We cannot see ourselves as others see us, or I should know what
appearance I cut at hearing this from the tall man. I said nothing,
feeling uncertain.
“I reckon I am looking for you, seh,” he repeated politely.
“I am looking for Judge Henry,” I now replied.
He walked toward me, and I saw that in inches he was not a giant. He was
not more than six feet. It was Uncle Hughey that had made him seem to
tower. But in his eye, in his face, in his step, in the whole man,
there dominated a something potent to be felt, I should think, by man or
woman.
“The Judge sent me afteh you, seh,” he now explained, in his civil
Southern voice; and he handed me a letter from my host. Had I not
witnessed his facetious performances with Uncle Hughey, I should have
judged him wholly ungifted with such powers. There was nothing external
about him but what seemed the signs of a nature as grave as you could
meet. But I had witnessed; and therefore supposing that I knew him in
spite of his appearance, that I was, so to speak, in his secret and
could give him a sort of wink, I adopted at once a method of easiness.
It was so pleasant to be easy with a large stranger, who instead of
shooting at your heels had very civilly handed you a letter.
“You’re from old Virginia, I take it?” I began.
He answered slowly, “Then you have taken it correct, seh.”
A slight chill passed over my easiness, but I went cheerily on with a
further inquiry. “Find many oddities out here like Uncle Hughey?”
“Yes, seh, there is a right smart of oddities around. They come in on
every train.”
At this point I dropped my method of easiness.
“I wish that trunks came on the train,” said I. And I told him my
predicament.
It was not to be expected that he would be greatly moved at my loss; but
he took it with no comment whatever. “We’ll wait in town for it,” said
he, always perfectly civil.
Now, what I had seen of “town” was, to my newly arrived eyes, altogether
horrible. If I could possibly sleep at the Judge’s ranch, I preferred to
do so.
“Is it too far to drive there to-night?” I inquired.
He looked at me in a puzzled manner.
“For this valise,” I explained, “contains all that I immediately need;
in fact, I could do without my trunk for a day or two, if it is not
convenient to send. So if we could arrive there not too late by starting
at once--” I paused.
“It’s two hundred and sixty-three miles,” said the Virginian.
To my loud ejaculation he made no answer, but surveyed me a moment
longer, and then said, “Supper will be about ready now.” He took my
valise, and I followed his steps toward the eating-house in silence. I
was dazed.
As we went, I read my host’s letter--a brief hospitable message. He was
very sorry not to meet me himself. He had been getting ready to drive
over, when the surveyor appeared and detained him. Therefore in his
stead he was sending a trustworthy man to town, who would look after
me and drive me over. They were looking forward to my visit with much
pleasure. This was all.
Yes, I was dazed. How did they count distance in this country? You spoke
in a neighborly fashion about driving over to town, and it meant--I
did not know yet how many days. And what would be meant by the term
“dropping in,” I wondered. And how many miles would be considered really
far? I abstained from further questioning the “trustworthy man.” My
questions had not fared excessively well. He did not propose making me
dance, to be sure: that would scarcely be trustworthy. But neither did
he propose to have me familiar with him. Why was this? What had I done
to elicit that veiled and skilful sarcasm about oddities coming in on
every train? Having been sent to look after me, he would do so,
would even carry my valise; but I could not be jocular with him. This
handsome, ungrammatical son of the soil had set between us the bar of
his cold and perfect civility. No polished person could have done it
better. What was the matter? I looked at him, and suddenly it came to
me. If he had tried familiarity with me the first two minutes of our
acquaintance, I should have resented it; by what right, then, had I
tried it with him? It smacked of patronizing: on this occasion he had
come off the better gentleman of the two. Here in flesh and blood was
a truth which I had long believed in words, but never met before. The
creature we call a GENTLEMAN lies deep in the hearts of thousands that
are born without chance to master the outward graces of the type.
Between the station and the eating-house I did a deal of straight
thinking. But my thoughts were destined presently to be drowned in
amazement at the rare personage into whose society fate had thrown me.
Town, as they called it, pleased me the less, the longer I saw it. But
until our language stretches itself and takes in a new word of closer
fit, town will have to do for the name of such a place as was Medicine
Bow. I have seen and slept in many like it since. Scattered wide, they
littered the frontier from the Columbia to the Rio Grande, from the
Missouri to the Sierras. They lay stark, dotted over a planet of
treeless dust, like soiled packs of cards. Each was similar to the next,
as one old five-spot of clubs resembles another. Houses, empty bottles,
and garbage, they were forever of the same shapeless pattern. More
forlorn they were than stale bones. They seemed to have been strewn
there by the wind and to be waiting till the wind should come again and
blow them away. Yet serene above their foulness swam a pure and quiet
light, such as the East never sees; they might be bathing in the air of
creation’s first morning. Beneath sun and stars their days and nights
were immaculate and wonderful.
