*CHAPTER VIII*
_*What Befell at the Half-Way House*_
Of the second incident that befell on the journey to Camp Kettle I musttell you because it had a far-reaching effect and a good deal more to dowith our expedition than could possibly have been foretold at the time.
Of the incident at the Rest House, which I have just narrated, ApacheKid said nothing, and as curiosity is not one of my failings (manyothers though I have), to question I never dreamt; and besides, in theWest, even the inquisitive learn to listen without inquiring, and heevidently had no intention of explaining. But when, at last, after avery long silence during which our three fellow-travellers looked at himin the dusk of the coach (whose only light was that reflected from thelamp-lit road) with interest, and admiration, I believe, he said in alow voice which I alone could hear, owing to the creaking and screamingof the battered vehicle: "I think you and I had better be strangers;only fellow-travellers thrown together by chance, not fellow-plottersjourneying together with design."
"I understand," said I, and this resolution we accordingly carried out.
After a night and a day's journey, with only short stops for wateringand "snatch meals," we were hungry and sleepily happy and tired when wecame to the "Half-Way-to-Kettle Hotel" standing up white-painted andsun-blistered in the midst of the sand and sage-brush; and I, for mypart, paid little heed to the hangers-on who watched our arrival,several of whom stretched hands simultaneously for the honour ofcatching the reins which the driver flung aside in his long-practised,aggressive manner--a manner without which he had seemed something lessthan a real stage-driver.
I noticed that Apache Kid had taken his belt and revolver from hisblanket-roll and now, indeed, was "heeled" for all men to see, for itwas a heavy Colt he used.
Indoors were tables set, in a room at one side of the entrance, withclean, white table-cloths and a young woman waiting to attend our wantsafter we had washed the dust of the way from our faces and hands andbrushed the grit from our clothes with a horse brush which hung in thecool though narrow hall-way.
Apache Kid sat at one table, I at another, two of our fellow-voyagers ata third. The remaining traveller announced to the bearded proprietorwho stood at the door, in tones of something very like pride, that hewanted no supper except half a pound of cheese, a bottle of pickles, anda medium bottle of whisky.
This request, to my surprise, was received without the slightest show ofastonishment; indeed, it seemed to mark the speaker out for something ofa great man in the eyes of the proprietor who, with a "Very good,sir--step into the bar-room, sir," ushered the red-eyed man into thechamber to right, a dim-lit place in which I caught the sheen of glasseswith their pale reflection in the dark-stained tables on which theystood.
In the dining-room I found my eyes following the movements of the youngwoman who attended there. A broad-shouldered lass she was, and the firstthing about her that caught me, that made me look upon her withsomething of contentment after our dusty travel, was, I think, her cleanfreshness. She wore a white blouse, or, I believe, to name that articleof apparel rightly, with the name she would have used, a "shirt-waist."It fitted close at her wrists which I noticed had a strong and gladsomecurve. The dress she wore was of dark blue serge. She was what we mencall "spick and span" and open-eyed and honest, with her exuberant hairtidily brushed back and lying in the nape of her neck softly, with agolden glint among the dark lustre of it as she passed the side windowthrough which the golden evening sunlight streamed. I had been longenough in the country to be not at all astonished with the bearing, asof almost reverence, with which the men treated her, tagging a "miss" tothe end of their every sentence. The stage-driver, too, for all he wasso terrible and important a man, "missed" her and "if you pleased" herto the verge of comicality.
I think she herself had a sense of humour, for I caught a twinkle in hereye as she journeyed to and fro. That she did so without affectationspoke a deal for her power over her pride. A woman in such a place, Ishould imagine, must constantly find it advisable to remind herself thatthere are very few of the gentler sex in the land and a vast number ofmen, and tell herself that it is not her captivating ways alone that areresponsible for the extreme of respect that is lavished upon her. Shechatted to all easily and pleasantly, with a sparkle in her wide-seteyes.
"I think I remember of you on the way up to Baker City," she said:"about two months ago, wasn't it?"
And when I had informed her that it was even so she asked me how I hadfared there. I told her I thought I might have fared better had I beenin a ranching country.
"Can you ride?" she asked.
I told her no--at least, not in the sense of the word here. I couldkeep a seat on some horses, but the horses I had seen here were such asmade me consider myself hardly a "rider" at all.
