BOOTS
The green of the prairie had given way to brown, and the brown to white,
which rolled off to the sky-line and the hills in dazzling billows, in
the cold light of the sun. For winter had the Bar O in its grip. And
though winter was no gentle thing in Montana, there was a tingle in the
cold, sharp air that made a boy want to whoop and to get on his
snowshoes and go after rabbits, which wise old Nature had also turned
white, so that they could blend in with the color of the landscape and
the better avoid their enemies. Not that Injun ever whooped; he never
did. His people always had reserved that form of expression for warlike
purposes.
There were many things the boys could do in winter, but these were
forgotten for a time by Whitey, for a great event was about to take
place. His father was to return to the ranch from New York, stopping
over at St. Paul, on his way, to buy supplies. And as the snow was not
too deep for sleighing, Whitey drove down to the Junction, with Bill
Jordan, to meet Mr. Sherwood. And outside Whitey was all wrapped up in a
buffalo coat, and inside he was so warm with excitement that the coat
seemed hardly necessary.
Now, of course, Whitey was awfully glad to see his father, and to hear
the news about his mother and sisters, and about Tom Johnson, and George
and Bobby Smith, and others of his boy friends. But after he had heard
all this there was another thing that naturally came to his mind. Mr.
Sherwood would not come back to the ranch without bringing Whitey some
sort of present, and his father was singularly silent about what this
was. In fact, he had not said anything about it at all. And it was after
supper, and Mr. Sherwood was unpacking his trunk, when he rather
carelessly said, "Oh, here's something I brought for you," and gave
Whitey a parcel.
Whitey thanked his father, and undid the parcel, and he dropped the
things that were in it, and his eyes popped out, and for a moment he
could hardly breathe, he was so excited, for they were Boots!
And when Whitey recovered a bit he rushed over and actually hugged his
father.
Perhaps you would like to know why a pair of boots would cause all this
feeling in Whitey. For one thing, it was because he never had owned any.
In New York all the boys wore shoes, and when Whitey had come to the
ranch he had worn them, too, until the soles of his feet had become hard
enough, like Injun's, for him to go barefoot, which he delighted in
doing.
But in the late fall, and the spring, when it was colder, he again
followed Injun's lead, and wore moccasins. Buckskin moccasins, with
little bead decorations. In the cold of winter, when the snow was deep,
and when the big thaws came, Whitey wore heavy, moccasin-like
muck-lucks, made of buckskin, which laced high, nearly to his knees, and
over the tops of which hung the tops of heavy, woolen socks.
These comprised Injun and Whitey's footwear for the seasons. But there
was one thing that Whitey envied the cowboys on the ranch their boots.
For you must know that there are two things on which a puncher spends
his money extravagantly--his boots and his saddle. Unless he happens to
be a Mexican--then he spends it on his hat, too.
So the dream of Whitey's life, the pinnacle of his ambition, the idea of
the tip-top of ecstatic happiness that lived in his brain
was--Boots. And now he had them. And they were beauties; with
tops of soft leather with fancy stitching, inlaid with white enameled
leather, and high heels, that a fellow could dig into the ground when he
was roping a horse. In short, they were regular boots, that any one
might be proud of. And they had been made to order for Whitey!
It would be useless to attempt a description of how Whitey felt about
those boots. Shakespeare would have to come back to life to do that, and
I doubt if he could have done it. I _know_ that Bacon could not.
Whitey's first impulse was to put the boots on, and go out and show them
to all the men in the bunk house. His next impulse was to save the
surprise till morning, when the decorations on the boots would show
better.
But he put them on. And after his father had finished unpacking, Whitey
sat in the living-room with him, and it is to be feared that he listened
rather absent-mindedly to his father's talk. He would stretch out his
legs and admire the boots. Then he would twist his feet about so that he
could get a good view of the high heels. Then he would double up his
knees, and fairly hug the boots. And if Mr. Sherwood noticed all this he
gave no sign. Probably he remembered the day he had his first pair of
boots. And that night, though Whitey did not sleep in the boots, he took
them to bed with him.
In the morning Whitey restrained his impatience until breakfast-time,
then strolled down to the bunk house, wearing the boots. Several of the
men were there, just finishing the meal, and rolling their
after-breakfast cigarettes. Whitey sat down, sort of offhand and
careless-like, and to his pained surprise, no one noticed the boots.
Then he crossed his legs and leaned back, with his hands clasped behind
his head--and Buck Higgins noticed them.
And Whitey certainly was gratified, for they attracted a great deal of
admiration and praise, and there was much discussion about them, and
feeling of the leather, and estimating how much they cost. After a while
Injun arrived. Now, Injun did not care about boots, though he might have
liked a pair had they been made of pink leather. But even Injun was
moved to admiration by these boots.
