BARB MAKES A SURPRISING ALLIANCE
By a happy chance, on the night of Laramie's great hour, Sawdy and
Lefever returned from Medicine Bend. It was late when they
arrived--into the early morning hours, in fact, and at the Mountain
House the bar was not only closed but securely closed--barricaded
against just such marauders. Even the night clerk had gone to bed.
But this was less of an embarrassment, for the two adventurers, turning
on the lights, took his pass keys from the drawer and, opening the
doors of one room after another in the face of a variety of protests,
kept on till they found satisfactory quarters that "seemed"
unoccupied--quarters in which at least the beds were unoccupied.
The hardy scouts slept late. They breakfasted late, in what Sawdy
called the hotel "ornery," and while they were reducing the visible
supply of ham and eggs, Tenison walked in on them to ask about
complaints made at the office by indignant guests whose privacy had
been invaded during the night. Rebuffed on this subject, all knowledge
being disclaimed, Tenison was called on for the story of events since
the two had been away, and of these Laramie's escape from the canyon
came first. Tenison reported further, in confidence, Laramie's success
with Kate. Had the news provided every man in the Falling Wall with a
brand-new wife, it could not have been more to the humor of Sawdy and
Lefever.
Sawdy rose and stretched himself from the waist down to make sure his
legs touched the floor: "I've got to have a good cigar on that," he
declared. "Take away, Mabel." He nodded courteously to the waitress.
"Harry, we had the dustiest trip I ever seen in my life," he added, as
with his companions he left the table. "The old Ogallala trail wasn't
a marker to it. Why, the dust was a mile deep. My tonsils are plumb
full of it yet."
Not everyone in Sleepy Cat was so quick to credit the news that Kate
Doubleday was going to marry Jim Laramie. The cattlemen sympathizers
looked grumpy, when approached on the subject. They preferred not to
talk, but if taunted would retort with an intimating oath: "That show
ain't over yet."
"Jim Laramie acts as if it was, anyway," grumbled Belle, when the
butcher told her what they were saying. In fact, all of Laramie's
intimates were out of patience with him when he announced he was going
to rebuild the cabin on his Falling Wall ranch and live there.
"Wait till this cattle fight is over," they would urge.
"It is over," he would retort. And heedless of their protests, he
spent his time getting his building materials together.
"What do you want me to do?" he demanded, stirred at length by Belle's
remonstrances against going back to the Falling Wall. "I've got to
live somewhere. Danger? Why, yes--maybe. But I can't keep dying
every day on that account. Here in town a man was run over just the
other day by a railroad train."
Kate said little either way. She heard all that Belle could urge and
held in her heart all the men said. But when Jim asked her what _she_
wanted to do she told him, simply, whatever _he_ wanted to do. Then
Belle would call her a ninny, and Laramie would kiss her, and Belle in
disgust would disappear.
There came one morning the crowning sensation in the suspense of the
situation. Barb Doubleday drove into town in the buckboard, headed his
team into Kitchen's barn to put up and gave McAlpin a cigar.
An earthquake, where one had never been known, could not have stirred
the town more. When McAlpin ran up street to the Mountain House to be
first with his news, he was reviled as a vender of stories calculated
to start a shooting.
But McAlpin, with a cigar in his mouth--where no cigar, except a free
cigar, was ever seen--his face bursting red with import, stuck to his
guns. He walked straight to the billiard room bar, and attracted
attention by brusquely ordering his own drink. This, it was known,
always meant something serious.
When Sawdy saw the commotion about the barn boss, he walked in and
after listening began a stern cross-examination.
"Explain?" McAlpin echoed scornfully. "I don't explain. No, he wasn't
drinking! Nor he wasn't crazy!" McAlpin took the burning cigar from
his mouth. "That's the cigar he give me, right there--and a bum one.
Barb never smoked a good one in his life--you know that, Henry? I
don't explain--I drink. Hold on!" he exclaimed, as he emptied his
glass with a single gulp. He was looking across the street and
pointing. "Who's that over there comin' out of the lumber yard with
Barb Doubleday right now--blanked if it ain't! It's Jim Laramie,
that's who it is."
Doubleday had in fact run into Laramie in the lumber yard. With
nothing more than a greeting, he opened his mind: "I want a talk with
you, Jim," he said bluntly. "Where's Kate?"
Not even the freedom of the bar fully established could hold McAlpin
after he had seen Laramie and Doubleday walk out of the lumber yard and
start down Main Street together. McAlpin had the reputation of having
missed no important shooting in Sleepy Cat for years. He had been
witness in more than one inquest and did not mean to imperil his
importance by slacking now. As he hastened out to trail the long-day
bitter enemies, he was framing in his mind the preliminary answers for
the coroner. He would be compelled to testify, he felt, that the dead
man had showed no sign of intoxication or excitement when he drove his
team into the barn--for in the circumstances, the barn boss already
figured Barb as the inevitable victim.
Thus ruminating, he trailed the unsuspecting pair as far as Belle's.
At Belle's without sign of heated argument, they knocked and entered
the cottage together. This left McAlpin across the street with nobody
but the butcher to talk to, while he listened intently for the first
shot.