She thought it "great," she said, to get on horseback and gallop "to thehorizon and back," as she put it.
"It makes you feel so free and glad all over."
I would soon learn, she said, but "the boys" would have their fun withme to start.
All this was a broken talk, between her attending on the tables; and asshe kept up a conversation at each table as she visited it I could nothelp considering that her mind must be particularly alert. Perhaps itwas these rides "to the horizon and back" that kept her mind so agileand her form and face so pure. It was when she was bringing me my lastcourse, a dish of apricots, that a man with a rolling gait, heavy brows,and red, pluffy hands, a big, unwieldy man in a dark, dusty suit, camein and sat down at my table casting his arm over the back of the chair.
This fellow "my deared" her instead of following the fashion of therest, and surveyed me, with his great head flung back and his bulgy eyestravelling over me in an insolent fashion. When she returned with hisfirst order he put up his hand and chucked her under the chin, as it iscalled.
"Sir," said she, with a pucker in her brows, "I have told you beforethat I did n't like that:" and she turned away.
My vis-a-vis at that turned to his soup, first glancing at me andwinking, and then bending over his plate he supped with greatnoise,--something more than "audible" this,--and perennial suckings ofhis moustache.
When the maid came again at his rather peremptory rattle on the plate,"Angry?" he asks, and then "Tuts! should n't be angry," and he made asthough to embrace her waist, but she stepped back.
He turned to me, and, wagging his head toward her, remarked:
"She does n't cotton to me."
I make no reply, looking blankly in his face as though I would say: "Idon't want anything to do with you"--just like that.
"Ho!" he said, and blew through his nose at me, thrusting out his wetmoustache. "Are you deaf or saucy?"
I looked at him then alert, and rapped out sharply: "I had rather notspeak to you at all, sir. But as to your remark, I am not astonishedthat the young lady does not cotton to you."
With the tail of my eye, as the phrase is, I knew that there was aturning of faces toward me then, and my lady drew herself more erect.
"Ho!" cried the bully. "Here's a fane how-de-do about nothing! Youwant to learn manners, young man. I reckon you have n't travelled much,else you would know that gentlemen setting down together at table arenot supposed to be so mighty high-toned as to want nothin' to do witheach other."
I heard him to an end, and, laying down my spoon, "With gentlemen--yes,"I said, "there can be no objection to talk, even though your remark isan evasion of the matter at present. But seeing you have gone out ofyour way to blame my manners, I will make bold to say I don't likeyours."
The girl stepped forward a pace and, "Sir, sir," she began to me and thebully was glaring on me and crying out, "Gentlemen! 'between gentlemen'you say, and what you insinuate with that?"
But I waved aside the girl and to him I began:
"I have been in this country some time, sir, and I may tell you that Ifind you at the top of one list in my mental notes. Up to
to-night Ihave never seen a woman insulted in the West----" and then, as is a wayI have and I suppose shall have a tendency to till the end of my days,though I ever strive to master it (and indeed find the periods betweenthe loss of that mastery constantly lengthening), I suddenly "flaredup."
To say more in a calm voice was beyond me and I cried out: "But I wantno more talk from you, sir; understand that."
"Ho!" he began. "You----"
But I interrupted him with: "No more, sir; understand!"
And then in a tone which I dare say savoured very much as though Ithought myself quite a little ruler of men, I said: "I have told youtwice now not to say more to me. I only tell you once more."
"Good Lord!" he cried. "Do you think you can scare me?"
"That's the third time," said I, mastering the quaver of excitement inmy voice, lest he should take it for a quaver of fear. "Next time Idon't speak at all."
"Maybe neither do I," said he, and he lifted the water carafe as thoughto throw the contents on me, but he never did so; for I leant quicklyacross the table and with the flat of my hand slapped him soundly on thecheek, as I might have slapped a side of bacon, and, "That," said I, "isfor insulting the lady."
It was "clear decks for action" then, for he flung back his chair and,spinning around the end of the table, aimed a blow at me; but I hadscarce time to guard, so quick was he for all his size. I took thesimplest guard of all--held my left arm out rigidly, the fist clenched,and when he lunged forward to deliver the blow I ducked my shoulder butkept my fist still firm.
