by W. C. Tuttle
Author of “Pariahs from Piperock,” “Another Ace for Ananias,” etc.
I’ve been accused of lots of things. Folks has risen on to their hind
legs and orated aloud that I’m a _hombre_ who spends his time trying to
pierce the blackness of things instead of shedding the scales off my
eyes and coming out into the sunlight of optimism.
Maybe I am. I can smell powder-smoke a long ways, and to me there ain’t
no unloaded guns. Nobody can hurt my feelings by chiding me, and that’s
the reason that I sets supine and grins at “Magpie” Simpkins instead of
rising up and smiting him hip and thigh for his insinuations.
“Well,” says I when he seems to stop for breath, “you don’t need me. I
ain’t no prize-fighter, gunman nor _matador_, and a feller has got to be
all three if he tinkers with the wheels of a Piperock entertainment,
Magpie.”
“You only sees the horrors and none of the honors, Ike,” says he
sad-like. “You argues that Piperock has mostly always blowed up somebody
in her entertainments, but it’s reasonable to suppose that we’ll have
one complete success if we keeps at it long enough.”
“Yes,” says I, “but one lifetime ain’t long enough. Why not let
Thanksgiving just sort of pass along like any other day? Christopher
Columbus wasn’t nothing in my every-day life, Magpie.”
“What in —— has Columbus got to do with it?” he asked. “He never had
nothing to do with Thanksgiving.”
“Well, I believe in giving the devil his due, and if it hadn’t been for
Columbus you’d never have had a Thanksgiving.”
“Ike, sometimes you talk like a fool.”
“Yes’m. I reckon we all do, Magpie, but I won’t act like one. Any old
time you speaks to me in a siren’s voice—I’m neutral.”
“There’s only a few of us select ones to take part, Ike. I told Miss
Finney that you’d help out.”
“That funny-faced school-teacher, Magpie?”
“She’s to be pitied, Ike.”
“All right, cowboy, I’ll pity her; but that don’t keep me from giggling
when I see her. Still that ain’t no reason for you to take the liberty
of offering me as a burnt offering at the altar of attraction, though.
“Ain’t I told you time and again that I’m all through and tied up for
shipment when it comes to helping this here crazy cow-town celebrate
anything except its demise?”
“‘Dirty Shirt’ is going to be asked to help,” states Magpie. “The Cross
J quartet will likely sing, and Mrs. Smith said she would recite.”
“‘Curfew Shall Not Ring Tonight’?”
“‘Asleep at the Switch.’ She recited ‘Curfew’ early this spring. This is
going to be a regular entertainment, Ike. Miss Finney sure knows things.
Says that ‘Old Testament’ Tilton and Judge Steele are as good Pilgrim
Fathers as she ever seen. Likely be a masquerade afterward.”
“More likely a funeral,” says I. “Always have had and always will have,
Magpie. Some of the leading lights will get drunk and——”
“Ah-ha! Just shows where you’re wrong, Ike. You’ve been away so long
that you ain’t wise to Piperock. Piperock is dry. _Sabe?_ No more shall
the war-cries sever or the winding rivers be red, Ike. Buck Masterson’s
is a soft-drink emporium now.”
“My ——!” says I. “Have I come back, to this? Is everything and everybody
dry?”
“Everybody is, Ike. I never did see so many dry folks. To all intents
and purposes this here country is plumb dusty, but down deep in her
heart she’s alcoholic to a startling degree. Even Old Testament has a
root-house full of snake-antidote, and before election he was the
silv’ry-tongued temperance talker of the world.
“But that ain’t going to interfere with the antiseptic attitude of this
celebration, Ike. This is the first time we’ve attempted to celebrate
Thanksgiving, and she’s going to be worth while. We all feels that
Piperock has things to be thankful for.”
“Sure has,” says I. “After seeing the entertainments she’s pulled off in
the past I’d rise and orate that this here village ought to offer up
thanks every day in the week. She sure is lucky to still be in
existence.”
“You’ll help us, Ike?”
“I have spoken, Magpie.”
“I ask you to, Mr. Harper.”
“I heard you, Mr. Simpkins.”
“Harper!”
“Aw ——!”
“Sorrow cometh to all of us at times, Ike.”