Medicine Bow was my first, and I took its dimensions, twenty-nine
buildings in all,--one coal shute, one water tank, the station, one
store, two eating-houses, one billiard hall, two tool-houses, one feed
stable, and twelve others that for one reason and another I shall not
name. Yet this wretched husk of squalor spent thought upon appearances;
many houses in it wore a false front to seem as if they were two stories
high. There they stood, rearing their pitiful masquerade amid a fringe
of old tin cans, while at their very doors began a world of crystal
light, a land without end, a space across which Noah and Adam might come
straight from Genesis. Into that space went wandering a road, over a
hill and down out of sight, and up again smaller in the distance, and
down once more, and up once more, straining the eyes, and so away.
Then I heard a fellow greet my Virginian. He came rollicking out of
a door, and made a pass with his hand at the Virginian’s hat. The
Southerner dodged it, and I saw once more the tiger undulation of body,
and knew my escort was he of the rope and the corral.
“How are yu’ Steve?” he said to the rollicking man. And in his tone I
heard instantly old friendship speaking. With Steve he would take and
give familiarity.
Steve looked at me, and looked away--and that was all. But it was
enough. In no company had I ever felt so much an outsider. Yet I liked
the company, and wished that it would like me.
“Just come to town?” inquired Steve of the Virginian.
“Been here since noon. Been waiting for the train.”
“Going out to-night?”
“I reckon I’ll pull out to-morro’.”
“Beds are all took,” said Steve. This was for my benefit.
“Dear me,” said I.
“But I guess one of them drummers will let yu’ double up with him.”
Steve was enjoying himself, I think. He had his saddle and blankets, and
beds were nothing to him.
“Drummers, are they?” asked the Virginian.
“Two Jews handling cigars, one American with consumption killer, and a
Dutchman with jew’lry.”
The Virginian set down my valise, and seemed to meditate. “I did want a
bed to-night,” he murmured gently.
“Well,” Steve suggested, “the American looks like he washed the
oftenest.”
“That’s of no consequence to me,” observed the Southerner.
“Guess it’ll be when yu’ see ’em.”
“Oh, I’m meaning something different. I wanted a bed to myself.”
“Then you’ll have to build one.”
“Bet yu’ I have the Dutchman’s.”
“Take a man that won’t scare. Bet yu’ drinks yu’ can’t have the
American’s.”
“Go yu’” said the Virginian. “I’ll have his bed without any fuss. Drinks
for the crowd.”
“I suppose you have me beat,” said Steve, grinning at him
affectionately. “You’re such a son-of-a---- when you get down to work.
Well, so long! I got to fix my horse’s hoofs.”
I had expected that the man would be struck down. He had used to the
Virginian a term of heaviest insult, I thought. I had marvelled to hear
it come so unheralded from Steve’s friendly lips. And now I marvelled
still more. Evidently he had meant no harm by it, and evidently
no offence had been taken. Used thus, this language was plainly
complimentary. I had stepped into a world new to me indeed, and
novelties were occurring with scarce any time to get breath between
them. As to where I should sleep, I had forgotten that problem
altogether in my curiosity. What was the Virginian going to do now? I
began to know that the quiet of this man was volcanic.
“Will you wash first, sir?”
We were at the door of the eating-house, and he set my valise inside.
In my tenderfoot innocence I was looking indoors for the washing
arrangements.
“It’s out hyeh, seh,” he informed me gravely, but with strong Southern
accent. Internal mirth seemed often to heighten the local flavor of his
speech. There were other times when it had scarce any special accent or
fault in grammar.
A trough was to my right, slippery with soapy water; and hanging from
a roller above one end of it was a rag of discouraging appearance. The
Virginian caught it, and it performed one whirling revolution on its
roller. Not a dry or clean inch could be found on it. He took off his
hat, and put his head in the door.
“Your towel, ma’am,” said he, “has been too popular.”
She came out, a pretty woman. Her eyes rested upon him for a moment,
then upon me with disfavor; then they returned to his black hair.
“The allowance is one a day,” said she, very quietly. “But when folks
are particular--” She completed her sentence by removing the old towel
and giving a clean one to us.
“Thank you, ma’am,” said the cow-puncher.
She looked once more at his black hair, and without any word returned to
her guests at supper.
A pail stood in the trough, almost empty; and this he filled for me from
a well. There was some soap sliding at large in the trough, but I got my
own. And then in a tin basin I removed as many of the stains of travel
as I was able. It was not much of a toilet that I made in this first
wash-trough of my experience, but it had to suffice, and I took my seat
at supper.
Canned stuff it was,--corned beef. And one of my table companions said
the truth about it. “When I slung my teeth over that,” he remarked, “I
thought I was chewing a hammock.” We had strange coffee, and condensed
milk; and I have never seen more flies. I made no attempt to talk,
for no one in this country seemed favorable to me. By reason of
something,--my clothes, my hat, my pronunciation, whatever it might be,
I possessed the secret of estranging people at sight. Yet I was doing
better than I knew; my strict silence and attention to the corned beef
made me in the eyes of the cow-boys at table compare well with the
over-talkative commercial travellers.
The Virginian’s entrance produced a slight silence. He had done wonders
with the wash-trough, and he had somehow brushed his clothes. With all
the roughness of his dress, he was now the neatest of us. He nodded to
some of the other cow-boys, and began his meal in quiet.
