“What’s the matter with her?”
“Nobody got any room.”
“My trunks will be here tomorrow,” says she.
“Female drummer?” asks Hen.
“I?” says the lady, kinda dignified-like. “I am an arteest.”
“Oh--yeah. Kinda like what, ma’am? Do yuh paint?”
“I dance.”
“By cripes!” grunts Muley. “We’ll give a dance.”
“I--I am an interpretive dancer,” she explains.
“Oh, yeah,” nods Telescope. “I see.”
“You’re a kindly liar,” says Chuck, “because you don’t see nothin’.
Ma’am, I’m plumb ignorant of the word you used.”
“Why--I--er--do nature dances, don’t you know?”
“Nature? Oh, yeah.”
“Oh, yeah,” mimics Hen. “You see just like Telescope did, Chuck.”
“I--er--really, I do not believe I can explain it to you,” says she.
“Unless you have seen one done, it is difficult for the lay mind to
grasp----”
“That’s a word I’ve been tryin’ to get for years,” says Magpie. “Every
time I’ve looked at this Cross J bunch I’ve tried to think of a word to
describe their mentality. I thanks yuh for the word ‘lay mind,’ ma’am.
Them four snake-hunters sure have that kinda minds.”
“It ain’t the hoochie--” begins Hen.
“It ain’t!” yelps Telescope. “The lady never said nothin’ about muscles.
Henry, your horns are gettin’ too long.”
“Clip ’em, cowboy,” challenges Hen. “Start clippin’ and see which one of
us gets dehorned first. You’ve got a pretty fair spread yourself. If the
lady don’t do that kinda dances it’s her lookout, ain’t it? Yuh don’t
need to whoop about it. I noticed yuh down at Silver Bend at the
circus----”
“Now have a little sense,” advises Magpie. “You pelicans are too danged
anxious to show off before the lady. You fellers spillin’ lead up and
down the street ain’t gettin’ her a place to lay her head, is it?”
“If she only wants to lay her head--” begins Chuck; but Muley steps on
Chuck’s ankle and shoves him aside.
“Ma’am, I apologizes for my friends. They mean well, but they ain’t got
no sense. Now, it appears to me that you are lookin’ for a place to
sleep.”
“It took that idea a long time to appear to you, Muley,” says Magpie.
“Jist in what shape did you get this here bright vision? I don’t think
that Piperock needs any assistance from the Cross J cow-outfit when it
comes to housin’ our guests. I’ll take care of Miss Harrison, y’betcha.”
“Can’t she get a room at Sam Holt’s place?” asks Chuck, serious-like.
“Ma Holt,” says Magpie, winking at Chuck; “Ma Holt says that every room
is full.”
Chuck wiggles his ears at Magpie and then looks over toward the hotel.
Then he grins and says:
“You wait, will yuh? I _sabe_ the cure for that.”
* * * * *
Chuck goes over to the hotel, and in a few minutes him and old Sam comes
over to us. Old Sam says--
“Ma’am, we’ve got a vacancy and can sleep yuh fine.”
Chuck grabs her valise, and him and the lady and old Sam beats it for
the hotel.
“Now, what in ---- did Chuck do to cause such a condition?” wonders
Magpie.
“Chuck lied,” declares Muley. “The son-of-a-gun lied; but what did he
lie about?”
Naturally none of us knowed, so we went over to Buck’s place and had a
drink. We waited around for Chuck, but he didn’t show up; so me and
Magpie went home. I said “home,” but it wasn’t home any more. Magpie got
dissatisfied right away.
“Hawg-pen,” says he. “Anybody could tell that hawgs lived here. Lawd
never intended for men to live alone this away.”
“You living alone?” I asks.
“You don’t count, Ike. A man like me kinda pines for the soft things of
life.”
“Mush?”
“Mush! Naw-w-w! Always thinkin’ of your belly, Ike. A woman don’t mean
nothin’ to you.”
“I don’t mean nothin’ to her, Magpie; so it’s fifty-fifty. Have you gone
and fell into love again? Why, you danged old gray-backed pack-rat!”
“Age ain’t no barrier to happiness, Ike. It ain’t kind of you to point
out a man’s failin’s thataway. Love knows no barriers.”