“You don’t need to spit on your hands—I ain’t slippery. What do you want
me to do?”
“That’s better, Ike.”
“Uh-huh,” says I. “It might be worse.”
* * * * *
I goes down-town and runs across Old Testament and “Scenery” Sims. They
greets me like a brother, and I asks ’em to have a shot.
“Shot?” squeaks Scenery. “You mean ‘dish,’ don’t you? There ain’t no
such a thing as a shot any more, Ike.”
“All right,” says I. “I’ll buy a dish.”
We finds Buck behind the bar, washing dishes. He looks at me and I look
at him.
“My ——!” says he sad-like. “Look what you came back to, Ike. Ain’t it a
awful condition of affairs?”
“The extreme end of nothing whittled to a point, Buck,” says I.
“Vanilly ice-cream, Buck,” says Scenery.
“Make mine vanilly, too, Buck,” nods Testament.
“What odor does you desire, Ike?” asks Buck, but I shakes my head.
“None a-tall, Buck. I’ll just look on, being as I’m still on the
whisky-wagon yet. I don’t hand my stummick no perfumed snow-slide.
_Sabe?_”
“Got some ras’b’ry juice which ain’t so bad,” observes Buck, peering
under the bar. “Ain’t so bad unless you’re thirsty or sad.”
“Make mine ras’b’ry, Buck,” says Scenery.
“Cancel my vanilly, too,” says Testament. “I sort of sickens from it.
Ras’b’ry sounds sort of regular, Buck.”
Buck elects to indulge with us, so we sets around a card-table and sips.
“How,” says Scenery, holding up his glass.
“Unanswerable, Scenery,” says Buck. “I didn’t make it.”
“Mm-m-m-m,” says Old Testament, licking his lips, “them ras’berries must
’a’ stood a while, Buck.”
“Picked fresh in Californy. Ain’t it good?”
“Yea. Little bitey, but not offensive. Better than vanilly.”
“I’m through with vanilly as long as this lasts,” states Scenery.
“Funny thing about ice-cream. ‘Tombstone’ Todd was over in Curlew a few
days ago—went over to kill ‘Hassayampa’ Harris. _Sabe?_ Ever so often
Tombstone feels that he’s called upon to kill Hassayampa. Tombstone
wishes to work himself up to a killing mood, but can’t seem to find
nothing but soft stuff.
“Well, he eats a freezer of ice-cream and then drinks eight quarts of
near beer. The more he imbibes the more he feels sorry for Hassayampa.
After a while he feels so sorry for Hassayampa that he decides to kill
himself and save Hassayampa, thereby making a hero out of himself.”
“Did he make good?” asks Buck.
“Nope. The way I figures it is this: When a feller drinks and drinks
whisky he gets so drunk he can’t hit anything. _Sabe?_
“Well, ain’t it reasonable to suppose that when a feller eats and eats
ice-cream and drinks and drinks near beer he gets so danged sober that
he can’t hit anything? Yes, he missed himself. Let’s have some more
ras’berry juice, Buck.”
We had a round on Scenery, one on Testament, and then Buck treats.
“Pro’bishun is a blessing in sheep’s clothing,” states Testament. “Mine
is a wocker. Who wants strong drink?”
“I hears that you’ve got a root-house full, Testament,” says I.
“Tha’s calumny, Ike. Shomebody has beared false witness against his
neighbor. Nossir, it ain’t full.”
Just then Judge Steele comes in. He nods to us and lays his cane on the
bar.
“Masterson,” says he, “in the name of the great Jehovah and the
Continental Congress, have you anything—anything in the world to drink
that showeth any authority whatsoever?”
“There is naught in the statutes that says a man shall not drink of the
juice of corn. It sayeth that ye may not make, sell, peddle or portion,
but it don’t say anything about what a man may absorb into his system if
said absorption adopts an alias.”
“Such as ras’berry juice, judge?” asks Buck. “Fresh from Californy?”
“She stingeth like a adder, but feeleth good to a man’s insides,” adds
Testament. “She tempers the wind to the clipped sheep. Ras’berries
forever!”
“One and undigestible,” says Scenery.
Then one more of Piperock’s bright and shining lights trimmed his lamp
and got lit up with us. Scenery gets to crying after a while.
