“The wrong room! My ——!”
Then somebody knocks on the door.
“Honey,” says Peaceful’s voice, “are you-all asleep?”
“No, dear. What is wrong?”
“Can you-all come out here?”
“Not unless we dress. Why?”
“Got some funny news to tell you. Can you-all cover up good so we can
come in?”
Me and Magpie slides to the floor and under the bed just as the door
opens.
“Reverend, this is my wife and her sister. Excuse ’em for being in bed.”
“Not at all. Not at all. Don’t mention it.”
“Honey,” says Peaceful, “them wasn’t preacher folks we had here.
Dawg-gone ’em, they impostered upon us. Seems that the sheriff puts ’em
in jail for robbing a bank and shooting the cashier. Sheriff took away
their clothes, but they got away just the same and they burgled the
Reverend’s home. They stole his clothes and his wife’s clothes, too,
and——”
“She—she wasn’t a woman?” gasps Mrs. Peaceful. “She wasn’t?”
“Nope. She was a he.”
“My heavenly home! She was going to sleep—Oh, my!”
“Yes, they were low-down imposters,” says the preacher. “I came all the
way down here to expose them. No doubt they had designs for some crooked
work in War Bonnet. They are of low morals and a menace to society. It
would give me great pleasure to lay my hands——”
“Ow-w-w-w-w!”
The sky-pilot was standing near the bed, so Magpie reaches out, grabs
him by the feet and yanks him upside-down. I grabbed Peaceful. I only
got one boot, but I sure yanked hard and I heard a rocking chair give up
the ghost when he landed on it.
Then me and Magpie skids out from under that bed and stops at the door
with a gun in each hand. The women ducks under the covers, while the
preacher and Peaceful looks up at us like we was ghosts.
“Preacher,” pants Magpie, “you talk too much. _Sabe?_ We’re here to get
the evidence that will send you over the road.”
“O-over the r-r-road?” he gasps.
“Danged right!” snaps Magpie. “You’re the jasper what robbed the bank.
In that other room is two valises with a lot of money in ’em, and they
came from your bedroom. _Sabe?_ Preacher ——! You ain’t no more preacher
than I am!”
“Two valises with money in them?” he gasps, turning green.
“Yes, two valises with money in them!” mocks Magpie.
“Ah!” The preacher sets up and stares at us. “You—you took those
valises? Give them back to me—please. That is the money we raised in
Greasewood to build a church. We—we thought it would be safer there than
in the bank, don’t you see?”
Me and Magpie looks at each other and then back at the two on the floor.
“It’s in the other room,” says Magpie in a far-away voice. “You’re much
obliged to it.”
“Dud—don’t mention it,” says the preacher. “I—I never robbed any bank.
The sheriff caught the real robbers early this evening and he came back
to let you out, but you was gone. He brought your horses to War Bonnet.
Said he was going to apologize and give them back to you, and——”
* * * * *
But me and Magpie walked out of the front door, got on our broncs and
drifted toward a very pale north star. When we’re out of sight of War
Bonnet, Magpie skids his bronc across the trail and rolls a cigaret. I
finds the makings in the sheriff’s pockets. He didn’t have anything else
in them. I sent ’em back to him later—along with his gun. We got our
smokes to going.
“Feller men should be circumspect,” says I. “Each and every man should
live like an open book. It ain’t noways possible for every crime to have
a witness and you can’t acquit a man just because he sneaks up on his
criminal occupation in the dark when everybody else is asleep.”
“Ike,” says Magpie soft-like, “I hate to argue, but I’ll say right here
and now that you’re crazy if you even think so. Tell you why you’re
wrong. Just because a feller can’t prove he’s innocent——”
And we went on our way rejoicing over another argument.
[Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in Adventure Magazine,
February 18, 1920. It is believed to be in the public domain in the
United States; copyright status may differ in other countries.]