The Mammoth Book of Westerns

by Jon E. Lewis

  “She’s coming,” said Old Man Clarke. “Winter’s coming. I’ll shoot any of ye a match with my new .45–90 at a hundred yards. Hit the ace of spades, five out of five.”

  “Sure you can, Uncle Jerry.”

  “Flapjacks. Biscuits. And she could look as pretty as a bride,” said Old Man Clarke.

  “Wasn’t it Chet,” said Work, “that told Toothpick Kid Doc Barker had fixed up Duke Gardiner’s teeth for him?”

  “Not Chet. It was Buck told him that.”

  Henry appealed to me. “What’s your remembrance of it?”

  “Why, I always thought it was Buck,” I answered.

  “Buck was always Buck,” said Marshal. “Well, well!”

  “Who did fix Duke’s teeth?”

  “It was a traveling dentist. He done a good job, too, on Duke. All gold. Hit Drybone when Duke was in the hospital, but he went North in two or three days on the stage for Buffalo. That’s how the play come up.”

  “Chet could yarn as well as Buck now and then,” said Stirling.

  “Not often,” said Henry. “Not very often.”

  “Well, but he could. There was the experience Chet claimed he had done in the tornado belt.”

  “I remember,” said Henry. “down in Texas.”

  “Chet mentioned it was in Kansas.”

  “San Saba, Texas,” said Henry.

  “You’re right. San Saba. So it was. Chet worked for a gambler there who wanted to be owner of a house that you could go upstairs in.”

  “I didn’t know Chet could deal a deck,” said Marshal.

  “He couldn’t. Never could. He hired as a carpenter to the gambler.”

  “Chet was handy with tools,” said Henry.

  “A very neat worker. So the house was to be two stories. So Chet he said he’d help. Said he built the whole thing. Said it took him four months. Said he kep’ asking the gambler for some money. The day he could open the front door of his house and walk in and sit down, the gambler told Chet, he’d pay him the total. So they walk out to it the day the job’s complete and chairs ready for sitting in, and the gambler he takes hold of the doorknob and whang! a cyclone hits the house.

  “The gambler saved the door-knob – didn’t let go of it. Chet claimed he had fulfilled his part of the contract, but the gambler said a door-knob was not sufficient evidence that any house had been there. Wouldn’t pay Chet a cent.”

  “They used to be a mean bunch in Texas,” said Stirling.

  “I was in this country before any of you boys were born,” said Old Man Clarke.

  “Sure you were, Uncle Jerry,” said Henry. “ Sure you were.”

  “I used to be hell and repeat.”

  “Sure thing, Uncle Jerry.”

  For a while there was little sound in the Last Chance Saloon save the light notes which Jed Goodland struck on his fiddle from time to time.

  “How did that play come up, Henry?” asked Work.

  “Which play?”

  “Why, Doc Barker and Toothpick Kid.”

  “Why, wasn’t you right there that day?”

  “I was, but I don’t seem to remember exactly how it started.”

  “Well,” said Henry, “the Kid had to admit that Doc Barker put the kibosh on him after all. You’re wrong about Buck. He didn’t come into that.” Henry’s voice seemed to be waking up, his eyes were waking up.

  “Sure he put the kibosh on him,” Work agreed energetically.

  “Wasn’t it the day after they’d corralled that fello’ up on the Dry Cheyenne? asked Stirling.

  “So it was!” said Marshal. He too was waking up. Life was coming into the talk of all. “That’s where the boys corralled him.”

  “Well,” said Stirling, “you couldn’t leave a man as slick as he was, foot-loose, to go around and play such a game on the whole country.”

  “It was at the ranch gate Toothpick Kid saw those new gold teeth of Duke’s,” said Marshal.

  “It wasn’t a mile from the gate,” said Stirling. “Not a mile. And Toothpick didn’t wait to ask Duke the facts, or he’d have saved his money. Duke had happened to trail his rope over the carcasses of some stock. When he was roping a steer after that, his hand was caught between a twist of rope and his saddle horn. So his hand got burned.”

  “Didn’t Buck tell him he’d ought to get Doc Barker to put some stuff on it?”

  “Buck did warn him, but Duke wouldn’t listen. So Buck had to bring him into the Drybone hospital with an arm that they had to cut his shirt-sleeve for.”

  “I remember,” said Henry. “Duke told me that Buck never said ‘I told you so’ to him.”

  “Buck wouldn’t. If ever there was a gentleman, it was Buck Seabrook. Doc Barker slashed his arm open from shoulder to elbow. And in twenty-four hours the arm wasn’t so big. But it was still pretty big, and it looked like nothing at all, and Duke’s brother saw it. They had sent for him. He rode into town, and when he saw the arm and the way it had been cut by Doc Barker he figured he’d lay for Doc and kill him. Doc happened to be out at the C-Y on a case.

