by O. Henry
" `Did I have a requisition,' says Luke, `when I went over into the Brazos bottoms and brought back Bill Grimes and two more for holding up the International? Did me and you have a search warrant or a posse comitatus when we rounded up them six Mexican cow thieves down in Hidalgo? It's my business to keep order in Mojada County. '
" `And it's my business as office deputy,' says I, `to see that business is carried on according to law. Between us both we ought to keep things pretty well cleaned up.'
"So, the next day, Luke packs a blanket and some collars and his mileage book in a haversack, and him and me hits the breeze for New York. It was a powerful long ride. The seats in the cars was too short for six-footers like us to sleep comfortable on; and the conductor had to keep us from getting off at every town that had five-story houses in it. But we got there finally; and we seemed to see right away that he was right about it.
" `Luke,' says I, `as office deputy and from a law standpoint, it don't look to me like this place is properly and legally in the jurisdiction of Mojada County, Texas.'
" `From the standpoint of order,' says he, `it's amenable to answer for its sins to the properly appointed authorities from Bildad to Jerusalem.'
" `Amen,' says I. `But let's turn our trick sudden, and ride. I don't like the looks of this place.'
" `Think of Pedro Johnson,' says Luke, `a friend of mine and yours shot down by one of these gilded abolitionists at his very door!'
" `It was at the door of the freight depot,' says I. `But the law will not be balked at a quibble like that.'
"We put up at one of them big hotels on Broadway. The next morning I goes down about two miles of stairsteps to the bottom and hunts for Luke. It ain't no use. It looks like San Jacinto day in San Antone. There's a thousand folks milling around in a kind of a roofed-over plaza with marble pavements and trees growing right out of 'em, and I see no more chance of finding Luke than if we was hunting each other in the big pear flat down below Old Fort Ewell. But soon Luke and me runs together in one of the turns of them marble alleys.
" `It ain't no use, Bud,' says he. `I can't find no place to eat at. I've been looking for restaurant signs and smelling for ham all over the camp. But I'm used to going hungry when I have to. Now,' says he, `I'm going out and get a hack and ride down to the address on this Scudder card. You stay here and try to hustle some grub. But I doubt if you'll find it. I wish we'd brought along some cornmeal and bacon and beans. I'll be back when I see this Scudder, if the trail ain't wiped out.'
"So I starts foraging for breakfast. For the honor of old Mojada County I didn't want to seem green to them abolitionists, so every time I turned a corner in them marble halls I went up to the first desk or counter I see and looks around for grub. If I didn't see what I wanted I asked for something else. In about half an hour I had a dozen cigars, five story magazines, and seven or eight railroad time-tables in my pockets, and never a smell of coffee or bacon to point out the trail.
"Once a lady sitting at a table and playing a game kind of like pushpin told me to go into a closet that she called Number 3. I went in and shut the door, and the blamed thing lit itself up. I set down on a stool before a shelf and waited. Thinks I, `This is a private dining-room.' But no waiter never came. When I got to sweating good and hard, I goes out again.
" `Did you get what you wanted?' says she.
" `No, ma'am,' says I. `Not a bite.'
" `Then there's no charge,' says she.
" `Thanky, ma'am,' says I, and I takes up the trail again.
"By and by I thinks I'll shed etiquette; and I picks up one of them boys with blue clothes and yellow buttons in front, and he leads me to what he calls the caffay breakfast room. And the first thing I lays my eyes on when I go in is that boy that had shot Pedro Johnson. He was setting all alone at a little table, hitting a egg with a spoon like he was afraid he'd break it.
"I takes the chair across the table from him; and he looks insulted and makes a move like he was going to get up.
" `Keep still, son,' says I. `You're apprehended, arrested, and in charge of the Texas authorities. Go on and hammer that egg some more if it's the inside of it you want. Now, what did you shoot Mr. Johnson, of Bildad, for?'
" `And may I ask who you are?' says he.
" `You may,' says I. `Go ahead'.
" `I suppose you're on,' says this kid, without batting his eyes. `But what are you eating? Here, waiter!' he calls out, raising his finger. `Take this gentleman's order.'
" `A beefsteak,' says I, `and some fried eggs and a can of peaches and a quart of coffee will about suffice.'
"We talk a while about the sundries of life and then he says:
" `What are you going to do about that shooting? I had a right to shoot that man,' says he. `He called me names that I couldn't overlook, and then he struck me. He carried a gun, too. What else could I do?'
" `We'll have to take you back to Texas,' says I.
" `I'd like to go back,' says the boy, with a kind of a grin--`if it wasn't on an occasion of this kind. It's the life I like. I've always wanted to ride and shoot and live in the open air ever since I can remember.'