“Jus’ to think!” he wails. “Jus’ to think, gents, that in all of Yaller
Rock County there ain’t a single ras’b’ry-patch! They won’t gro-o-o-o-ow
here!”
Then Mrs. Wick Smith comes in to purchase a quart of vanilly ice-cream,
and she looks us over sweet-like.
“I told Wicksie that prohibition would be a boon,” says she, “and it
does my heart good to see you erstwhile drinkers enjoying temperance
drinks. The lion and the lamb will lie down together.”
We watches her waddle out, and then Buck nods his head.
“They will. Yessir, they sure will—if the ras’berries hold out.”
“She called us erstwhile drinkers,” says the judge. “Wish I had my
dictionary.”
“Maybe it’s new name for rashb’ry,” says Testament. “Maybe it is. Wha’s
th’ difference? I feel like a medder-lark in June.”
“You bet you do,” grins Buck; “but tomorrow you’ll feel like a crow in
January, Testament.”
Then comes “Mighty” Jones. He looks us over and orders a milk-shake.
“No milk,” says Buck. “Not a danged bit of cow-juice, Mighty.”
“Never mind,” says Mighty. “Leave out the milk. Never did care for the
stuff.”
“If there ain’t no milk there ain’t nothing to shake,” says Buck.
“All right, Buck—leave out the shake.”
“Leavin’ out the milk and the shake—nothin’ left, Mighty.”
“All right, all right! Don’t start no argument, Buck, I didn’t want the ——
thing noways. I just wanted to show you that I was capable of
ordering a drink in these perverted times.”
“Come in to enjoy Thanksgiving, Mighty?” I asks.
“Enjoy ——! Nobody can enjoy gettin’ their insides gummed up with
ice-cream or sluicing themselves with perfumed water. I’m here on
business.”
“Sellin’ goats, cougars, rattlesnakes or wolves?” asks the judge, but
Mighty shakes his head.
Mighty is always catching some kind of a varmint and trying to sell it.
“Nope. What does folks usually eat on Thanksgiving, judge?”
“Eat? Hm-m-m-m! Turkeys, I reckon.”
“Know where there is any, judge?”
“Nope—not offhanded.”
“Must be some around,” opines Buck. “Naturally would be.”
“Try to find one,” grins Mighty, and then he pats himself on the chest.
“Look upon me! Mighty Jones the Turkey Baron. I went out to ‘Hailstorm’
Wilson’s place and bought out every bird he owned—and he’s the only
turkey-raiser in the county. I sure cornered the crop.”
* * * * *
“Bought every one he had?” asks Buck awed-like. “Gosh! How many you got,
Mighty?”
“Two. Names are Evangeline and Hiawather. Full-blooded turkeys, too.”
“Ahem-m-m-m-m-m!”
The old judge stands up and braces himself on the table.
“Mighty Jones, does you stand there and tell us that you has combined
together to hold us up for our holiday meat? It ain’t legal.”
“Evangeline and Hiawather belong to me. _Sabe?_ I do as I please.”
“M-m-m-m-m. So? How’d you like to be served with a _habeas corpus_?”
“Never drank one, judge. Can you mix one, Buck?”
“Could if I had some lemons, but I ain’t. Y’ betcha I can mix anything.”
“Talking turkey,” says I, “how much per pound, Mighty?”
“According to your luck, Ike. Going to raffle ’em off. _Sabe?_ Got all
the tickets made out. Numbers from one to one hundred on each bird. If
you gets number one it costs you a cent, but if you gets number one
hundred you pays a dollar.
“For instance, if you get numbers like twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two or
twenty-three you pays twenty cents; but from there up to and including
twenty-seven you pays two bits. See the idea?”
“Well,” says Buck, “I ain’t never been to school enough to make me a
figure-hound, but my natural instinct seems to tell me that you ain’t
going to lose money, Mighty.”
“You made a decent profit on your hooch, Buck.”
“Nothing like that, Mighty.”
“No? You been in business here for years and years, Buck. You started in
with one barrel of hooch, and you never got her empty. That ain’t so bad
when you figures that we didn’t drink anything else.”
“Speaking of turkeys reminds me of Miss Finney,” states the judge.
“You let up on that!” snaps Mighty. “I’ve got a danged nice-looking pair
of birds, judge.”
