I GOT back all right. It takes two dollars and six-bits to git from
Goldstone to Briggs City on the Local. But if you happen to have a little
flat bottle in you' back pocket, you ride in the freight caboose fer
nothin'. I _had_ a flat bottle. I swapped "The Lloyd Addition" fer it.
When I hit ole Briggs City, she looked all right t' _me,_ I can tell
y'. And so did the boys. And by noon I was plumb wored out, I'd gassed
so much.
Wal, I went over and sit down on the edge of Silverstein's porch to
rest my face and hands. Pretty soon, I heerd a hoss a-comin' up the
street--_clickety, clickety, clickety, click._ It stopped at the
post-office, right next me. I looked up--and here was Macie!
Say! I felt turrible, 'cause I hadn't slicked up any yet. But she
didn't seem to notice. She knowed they was somethin' gone wrong though,
'fore ever I said a word. She just helt out one soft little hand.
"Never you mind, Alec," she says; "never you mind."
My little gal!
"It means punchin' cows fer four years at forty per, Macie," I says
to her.
"I'll wait fer you, Alec," she answers.
She'd gone, and I was turnin' back towards Silverstein's, when--I'm
a son-of-a-gun if I didn't see, a-comin' acrosst from the deepot, one
of them land-sharks! It was Porky, with that wedge-coat of hisn, and a
seegar as big as a corn-cob!
Say! I duv under the porch so quick that I clean scairt the life outen
six razorbacks and seventeen hens that was diggin' 'round under it. And
when I come out where the back door is, I skun fer Hairoil Johnson's
shack to borra a dif-f'rent suit of clothes offen the parson. Next, I
had my Santy Claus mowed at the barber-shop.
But, when I looked in the glass, I wasn't satisfied, 'cause I wasn't
changed enough. "What'll I _do?_" I ast the barber.
"Wash," he says.
Wal, I'll be dog-goned!--the _dis_guise was complete!
Just then, in come Hank Shackleton. "Hank," I says, "what do y'
think?--that fat Chicago millionaire I was a-tellin' you of is _here!_"
"You don't say so!" he answers, beginnin' to grin. "That shore _is_
luck!"
"How so?" ast the barber.
"Why," I says, "just think what we can _do_ to him!"
Hank just lent back and haw-hawed like he'd bust his buttons off. "Aw,
_don't_ make me laugh," he says; "my lip's cracked!"
They ain't no use talkin'--we fixed up a proposition that was a _daisy_.
"And it'll work like yeast," says Shackleton. "A-course, whatever
_I_ make outen it, Cupid, you git a draw-down on--yas, you do."
"Nobody from Goldstone'll speak up and spoil the fun, neither," I
says. "Not by a jugful! That passel of yaps down there is jealous of
Briggs, and 'd just _like_ to see her done. What's more, they got a
heap of little, mean pride, and 'd never own up _they_ been sold."
It was shore funny, but from that _very_ minute, and all by _itself_
kinda, Briggs City begun to boom! Billy Trowbridge put a barb-wire fence
'round a couple of vacant lots next his house. Bergin dug a big hole
behind that ole vacant shack of hisn, and buried about a ton of tin cans.
Hairoil turned some shoats into a rock patch he owned and cleaned out
the rattlesnakes. And all over town, sand got five times as high as
it'd ever been afore.
So when my dudey friend, the real-estate feller, struck our flourishin'
city, and hired a' empty shanty fer his office, he didn't find no one
anxious to sell him a slice of land. "Say! property's up here," he
_re_marked, whilst he put down the stiff price that Bill Rawson 'd ast
fer a lot. He seemed sorta bothered in his mind. (But he had to have
land--to start his game on.)
"And _climbin',_" says Bill, pocketin' the spondulix. (Later on, Bill
says to _me,_ "I ain't a-goin' to do another lick of hard work this
year!")
Same day, here was Sam Barnes, walkin' up and down on that acre of hisn
and holdin' to a forked stick. Wouldn't tell Porky _why,_ though he
hinted that whenever a forked stick dipped _three_ times, _it meant
somethin' more 'n water._
"But I ain't got the cash to do no investigatin'," says Sam, sad-like.
Porky got turrible inter_est_ed. "Say," he says t' Shackleton, "what
you think of that land of Barnes's?"