But silence is not the native element of the drummer. An average fish
can go a longer time out of water than this breed can live without
talking. One of them now looked across the table at the grave,
flannel-shirted Virginian; he inspected, and came to the imprudent
conclusion that he understood his man.
“Good evening,” he said briskly.
“Good evening,” said the Virginian.
“Just come to town?” pursued the drummer.
“Just come to town,” the Virginian suavely assented.
“Cattle business jumping along?” inquired the drummer.
“Oh, fair.” And the Virginian took some more corned beef.
“Gets a move on your appetite, anyway,” suggested the drummer.
The Virginian drank some coffee. Presently the pretty woman refilled his
cup without his asking her.
“Guess I’ve met you before,” the drummer stated next.
The Virginian glanced at him for a brief moment.
“Haven’t I, now? Ain’t I seen you somewhere? Look at me. You been in
Chicago, ain’t you? You look at me well. Remember Ikey’s, don’t you?”
“I don’t reckon I do.”
“See, now! I knowed you’d been in Chicago. Four or five years ago. Or
maybe it’s two years. Time’s nothing to me. But I never forget a face.
Yes, sir. Him and me’s met at Ikey’s, all right.” This important point
the drummer stated to all of us. We were called to witness how well he
had proved old acquaintanceship. “Ain’t the world small, though!” he
exclaimed complacently. “Meet a man once and you’re sure to run on to
him again. That’s straight. That’s no bar-room josh.” And the drummer’s
eye included us all in his confidence. I wondered if he had attained
that high perfection when a man believes his own lies.
The Virginian did not seem interested. He placidly attended to his
food, while our landlady moved between dining room and kitchen, and the
drummer expanded.
“Yes, sir! Ikey’s over by the stock-yards, patronized by all cattle-men
that know what’s what. That’s where. Maybe it’s three years. Time never
was nothing to me. But faces! Why, I can’t quit ’em. Adults or children,
male and female; onced I seen ’em I couldn’t lose one off my memory, not
if you were to pay me bounty, five dollars a face. White men, that is.
Can’t do nothing with niggers or Chinese. But you’re white, all
right.” The drummer suddenly returned to the Virginian with this high
compliment. The cow-puncher had taken out a pipe, and was slowly rubbing
it. The compliment seemed to escape his attention, and the drummer went
on.
“I can tell a man when he’s white, put him at Ikey’s or out loose here
in the sage-brush.” And he rolled a cigar across to the Virginian’s
plate.
“Selling them?” inquired the Virginian.
“Solid goods, my friend. Havana wrappers, the biggest tobacco
proposition for five cents got out yet. Take it, try it, light it, watch
it burn. Here.” And he held out a bunch of matches.
The Virginian tossed a five-cent piece over to him.
“Oh, no, my friend! Not from you! Not after Ikey’s. I don’t forget you.
See? I knowed your face right away. See? That’s straight. I seen you at
Chicago all right.”
“Maybe you did,” said the Virginian. “Sometimes I’m mighty careless what
I look at.”
“Well, py damn!” now exclaimed the Dutch drummer, hilariously. “I am
ploom disappointed. I vas hoping to sell him somedings myself.”
“Not the same here,” stated the American. “He’s too healthy for me. I
gave him up on sight.”
Now it was the American drummer whose bed the Virginian had in his eye.
This was a sensible man, and had talked less than his brothers in the
trade. I had little doubt who would end by sleeping in his bed; but how
the thing would be done interested me more deeply than ever.
The Virginian looked amiably at his intended victim, and made one or two
remarks regarding patent medicines. There must be a good deal of money
in them, he supposed, with a live man to manage them. The victim was
flattered. No other person at the table had been favored with so much
of the tall cow-puncher’s notice. He responded, and they had a pleasant
talk. I did not divine that the Virginian’s genius was even then at
work, and that all this was part of his satanic strategy. But Steve must
have divined it. For while a few of us still sat finishing our supper,
that facetious horseman returned from doctoring his horse’s hoofs, put
his head into the dining room, took in the way in which the Virginian
was engaging his victim in conversation, remarked aloud, “I’ve lost!”
and closed the door again.
“What’s he lost?” inquired the American drummer.
“Oh, you mustn’t mind him,” drawled the Virginian. “He’s one of those
box-head jokers goes around openin’ and shuttin’ doors that-a-way. We
call him harmless. Well,” he broke off, “I reckon I’ll go smoke. Not
allowed in hyeh?” This last he addressed to the landlady, with especial
gentleness. She shook her head, and her eyes followed him as he went
out.
Left to myself I meditated for some time upon my lodging for the night,
and smoked a cigar for consolation as I walked about. It was not a hotel
that we had supped in. Hotel at Medicine Bow there appeared to be none.
But connected with the eating-house was that place where, according
to Steve, the beds were all taken, and there I went to see for myself.
Steve had spoken the truth. It was a single apartment containing four or
five beds, and nothing else whatever. And when I looked at these beds,
my sorrow that I could sleep in none of them grew less. To be alone in
one offered no temptation, and as for this courtesy of the country, this
doubling up--!
“Well, they have got ahead of us.” This was the Virginian standing at my
elbow.