It was a fierce blow that he aimed, but it slipped over my shoulder andthen there was an unpleasant sound--a soft, sloppy sound--for his noseand my rigid fist had met. Then the blood came, quite a fountain. Butthis only heated him and he dealt another blow which I received with the"cross-guard," one of the best guards in the "straight on" system ofboxing, a system generally belittled, but very useful to know.
I think he had never seen the guard in his life, there was so astonisheda look on his face; but before he recovered I had him down with a jar onthe floor so that the floor and windows rattled,--and his brains, too, Ishould imagine.
He sat up glaring but something dazed and shaken. God forgive me that Ihave so feeble a control of my passions once they are roused and such ahorrible spirit of exultation! These have their punishment, of course,for a man who exults over such a deed, instead of leaving it to theonlookers to congratulate, falls in their estimation.
However, to give over moralising, I cried out, as he sat up there on thefloor with the blood on his face and chin and trickling on his thickneck: "Come on! Sit up! If you lie malingering, I 'll kick you to yourfeet! I 'm only beginning on you."
I think the onlookers must have smiled to hear me, for, though so far Ihad got the better, the match was an absurd one. But my foe was a manof a bad spirit; without rising he flung his hand round to his hip.
I had a quick glimpse of the girl clasping her hands and heard the gaspof her breath and her voice: "Stop that now--none of that!"
But another voice, very complacent and with a mocking, boyish ring,broke in:
"Throw up your hands, you son of a dog!" And then I ceased to be thecentre of interest and my brain cleared, for Apache Kid was sitting athis table, his chair pushed back a little way, his legs wide apart as heleant forward, his left hand on the left knee, his right forearm lyingnegligently on the right leg--and loosely in his hand was a revolverpointed at the gentleman on the floor.
The other two were looking on from under their brows, the stage-driversitting beaming on the scene. The girl swung round on Apache with aninfinite relief discernible in her face and gesture. The cook who hadcome from the rear of the room, having seen the business through thewicket window from his pantry, I suppose, cried out: "Make him take outhis gun and hand it over, sir."
Apache did not turn at the voice, but, "You hear that piece of advice?"said he. "Well, I 'm not going to take it. You can keep your littletoy in your hip-pocket. Do you know why? Because you can do no harmhere with it. Before you could get your hand an inch to it my Colt'sbullet would have let all the wind sighing out of your contemptiblecarcass."
Then he gave a laugh, a chuckling, quiet, hearty laugh in his throat,hardly opening his lips and added: "In the language of the country, sir,I would advise you to shake a leg--to get up and get--hike--before Iplug you."
And up rose the man, a commercial traveller (as the girl told meafterwards when trying to thank me--for what I cannot say, as I told herat the time), or a "drummer," as the name is, who had been there sinceyesterday's Baker-bound stage arrived, drinking at the bar and makinghimself disagreeable in the dining-room.
He looked a sorry figure as he shuffled from the chamber.
I turned to Apache Kid and began: "You saved my life, A----" but hisfrown reminded me that we were strangers;--"sir," I ended, "and I haveto thank you."
"That's all right, sir; that's all right, sir. Don't mention it," saidApache Kid, throwing his revolver back into its holster.
That was the end of the drummer; we saw him no more that night, and whenwe came down in the morning we were told he had gone on to Baker Citywith the stage which went west earlier by an hour than the one towardthe railway, the one we were to continue in--part of its journey.
But when we came to settle our bill the proprietor drew his hand underhis long beard and put his head on the side--reminding me of a portraitof Morris I had seen--and remarked, looking from Apache to me and backagain: "Well, gentlemen, I 'd consider it a kind of honour to be allowedto remember that I did n't ask nothing for putting you up. I should n'tlike to remember about you, any time, and to think to myself that I hadcharged you up. I 'd be kind of honoured if you 'd let me remember Idid n't take nothing from you."
We did not speak, but Apache's bow was something to see, and with ahearty shake of the hand we mounted the stage.
"Look up tew the window, my lad," said the driver, gathering up hisreins. "Look up tew the window and get what's comin' to you; a smile towarm the cockles of your heart for the rest o' the trip."