"Wal," answers Hank, "I'll tell y': Oncet I seen another strip
that looked _just_ like hisn on top. And it was rich in gold. It was so
blamed rich in the colour that when the feller who owned it (he was as
lazy as a government mule)--when that feller wanted more t'bacca, 'r
some spuds, 'r a piece of pig, why, he'd just go out into the yard and
roll. Then he'd hike to town, and when he'd get into the bank, he'd
shake hisself--good--pick up what fell to the floor, git it weighed,
and the payin'-teller would hand him out what was comin' t' him."
Porky peeled his eyes. (It was plain he didn't swaller it all.) But,
after talkin' with that real-estate feller, he hunted up Sam and bought
ev'ry square inch he had. "'Cause it's dollars to doughnuts," he
says, "that Briggs City'll grow this way."
"Wal, I don't know," says Sam. "Bergin is powerful strong in
pollytics, and he figgers to git the Court House _er_ected on the
other side of town--where his wife's got some land."
The new parson and the doc showed up that same afternoon. And I reckon
they liked that Court House idear, 'cause they took the north half of
the Starvation Gap property straight off.
"The City Park," they says, "should allus be next the public
buildin's."
"The City Park," says Buckshot Milliken, "will likely be further
north, right agin the University. I _know_--fer the reason that they was
a meetin' of the University _di_rectors last night. Then, the Farmers'
and Merchants' Bank is goin' to be located facin' the Park, and so
is the Grand Op'ra House."
Porky gave Buckshot a' awful sharp look. But Buckshot's a' Injun when
it comes to actin' innocenter'n a kitten. So then the millionaire gent
looked _tickled_ ('cause, just think!--if we was _ex_cited a'ready
about a boom, what a pile of trouble it'd save him and his pardners!)
Wal, he waddled off and hunted 'em up. And that night they pur_chased_
'most all of them north lots--payin' good.
It was the next mornin' that they got holt of ole man Sewell and bought
the Andrews place. Sewell wasn't _on_--he hadn't been into town since I
come from Goldstone. But the real-estate gent was used to puttin' up a
good figger by now, and the boss made a fair haul.
Right off, the Andrews chunk was laid out in fifty-foot lots. It was
just rows and _rows_ of white stakes, and when the West-bound was stopped
at the deepot fer grub, I seen Bill Rawson pointin' them stakes out
to two poor ole white-haired women. "Ladies," he says, "that's the
battlefield where Crook fit the Kiowas. Ev'ry stake's a stiff."
As the train pulled out, she was tipped all to one side kinda, and
runnin' on her off wheels, 'cause the pass'ngers was herded along
the west side of the cars, lookin' at that big graveyard.
When Hank's next _Eye-Opener_ come out, one hull side of it was covered
with a map of Briggs City--drawed three mile square, so's to take
in what Mrs. Bergin had left. Under the map it said, "_The left-hand
cross marks the position of the West Oklahomaw Observatory, which is
to be built on top of Rogers's Butte, and the cross in the Andrews
Addition marks the spot where the great Sanatarium'll stand._" (Say!
it was gittin' to be a cold day in Briggs when somebody didn't start
a grand, new institootion!) "_Why,_" goes on Shackleton, in that
piece of hisn, "_breathin' that fine crick-bottom air, and on a plain
diet--say, of bread and clabbered milk, a sick person oughta git cured
up easy, and a healthy person oughta live more'n a hunderd years._"
(Wal, as far as _I'_m concerned, if I had to eat clabbered milk a
hunderd years, I'd ruther _die!_)
Next thing, two 'r three of the boys got into a reg'lar jawin'-match
over some property. Chub Flannagan wanted to start a new paper called
the _Rip-Saw_. Shackleton, a-course, didn't want he should. Right in
front of that real-estate feller's, Chub drawed a gun on Hank. And
Monkey Mike had to interfere 'twixt them.
"I got a right to do what I please on my own land," yells Chub.
"Wal, I'll buy you' blamed lots," says Shackleton, "but I don't
stand fer compytition. Here, agent, what's Chub's block worth?"
The dude reckoned it was worth five hunderd. And Shackleton dug down like
a man!
The rest of us done a turrible lot of buyin' and sellin' right after
that--one to the other. The sheriff sold to Sam Barnes (fer a chaw of
t'bacca); Bill Rawson, he sold to me (on tick); Hairoil Johnson to
Dutchy, and so forth. 'R, it'd be like this: "Bet you a lot I can
jump the furth'est." "Bet you cain't." Then real estate 'd change
hands, and the _Tarantula_ 'd talk about "a lively market."