Then Whitey strutted around the ranch buildings and corrals for a while,
and the milch cows, and the horses and the pigs--all the stock, in
fact--had a good look at the boots. And Sitting Bull admired them so
much that he wanted to lick them, but of course that wouldn't do.
Bill Jordan had an errand at the Junction and he drove Whitey and Injun
over with him. Al Strong's store was also the postoffice, and every man,
woman, and child that happened to be there at mail-time had a fine view
of Whitey's boots. That night, when Whitey went to bed, he was quite
tired from exhibiting them.
The next day Whitey figured that about every human being and animal in
the neighborhood had seen his boots. Then he happened to think of the
Indians fishing on the river. I say _on_ the river, for it was frozen
over, with its first solid covering of ice. Now, the Indians never fish
in the summer-time. Few white people know about it, but the Indians
don't like to fish. They only eat fish when they can't hunt much. When
the Indian goes into camp for the winter, he has his provisions all
stacked to carry him through, but to be sure that these provisions will
hold out, he will eat just a little fish.
And this is the Indian's mode of fishing. He puts up a tepee right out
on the ice, and puts a blanket inside the tepee. Then he cuts a hole in
the ice, and lies down on the blanket and industriously watches the
hole. You know that fish are very inquisitive, and when Mr. Inquiring
Fish comes along to see about that hole, Mr. Indian spears him just back
of the head, pulls him out, and has fried fish for supper.
When Whitey beat it down to the river, to show his boots to a new
audience, he was followed by Injun and Sitting Bull. Trouble was
following, too,--Harrowing Trouble,--but Whitey didn't know it. On the
frozen river were about a dozen tepees, standing up something like big
stacks of cornstalks on a field of frosted glass. So there probably were
about a dozen Indians, lying on their stomachs, watching as many holes
in the ice.
There was not one of those Indians that Whitey thought should miss
seeing those boots. In the first tepee his reception was very
gratifying. Little Eagle was the owner's name, and _he_ didn't care much
about boots, but the decorations on these pleased his taste for the
gaudy, and his eyes sparkled as he grunted his praise.
So it went around the little fishing village, until Whitey entered about
the eighth tepee, and that was where Trouble was right next to him.
Inside the tent it was dark. And Whitey didn't fall into the hole in the
ice--he walked into it. His life was not in danger, because he didn't
mind a little cold water, and the Indian lying there on his stomach,
with his eyes accustomed to the darkness, could see, and he quickly
grabbed Whitey by the shoulders and yanked him out--but, oh! the boots!
They were crinkled and soaked and water-logged and shrunken. And it took
six Indians to get them off, two pulling on each boot, and two to hold
Whitey. And when they were off, Whitey borrowed a pair of moccasins, and
raced to the ranch house, with Injun and Sitting Bull.
Now, in the living-room of the Bar O ranch house in winter--and in every
other ranch house in that part of the country--was a big stove that held
a stick of cordwood three feet long. In fact, it held four or five such
sticks of cordwood, which, you can imagine, made a good fire. And
straight to this fire went Whitey. He was wet, and he was ashamed. And
he put the boots under the stove to dry, without anybody's seeing him.
And he didn't say anything to his father about it, because he was
ashamed. And he went to bed without saying anything about it.
In the morning Whitey was up with the sun, and went to get his boots.
And, oh, ye gods! Why didn't the heavens fall? What once was a pair of
proud boots, looked like two little, brown wrinkled apples! It was a
tragedy in six acts. It was worse than that, for one can find words for
a tragedy. But why dwell on it?
And while Whitey was getting the worst of the first, horrible shock, his
father came into the living-room, and not knowing why, Whitey ran, and
his father, not knowing why, I suspect, ran after him. Whitey was fleet
of foot, and much smaller than his father, so he could make the stairs
better. And he ran up and down and around, now slamming this door, and
now slamming that one.
And Whitey's father began to get angry. But Whitey had become a frontier
boy, and accustomed to standing his ground in the face of a superior
enemy--at least, when he couldn't run any farther. When he was finally
run down, he backed into a corner, lifted his fists to the proper angle,
and, in this boyish fighting attitude, said to his big, strong,
wonderful dad, "Don't you hit me!"
If it hadn't been for his father's strong sense of humor, Whitey
probably would have been in for a sound trimming. As it was, his father
paused and looked at him sternly; then his piercing blue eyes began to
soften, and signs of his sense of humor began to appear about his mouth.
And he turned on his heel, and walked away, leaving Whitey to his grief.