“I ain’t making physical comparisons,” says the judge. “At the
celebration tomorrow night, which is to all intents and purposes the
night before Thanksgiving, we aims to produce a tableau symbolic of the
landing of the Pilgrim Fathers.
“She depicts a far-distant day, gents; a day that none of us can
remember. It was in them times that turkeys became the desired food, and
through the ages we has hankered for them on that day and date.
“Miss Finney says we must surely have turkeys in the tableau, being as
them birds helps make it symbolic, but if there ain’t no turkeys to be
had—well, the tableau sort of loses prestige. What does you think,
Mighty?”
“I think she’ll fail, judge, if you needs turkeys, ’cause I hereby
states at the top of my voice: Evangeline and Hiawather shall never
appear on any stage. I bought turkeys, judge—not actors.”
“Hol’ on, Mighty!” says the judge, getting red around the eyes. “Don’t
render no decision until the evidence is all in. You wishes to raffle
them birds? All right. Suppose Piperock gets peeved at you for being
unpatriotic? Suppose they boycotts your old raffle?
“Unless you cometh forth with them birds I shall agitate against all
raffles. I’ll get out a injunction against you, and then where would you
be?”
“Likely in jail for killing you!” snaps Mighty. “Injunction? On what
grounds, judge? They’re my birds, ain’t they? Go ahead and agitate. I’ll
bar the door and eat ’em myself. _Sabe?_”
Mighty yanks himself from our presence, and the judge turns to
Testament.
“Well, what do you think about it?”
The old sky-pilot sort of jerks and then sets his hat on straight.
“What shay?”
“I asked you what you thought of it.”
“Good. Ve-e-e-ery good. Any left, Buck?”
The sheriff still slept.
* * * * *
I found Magpie with his long nose buried in a book. After a while he
shuts the book and rolls a cigaret.
“Ike, they was a doughty crew,” says he. “Dog-gone doughty.”
“No doubty,” says I, “Where did they hail from?”
“England, of course. Where did you think they hailed from?”
“Missouri, Mexico—lots of places on the earth, Magpie.”
“They braved the tempest and the wave, Ike—remember that.”
“I’ll tie a string around my trigger-finger. Go ahead.”
“In 1620 they landed on a Plymouth Rock.”
“Chicken-thieves!”
I ducked just in time and went out to feed my bronc. It was a danged
unintelligent conversation to me, but Magpie understood enough of it to
get mad at me.
Magpie’s a smart _hombre_. He sure does love a book, and he thinks we
all ought to know things. I’m going to get me a book some day. I had one
once called “The Revelations of the Countess.” It was a good book, but
she wore out.
That night I am met by Magpie and Dirty Shirt, and they insists that I
go with them. I asks Dirty why I am wanted, and he says—
“Misery likes company.”
They takes me up into the Mint Hall, and I meets Piperock’s star
entertainers. There’s Wick Smith, Old Testament, Judge Steele, Pete
Gonyer, “Ricky” Henderson, Scenery Sims, Mrs. Smith, Miss Finney, and
Clementine Smith, a niece of “Doughgod” Smith.
Judge Steele seems to have the floor—as usual. Old Testament seems to be
swallering hard, and the medder-lark seems to have left his system.
Scenery look a heap like he was observing the horrors of Death Valley,
too.
“Ike,” says the judge, “you _sabe_ the reason you’re up here?”
“One on each side of me, judge,” says I.
“Ahem-m-m-m-m! You know why we celebrates Thanksgiving?”
“Because you ain’t got brains enough to let well enough alone.”
“Celebrating in Piperock is like thawing dynamite in the oven. You
dog-gone, buzzard-headed——”
“Whoa!” howls Magpie. “Your cinch is slipping, Ike!”
The ladies look shocked, but the judge keeps right on talking.
“Thanksgiving was started in 1620. _Sabe?_”
“And ended the year I was born, as far as I’m concerned,” says I. “I’ve
got along all these years without it, and I sure ain’t missed it none to
speak about. If she was started in 1620, folks, I figure we ought to let
her lay off for a while.”
“Gracious, that is a queer view-point,” says Miss Finney.
