his whiskbroom and brush, and set himself patiently to
await the first call to dinner.
The better to hear the dinner call Webster left his stateroom door open,
and presently a pink-jowled, well-curried, flashily dressed big man, of
about Webster's age, passed in the corridor, going toward the head of
the train. An instant later a woman's voice said very distinctly:
“I do not know you, sir; I do not wish to know you, and it is loathsome
of you to persist in addressing me. If you do not stop your annoying
attentions, I shall call the conductor.”
“Ah! Beauty in distress,” John Stuart Webster soliloquized. “I look so
much like an Angora goat I might as well butt in.” He stepped to the
door of his stateroom. A girl stood in the vestibule, confronting the
man who had just passed Webster's door. Webster bowed.
“Madame, or mademoiselle, as the case may be,” he said, “unlike this
other male biped, my sole purpose in presuming to address you is to
suggest that there is not the slightest necessity for taking this matter
up with the conductor. I am here and very much at your service.”
The girl turned--and John Stuart Webster's heart flopped twice in rapid
succession, like a trout newly grassed. She was as lovely as a royal
flush. Her starry glance began at his miner's boots, travelled up his
old, soiled, whipcord trousers, over his light blue chambray shirt
and found the man behind the whiskers. She favoured him with a quick,
curious scrutiny and a grave, sweet smile. “Thank you so much, sir,” she
answered, and passed down the corridor to the observation-car.
“Well, old-timer,” Webster greeted the fellow who had been annoying
her, “how about you? What do you think we ought to do about this little
affair?”
“The sensible thing would be to do--nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Nothing.”
“Why?”
“You might start something you couldn't finish.”
“That's a dare,” Webster declared brightly, “and wasn't it the immortal
_Huckleberry Finn_ who remarked that anybody that'd take a dare would
suck eggs and steal sheep?” He caressed his beard meditatively. “They
say the good Lord made man to His own image and likeness. I take it
those were only the specifications for the building complete--the
painting and interior decorating, not to mention the furnishings, being
let to a sub-contractor.” He was silent a few seconds, appraising his
man. “I suppose you commenced operations by moving into her section and
asking if she would like to have the window open and enjoy the fresh
air. Of course if she had wanted the window open, she would have called
the porter. She rebuffed you, but being a persistent devil, you followed
her into the observation-car, and in all probability you ogled her at
luncheon and ruined her appetite. And just now, when you met her in
this vestibule, you doubtless jostled her, begged her pardon and
without waiting to be introduced asked her to have dinner with you this
evening.”
“Well?” the fellow echoed belligerently.
“It's all bad form. You shouldn't try to make a mash on a lady. I don't
know who she is, of course, but she's not common; she's travelling
without a chaperon, I take it, and for the sake of the mother that bore
me I always respect and protect a good woman and whale hell out of those
that do not.”
He reached inside his stateroom and pressed the bell. The porter arrived
on the run.
“George,” said Mr. Webster, “in a few minutes we're due at Smithville.
If my memory serves me aright, we stop five minutes for water and
orders.”
“Yassah.”
“Remain right here and let me off as soon as the train comes to a stop.”
When the train slid to a grinding halt and the porter opened the car
door, Webster pointed.
“Out!” he said. “This is no nice place to pull off a scrap.”
“See here, neighbour, I don't want to have any trouble with you----”
“I know it. All the same, you're going to have it--or come with me to
that young lady and beg her pardon.”
There are some things in this world which the most craven of men will
not do--and the vanity of that masher forbade acceptance of Webster's
alternative. He preferred to fight, but--he did not purpose being
thrashed. He resolved on strategy.
“All right. I'll apologize,” he declared, and started forward as if
to pass Webster in the vestibule, on his way to the observation-car,
whither the subject of his annoying attentions had gone. Two steps
brought him within striking distance of his enemy, and before Webster
could dodge, a sizzling righthanded blow landed on his jaw and set him
back on his haunches in the vestibule.
It was almost a knockout--almost, but not quite. As Webster's body
struck the floor the big automatic came out of the holster; swinging in
a weak circle, it covered the other.
“That was a daisy,” Webster mumbled. “If you move before my head clears,
I'll put four bullets into you before you reach the corridor.”
He waited about a minute; then with the gun he pointed to the car
door, and the masher stepped out. Webster handed the porter his gun and
followed; two minutes later he returned, dragging his assailant by the
collar. Up the steps he jerked the big battered hulk and tossed it in
the corner of the vestibule, just as the girl came through the car,
making for the diner up ahead.
Again she favoured him with that calm, grave, yet vitally interested
gaze, nodded appreciatively, made as if to pass on, changed her mind,
and said very gravely: “You are--a very courtly gentleman, sir.”
He bowed. There was nothing else to do, nothing that he could say,
under the circumstances; to use his chivalry as a wedge to open an
acquaintance never occurred to him--but his whiskers did occur to him.
Hastily he backed into his stateroom and closed the door; presently
he rose and surveyed himself critically in the small mirror over the
washstand.
“No, Johnny,” he murmured, “we can't go into the diner now. We're too
blamed disreputable. We were bad enough before that big swine hung
the shanty on our right eye, but whatever our physical and personal
feelings, far be it from us to parade our iridescent orb in public.
Besides, one look at that queen is enough to do us for the remainder of
our natural life, and a second look, minus a proper introduction, would
only drive us into a suicide's grave. That's a fair sample of our
luck, Johnny. It rains duck soup--and we're there like a Chinaman--with
chopsticks; and on the only day in the history of the human race, here
I am with a marvellous black eye, a dislocated thumb, four skinned
knuckles, and a grouch, while otherwise looking like a cross between
_Rip Van Winkle_ and a hired man.” He sighed, rang for the porter and
told him to send a waiter for his order, since he would fain break his
fast in the privacy of his stateroom. And when the waiter came for the
order, such was Mr. Webster's mental perturbation that ham and eggs
were furthest from his thoughts. He ordered a steak with French fried
potatoes.