A-course, the dude and Porky, and the doc and the new parson was
doin' some buyin', too. 'Fore long, they owned all Bergin had, and
Shackleton's, and Chub's, and Rawson's, and Johnson's, and mine. And
they picked out a place fer the Deef, Dumb, and Blind Asylum; and named
ole man Sewell fer President of the Briggs City Pott'ry works.
[Illustration: "_I'll buy you blamed lots, but I don't stand fer
compytition_"]
Pretty soon, havin' all the land they wanted, they begun, steady by
jerks, to sell each other, notice of them sales appearin' in the
_Eye-Opener_ at two-bits apiece. Next, they got to sellin' faster.
Then, it was dawg eat dawg. Lickin' things into a' _ex_citin' pass,
them lots of theirn flew back'ards and for'ards till the air was
plumb full of sand. When the sun went down that never-to-be-fergot
evenin' (as the speaker allus says at a _po_litical pow-wow), ole
Briggs City was the colour of mesquite. But the pockets of the punchers
was so chuck full that, as the hours drug by, our growin' city got
redder 'n a section-house, 'cause the boys was busy paintin' it. (But
count _me_ out--I had my draw-down, and I was a-hangin' _on_ to it.)
Whilst over at the real-estate shack, them gun-shy gents was havin'
a quiet, little business talk, gittin' ready fer they onloadin'
campaign next day.
About ten o'clock, I stopped by they shebang and knocked. When the door
was opened, here they all sit, makin' out more deeds 'n you could
shake a stick at. I didn't go in. I figgered I'd be gittin' married
soon; and no feller wants his face spotted up like a Sioux chief's on
his weddin' day.
"Gents," I says, "the boys sent me over to thank you all fer
pur_chasin'_ property hereabouts in such a blamed gen'rous way. And
it's shore too bad that _they_ feel they cain't invest. But they plan
to wait a year, and buy in what you got fer taxes."
Fer as long as you could count ten, not a' one of 'em said a word. Then
the doc stood up. "Who in thunder are _you?_" he ast, voice like a frog.
"Why," I answers, "don't you recollect _me?_ I'm Cupid here; but,
down at Goldstone, I was the owner of the Lloyd Addition."
They jumped like they'd been stuck with a pin. "The Lloyd Addition!"
they kinda hisses.
"Yas," I goes on. "So I reckon you realise that it wouldn't be no
use fer Mister Real-Estate Agent, here, to git three-sheets-in-the-wind,
and then let out his grand natu'al development secret; 'r fer our
millionaire friend to go send hisself a telegram from Rockafeller.
Gent's you' little Briggs City boom is busted."
Say! next minute the hull quartette of 'em was a-swearin' to oncet,
so's it sounded like a tune--nigger chords and all.
Next, Porky begun a solo. Said if they hadn't all been plumb crazy,
they'd 'a' knowed they was a screw loose in Briggs. And now here they
was stripped cleaner'n a whistle by a set of ornery cow-punchers----
I cut him short. "We know how to cure a dawg of suckin' aigs," I says.
"We give him all he wants of 'em--red hot. Wal, you gents had the boom
disease, and you had it bad. But I reckon now you've got just about all
the land you can hole."
They nodded they haids. It was a show-down, and no mistake, and they
was plumb offen they high hoss. Blamed if I didn't come nigh feelin'
sorry fer 'em! But I goes on, "I'm feard you-all're _just_ a little
bit ongrateful to me--_con_sider-in' that I come here t'-night to help
y'."
"Help?" they says. (Quartette again.)
"Why, yas. Don't you think, about this time, that Chicago 'd look
pretty good to you?"
"Chicago!" says Porky, low and wistful, like he didn't never expect
to see the place again.
"And hittin' the ties, fer two dudes like the agent, here, and the
parson----"
"Parson be hanged!" says the last named gent, ugly as the dickens.
"I hope not," I goes on, "but you never can tell what the boys'll
do."
The doc was standin' up. As I said that, he come down kerplunk onto a
bench, like as if a spring 'd give way in his laigs.
"Lloyd," he says, "we--we--we're willin' to go, but we ain't got
no money."
"You're what I'd call land-poor," I says.
"You need four tickets--wal, now, you own that Andrews chunk, don't
y'?"
"Lloyd," says the real-estate feller, "you've got the dead wood on
us, ole man." He picked up one of them deeds from the table. "Git us
the tickets," he says, "and here's the Andrews property."
"A up-freight goes by in twenty minutes," I says. And started fer the
station.
"Lloyd!" calls Porky after me, "think you could spare us a' extra
twenty fer grub?--_you_ don't want us to starve, Lloyd. And--and mebbe
you could use the rest of these deeds."