“Ma’am,” says I, “you don’t know Piperock like I do. I had a view-point
once, but Piperock entertainments has bumped into it until she’s plumb
flat on the end.”
“I fear you are a pessimist, Mr. Harper,” says Clementine.
“No, ma’am. I’m educated—that’s all.”
“Now that recitation of mine,” says Mrs. Smith; “I ain’t learned it by
heart yet, but I’ll read it to you. I think it’s the most touching thing
Muley Bowles ever wrote.”
She waddles to the platform, and reads it to us.
“It was a dewy morn in Spring;
The birds were flying high.
I thought of one I loved so well;
A tear stood in my eye.
I wandered down among the trees
Where I plighted her my love.
The tear-drop trickled down my cheek,
The birds flew up above.
The tree where we had cut our names,
Where I swore I’d love her best.
The birds flew higher in the sky;
A tear fell on my chest.
Oh, bitter day! Oh, bitter day!
A sad, sad day, but sweet.
The bitter tears roll off my chest—
Roll off and wet my feet.”
Mrs. Smith pants that much and then wipes away her tears. Maybe she was
afraid she’d get her feet wet.
“Don’t you think it’s wonderful?” she asks.
“Rare,” says I. “If I had it I’d take it to a taxidermist or have it
pickled.”
“I like ‘Asleep at the Switch’ better,” says Wick.
“Yes, you would,” says Mrs. Smith. “You like anything with the word
‘sleep’ in it, Wicksie.”
“Well, folks, we might as well get to work on that tableau,” states Miss
Finney.
I seen a face like hers once. It was near the top of a totem-pole in
Seattle.
We all trails up on the stage. She shoves Old Testament out near the
front.
“Now,” says she, “look dignified, Dr. Tilton, and pose like you had a
book under your arm. Yes, like that. You will have a gun in your other
hand.”
“Don’t give me no book,” says I. “I’ll take two guns.”
“Shut up!” snaps Magpie. “Miss Finney knows what she’s doing.”
“Like ——! If she did she wouldn’t give that old pelican a gun.”
Miss Finney don’t pay no attention to me. She lines Mrs. Smith up with
Testament, and then comes Magpie, Clementine and Judge Steele. She walks
all around them and acts pleased.
“Really you look the part already. Don’t you think so, Mr. Harper?”
“Yes,” says I, “they sure do. What part are you talking about?”
“Ike, you’re a danged fool!” snaps Magpie.
“Now,” says Miss Finney, “I will place Mr. Harper, Mr. Jones and Mr.
Smith. The three of you will crouch down behind these boxes looking as
fierce as you can. Remember, these people are your enemies.”
“Yes’m,” says I. “That won’t require no acting on my part. What are we
bushwhackers supposed to be?”
“You three will represent Indians. Indians hiding from the Pilgrims.”
“From that bunch?” asks Dirty Shirt. “Hide from them? Not me!”
“Yes!” snaps Magpie. “Hiding—behind—a—stump. _Sabe?_”
“Oh!” grunts Dirty. “Oh, behind a stump. All right. The Injuns never did
get a square deal.”
Then the three of us humps over behind them boxes. I reckon we looked as
much like Injuns as them boxes did like stumps.
“Fine!” says Miss Finney. “Just fine. When we get the costumes on and
Mr. Gonyer up there in the rafters sifting snow upon us it will be very
realistic. Dr. Tilton will recite the story of the first Thanksgiving
Day, which I have written for him.
“To begin with, there will be nobody on the stage except the three
Indians. They will be talking in gutturals.
“Suddenly one of them will hear the tolling of a bell. He will peer into
the distance and see the Pilgrims coming from church.
“The three Indians will dash to shelter behind the stumps. While I
slowly toll the bell behind the scenes you Pilgrim Fathers and Mothers
will slowly advance to your places before the audience.
“That is all. Isn’t it simple?”
“Yes,” says I. “Too danged simple.”
“Miss Finney and I are working on the costumes,” states Mrs. Smith.
“Miss Finney will give Mr. Simpkins some pictures showing the proper
costume for Indians of that age. He will be responsible for accuracy of
detail.”
“This will be all for this evening,” says Miss Finney. “Everybody will
please be on hand early tomorrow evening so the costumes may be properly
adjusted. Good evening.”
* * * * *