And sure enough we had a smile and a wave of a strong and graceful handfrom the upper window and raised our hats and bowed and were grantedanother wave and another also from the proprietor--and a wave from thecook at the gable of the house. And looking round again, as we rolledoff, there was the fresh white girl standing at the door now.
She raised her hand to her lips and I felt a little sorry in my heart.I did not like to think she was going to "blow a kiss:" it would be acheapening of herself methought. Then I felt a little regretful, forshe did not blow a kiss, but kept her hand to her mouth as long as sheremained there.
We went on in silence and then I heard Apache Kid murmur: "Did she meanit or did she not?"
"Mean what?" I asked.
"What do you mean?" said he, alert suddenly. "Oh! I was talking tomyself:" and then he said in a louder tone: "Excuse me, sir, for asking,but do you not carry a gun?"
"No," said I, with a smile part at this revival of his old caution andpart at something else.
"Can you shoot?"
I shook my head.
"Well," said he, "this period of the history of the West is a transitionperiod. The old order changeth, giving place to new. Fists aresettling trouble that was formerly settled with the gun. But thetrouble of the transition period is that you can never be sure whetherit's to be a gun or the fists. Men like that drummer, too, carry agun--but they carry it out of sight and you don't know it's there forcertain. I advocate the gun carried openly; and I think you shouldbegin right away learning its use. I must look up that remark ofCarlyle's, first time I can, about the backwoods being the place wheremanners flourish. I want to see from the context if he did n't reallymean it. Most people think it was sarcasm, but if it was, it should n'thave been. Manners do flourish in all backwoods, until the police comein and the gun goes out, and it's the presence of the gun that keepseverybody mannerly. The gun does it. N
ow see--you hold a revolver likethis," and he exemplified as he spoke. "The usual method of grasping arevolver is with the forefinger pressing the trigger, and even manyexperts follow this method; but, with all due respect to the advocatesof that method, it is not the best. The best way to hold a revolver iswith the second finger pressing the trigger, the forefinger extendingalong the side of the barrel like this, you see. That is the greatdesideratum in endeavouring to make a shot with a revolver--keeping thething steady. It kicks under the muscular action required to pull thetrigger with the forefinger, and unless one is thoroughly practised thebullet will fly above the mark aimed at. Remember, too, to grip tight,or with these heavy guns you may get your thumb knocked out. Then youthrow your hand up and bring it down and just point at what you want tokill--like that!"
"Biff!" went the revolver, and I saw the top leaves on a sage-brush flyin the air.
The horses snorted and leapt forward and the driver flung a look overhis shoulder, a gleeful look, and, gathering the reins again, cried out,"My gosh, boys! Keep it up, and we 'll make speed into Camp Kettle.Say, this is like old days!" he cried again, when Apache Kid snapped asecond time and we went rocking onward.
So we "kept it up," Apache indicating objects for me to aim at, watchingmy manner of aiming, and coaching me as we went. It seemed to beinfectious, for the traveller who had before kept to himself whipped outa "gun" from some part of his clothing and potted away at the one sidewhile we potted at the other. The other two, the one who had supperedon cheese, pickles, and whisky, and breakfasted on the same, likeenough, and the man with whom he had struck up an acquaintanceship,wheeled about and potted backwards; and at that the driver grewabsolutely hilarious, got out his whip and cracked it loud as therevolver shots, crying out now and again: "Say, this is the old timesback again!" and so we volleyed along the uneven road till dusk fell onthe mountains to north and the bronze yellow plain to south and sunsetcrimsoned the western sky. And lights were just beginning to be litwhen, in a flutter of dust and banging of the leathern side-blinds andscreaming of the gritty wheels, we came rocking down the hillside intoCamp Kettle.
But at sight of that Apache Kid turned to me, and with the look of a mansuddenly recollecting, he said, in a tone of one ashamed: "Well, well!Here we are advertising ourselves for all we 're worth, when our planshould have been one of silence and self-effacement."
"Well," said I, "we can creep quietly up to bed when we reach the hotelhere, and let no one see us, if that is what you are anxious about."
"You 'll have no more bed now, Francis," he said quietly. "No more bedunder a roof, no more hotel now until----" and here for the first timehe acknowledged in actual, direct speech the goal of our journey, "untilwe lie down to sleep with our guns in our hands and our boots on----" heput his mouth to my ear and whispered, "in the Lost Cabin."