Lefever was bolder. He followed the two men unceremoniously to Belle's
porch and bluffed Belle herself into admitting him to the living room.
Laramie had gone into the back part of the house to hunt up Kate; Barb,
alone, sat in the rocking chair, chewing an unlighted cigar.
Lefever greeted the big cattleman effusively; Barb's response was cold.
He looked Lefever over critically: "What'you doing?" he asked, without
warm interest in any possible answer.
"Buying a relinquishment now and again, Barb."
"Railroad man, eh?" muttered Barb, irrelevantly.
"No, no. I've quit that game; I've got a claim up near you. I'm going
to try to live the life of a small but dishonest rancher, Barb."
"You ought to do well at that, eh?"
"Why, yes and no. But I'm thinking, if I can't figure out the game,
some of my neighbors can help me catch on--what?"
Barb's retort--if he had one--to Lefever's continued laugh, was cut off
by Laramie's entrance with Kate. John saw that he was _de trop_, that
it was a family conference, and only extracting from Laramie a promise
to see him--about nothing whatever--before leaving town he made what he
termed a graceful getaway. Kate and Laramie faced her father. Belle,
too, was for going out. Doubleday stopped her: "No secrets, Belle;
stay if you want to."
All sat down. Kate was for a chair, but Laramie domineering, made her
sit with him on the sofa. Barb spoke first: "This Falling Wall fight
is off," he began briefly. "Anyway, I quit on it. I've got to, Jim.
The settlers there are in to stay," declared Barb philosophically.
"They've got to be reco'nized." The settlers, in this instance, meant
Jim Laramie, since practically everyone else had been driven or
frightened out. But all understood what was intended; for if the
fighting ceased the park would fill up.
"Since yesterday," Doubleday went on, "I've found out something else."
He was speaking directly to Laramie. "That man Stone," he exclaimed,
"has been robbing me."
The old man paused. No one made any comment. Abe Hawk had long ago
told Laramie as much. "He's been misbranding on me--him and that
rascally Van Horn have been selling my steers to the railroad camps on
the Reservation. I've got the evidence from some Indians that came
over yesterday with the hides. Last night," continued the victim
coolly, "I fired Stone. He went right over to Van Horn's. I told him
that's where he belongs. I'm through with 'em both."
"Why don't you have 'em arrested?" demanded Belle.
"I might, yet," muttered Barb vaguely.
Laramie held his peace; but even Kate realized _that_ would never do.
"Jim and me has had our differences," added Barb, "but they're ended.
If you two get married----"
"There ain't goin' to be any 'if,' Barb," interposed Laramie, "there's
just going to be 'married,' and married right off."
"Well, that's for you and the girl to say; but when you say it, you've
got to have a house to live in. I met Jim," added her father, speaking
now to Kate, "over in the lumber yard this morning. When you get your
house up, turn the bill in to me."
Kate's kisses confused and stopped her father. Belle made ready a good
dinner. The four ate together. Belle was excited, Kate happy and
Laramie content. But for the old man it was somehow hard to fit in.
Having had his say, he relapsed into grim silence and taciturn
responses. Even his presence would have repressed Belle but for Kate's
happy laugh. She looked at her father, talked to him, thought of him,
studied him, and throwing off lingering doubts--for she never felt she
quite knew her father--enjoyed him, eating as he was in peace with her
husband-to-be.
When Laramie's cigars were lighted after the dinner, Barb seemed to
feel more at his ease. He told stories of his old railroad days and
laughed when Kate and Belle and Laramie laughed. Later, his daughter
and his new son-in-law walked up street with him. They went with him
on his errands and then to the barn. McAlpin, personally, hitched up
the ponies, both in compliment to a new customer and to hear every word
that passed in the talk.
"Damme," he muttered to the hostler in the harness room, "y' can't get
around old Barb. Look at him. What do I mean? Don't he fight Laramie
five years 'n' get licked? Now he turns him into his son-in-law and
gets the Falling Wall range anyway--can y' beat it? Coming right
along, sir!" he shouted, as Barb in the gangway bellowed for more
speed. And with a flutter of activity, real and feigned, McAlpin and
his helper fastened the traces.
When ready, the wiry team and the long narrow buckboard looked small
for Barb, who cautiously clambered into the seat and gingerly
distributed his bulk upon it. Laramie had taken the reins from
McAlpin; he passed them to Barb who, as he squared himself so as not to
fall off his slender perch, was huskily demanding when Laramie and Kate
would be out. At the last minute, Kate insisted on and was given, a
good-by kiss. She and Jim promised to go out next day. Barb spoke to
the horses. They jumped half-way out of the barn. Kate, with Laramie
following, hurried forward to see her father drive away.
The broad back, topped by the powerful shoulders and neck, and the big
hat bobbing up and down with the spring of the buckboard, the little
team plunging at their bits, and her father heedless of their
antics--all this was a familiar sight, but never had it been so
pleasing. The setting sun touched with gold the thin cloud of dust
that rose from the wheels. It was the close of a beautiful day and it
had been next to the happiest in her life, Kate thought, while she
stood, watching and thinking. The ponies reaching a turn in the road
dashed ahead and her father disappeared.