“Nor nothin’ else, Magpie.”
Magpie Simpkins is about six feet and a half in his socks, and he’s
built on the principle of the thinnest line between two points. He’s
just got hips enough to hold up his cartridge-belt--if he’s careful. His
face is long and his mustaches look plumb exhausted from just hanging
down past his mouth. His mind is full of odds and ends that never fit
into anything.
A ordinary man in love can be handled, but Magpie ain’t ordinary. Love
is quicksand and no help in sight to that _hombre_. I’ve herded him past
several affairs of the heart, liver, and lungs, but each time the attack
is harder. The D. T’s are a cinch beside what that pelican suffers when
the little fat god of love stings him with a poisoned arrow.
Mostly always I hangs a extra gun to my belt and fills my pockets with
rocks. Listen to reason? Say, that feller’s ears don’t hear nothin’ but
“love, honor and obey”--that, and the church bells ringing.
I went to bed that night, leaving him setting on the steps, talking to
himself about the gentle touch of a woman’s hand. I asked him if he
remembered the one what “touched” him in Great Falls. There wasn’t
anything gentle about that one, being as she took his watch and three
hundred dollars. That was another case of love at first sight, and then
he went blind.
As I said before, bad news travels fast. The next day is Sunday, but
that ain’t no excuse for every puncher from Silver Bend to Yaller Horse
to come to Piperock. I don’t think that the Cross J bunch went home
Saturday night.
Sam Holt never sold so many breakfasts before in his life. Some of them
hair-pant specimens ate two or three times. Muley Bowles comes back to
Buck’s place with his belt in his hand, and groans when he tells me that
he thinks he got ptomaine poisoning for breakfast.
“You done et three orders of ham and aigs,” says Hen.
“You say ‘ham and aigs’ to me again and I’ll massacree yuh, Hen.”
Magpie comes back from breakfast and acts kinda sad-like.
After everybody is back from breakfast, old Sam Holt shows up. The bunch
kinda crowds around him.
“I has to come away,” informs Sam. “Ma’s goin’ t’ feed the strange lady,
and she won’t allow nobody in the dinin’-room.”
“Won’t allow nobody in the dinin’-room?” parrots Telescope.
“She has her orders,” grins Sam. “Only one man is allowed to see her.”
“One man?” asks Magpie. “Sam, who is that there man?”
“Why, Chuck Warner, of course.”
“Chuck Warner, of course,” nods Magpie, like a man talking in his sleep.
“Chuck Warner,” wheezes Muley. “Of course.”
“Of course,” says Telescope. “Chuck Warner.”
Then we sets around and looks at each other.
“Chuck Warner?” says Hen, like he was trying to remember somebody by
that name.
“Works for the Cross J outfit,” says I. “Kind of handsome _hombre_. You
must remember him, men.”
“Oh-o-o-oh, yeah,” nods Telescope, fussing with his gun. “Chuck Warner.”
* * * * *
Magpie gets up, yawns and walks slow-like out of the door. Art Miller
kinda saunters out, and then Telescope seems to desire fresh air. Muley
kinda groans and starts to get up, but them three orders of ham and aigs
has sort of depressed him, and he sinks back into his chair.
He takes out a piece of paper and a pencil and begins to write. You’ve
got to hand it to Muley when it comes to poetry. In about fifteen
minutes Magpie, Telescope and Art drifts back, and the three of ’em
lines up at the bar.
“Here’s hopin’ he breaks a leg,” says Magpie.
“Or splits a hoof,” adds Art.
“Who yuh wishin’ all such luck to?” asks Hen.
“Chuck Warner,” says Telescope. “He’s--Ma Holt wouldn’t let us in, but
we peeked in the winder and seen Chuck dancin’ a war-dance for the
lady.”
“I’ll dance for her!” says Muley. “I’ll dance Chuck’s scalp for her. Why
won’t Mrs. Holt let anybody in?”
“She’s got her orders,” says old Sam.
Just then “Scenery” Sims, the sheriff, comes in. Scenery is a squeaky
little runt, and suspicious of everything and everybody. Magpie gets
right up, takes Scenery by the arm and leads him outside.
“Now,” says Telescope, “what kind of a frame-up has Magpie got under his
hair?”