" `Who was this gang of stout parties you took this trip with?' I asks.
" `My stepfather,' says he, `and some business partners of his in some Mexican mining and land schemes.'
" `I saw you shoot Pedro Johnson,' says I, `and I took that little popgun away from you that you did it with. And when I did so I noticed three or four little scars in a row over your right eyebrow. You've been in rookus before, haven't you?'
" `I've had these scars ever since I can remember,' says he. `I don't know how they came there.'
" `Was you ever in Texas before?' says I.
" `Not that I remember of,' says he. `But I thought I had when we struck the prairie country. But I guess I hadn't.'
" `Have you got a mother?' I asks.
" `She died five years ago,' says he.
"Skipping over the most of what followed--when Luke came back I turned the kid over to him. He had seen Scudder and told him what he wanted; and it seems that Scudder got active with one of these telephones as soon as he left. For in about an hour afterwards there comes to our hotel some of these city rangers in everyday clothes that they call detectives, and marches the whole outfit of us to what they call a magistrate's court. They accuse Luke of attempted kidnapping, and ask him what he has to say.
" `This snipe,' says Luke to the judge, `shot and willfully punctured with malice and forethought one of the most respected and prominent citizens of the town of Bildad, Texas, Your Honor. And in so doing laid himself liable to the penitence of law and order. And I hereby make claim and demand restitution of the State of New York City for the said alleged criminal; and I know he done it.'
" `Have you the usual and necessary requisition papers from the governor of your state?' asks the judge.
" `My usual papers,' says Luke, `was taken away from me at the hotel by these gentlemen who represent law and order in your city. They was two Colt's .45's that I've packed for nine years; and if I don't get 'em back, there'll be more trouble. You can ask anybody in Mojada County about Luke Summers. I don't usually need any other kind of papers for what I do.'
"I see the judge looks mad, so I steps up and says:
" `Your Honor, the aforesaid defendant, Mr. Luke Summers, sheriff of Mojada County, Texas, is as fine a man as ever threw a rope or upheld the statutes and codicils of the greatest state in the Union. But he----'
"The judge hits his table with a wooden hammer and asks who I am.
" `Bud Oakley,' says I. `Office deputy of the sheriff's office of Mojada County, Texas. Representing,' says I, `the Law. Luke Summers,' I goes on, `represents Order. And if Your Honor will give me about ten minutes in private talk, I'll explain the whole thing to you, and show you the equitable and legal requisition papers which I carry in my pocket.'
"The judge kind of half smiles and says he will talk with me in his private room. In there I put
the whole thing up to him in such language as I had, and when we goes outside, he announces the verdict that the young man is delivered into the hands of the Texas authorities; and calls the next case.
"Skipping over much of what happened on the way back, I'll tell you how the thing wound up in Bildad.
"When we got the prisoner in the sheriff's office, I says to Luke:
" `You remember that kid of yours--that two-year-old that they stole away from you when the bust-up come?'
"Luke looks black and angry. He'd never let anybody talk to him about that business, and he never mentioned it himself.
" `Toe the mark,' says I. `Do you remember when he was toddling around on the porch and fell down on a pair of Mexican spurs and cut four little holes over his right eye? Look at the prisoner,' says I, `look at his nose and the shape of his head and--why, you old fool, don't you know your own son?--
I knew him,' says I, `when he perforated Mr. Johnson at the depot.'
"Luke comes over to me shaking all over. I never saw him lose his nerve before.
" `Bud,' says he, `I've never had that boy out of my mind one day or one night since he was took away. But I never let on. But can we hold him?--Can we make him stay?--I'll make the best man of him that ever put his foot in a stirrup. Wait a minute,' says he, all excited and out of his mind--`I've got something here in my desk--I reckon it'll hold legal yet--I've looked at it a thousand times--"Cus-to-dy of the child," says Luke--"Cus-to-dy of the child." We can hold him on that, can't we? Le'me see if I can find that decree.'
"Luke begins to tear his desk to pieces.
" `Hold on,' says I. `You are Order and I'm Law. You needn't look for that paper, Luke. It ain't a decree any more. It's requisition papers. It's on file in that Magistrate's office in New York. I took it along when we went, because I was office deputy and knew the law.'
" `I've got him back,' says Luke. `He's mine again. I never thought----'
" `Wait a minute,' says I. `We've got to have law and order. You and me have got to preserve 'em both in Mojada County according to our oath and conscience. The kid shot Pedro Johnson, one of Bildad's most prominent and----"
" `Oh, hell!' says Luke. `That don't amount to anything. That fellow was half Mexican, anyhow.' "