  “The boys met him as he came back, and warned him to keep out of the way till Duke’s brother got sober, so Doc kep’ out of the way. No use having trouble with a drunken man. Doc would have had to shoot Duke’s brother or take the consequences. Well, next day the brother sobered up, and the boys persuaded him that Doc had saved Duke’s life, and he was satisfied and changed his mind and there was no further hard feelings. And he got interested in the traveling dentist who had come into town to pick up business from the boys. He did good work. The brother got a couple of teeth plugged. They kept the dentist quite busy.”

  “I remember,” said Marshal. “Chet and Buck both had work done.”

  “Do you remember the grass cook-fire Buck and Chet claimed they had to cook their supper with?” asked Work, with animation. Animation was warming each one, more and more. Their faces actually seemed to be growing younger.

  “Out beyond Meteetsee you mean?”

  “That was it.”

  “What was it?” asked Marshal.

  “Did they never tell you that? Buck went around telling everybody.”

  “Grass cook-fire?” said Old Man Clarke in his withered voice. “Nobody ever cooked with grass. Grass don’t burn half a minute. Rutherford B. Hayes was President when I came into this country. But Samuel J. Tilden was elected. Yes, sir.”

  “Sure he was, Uncle Jerry,” said Henry.

  “Well, Buck and Chet had to camp one night where they found a water-hole, but no wood. No sage-brush, no buffalochips, nothing except the grass, which was long. So Buck he filled the coffee-pot and lighted the grass. The little flames were hot, but they burned out quick and ran on to the next grass. So Buck he ran after them holding his coffee-pot over the flames as they traveled. So he said Chet lighted some more grass and held his frying-pan over those flames and kep’ a-following their trail like he was doing with the coffee-pot. He said that his coffee-pot boiled after a while and Chet’s meat was fried after a while, but by that time they were ten miles apart. Walked around hunting for each other till sunrise, and ate their supper for breakfast.”

  “What’s that toon you’re playing, Jed?” inquired Stirling.

  “That’s ‘Sandy Land’,” replied the fiddler.

  “Play it some more, Jed. Sounds plumb natural. Like old times.”

  “Yes, it does so,” said Henry. “Like when the boys used to dance here.”

  “Dance!” said Old Man Clarke. “None of you never seen me dance here.”

  “Better have a drink, Uncle Jerry.”

  “Thank you kindly. Just one. Put some water in. None of you never did, I guess.”

  “I’ll bet you shook a fancy heel, Uncle.”

  “I always started with the earliest and kept going with the latest. I used to call for ’em too. Salute your partners! Opposite the same! Swing your honey! That’s the style I used to be. All at the bottom of Lake Champlain. None of you ever knowed her.”
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br />   “Have another, Uncle Jerry. The nights are getting cold.”

  “Thank you kindly. I’ll have one more. Winter’s coming.”

  “Any of you see that Wolf Dance where Toothpick wore the buckskin pants?” asked Work. “Wasn’t any of you to that?”

  “Somebody played it on Toothpick, didn’t they?” said Stirling.

  “Buck did. Buck wasn’t dancing. He was just looking on. Toothpick always said Buck was mad because the Indians adopted him into the tribe and wouldn’t take Buck. They gave him a squaw, y’know. He lived with her on the reservation till he left for Alaska. He got her allotment of land with her, y’know. I saw him and her and their kids when I was there. I guess there were twelve kids. Probably twenty by the time he went to Alaska. She’d most always have twins.”

  “Here’s a name for you,” said the man at the back of the room. “What have you got to say about ‘Whistling Oyster’?”

  “Whistling Oyster?” said Henry. “Well, if I had ever the misfortune to think of such a name I’d not have mentioned it to anybody, and I’d have tried to forget it.”

  “Just like them English,” said Marshal.

  “Did Toothpick have any novelties in the way of teeth?” asked Stirling.

  “If he did, he concealed them,” said Work.

  “But him and Doc Barker had no hard feelings,” said Henry. “They both put the mistake on Doc Gardiner and Duke said, well, they could leave it there if that made them feel happier.”

  “Doc was happy as he could be already.”

  “Well, a man would be after what came so near happening to him, and what actually did happen.”

  “Did you say Buck was dead?” asked Marshal.

  “Dead these fifteen years,” said Henry. “Didn’t you hear about it? Some skunk in Texas caught Buck with his wife. Buck had no time to jump for his gun.”

  “Well, there are worse ways to die. Poor Buck! D’you remember how he laid right down flat on his back when they told him about Doc and the Kid’s teeth? The more the Kid said any man in his place would have acted the same, the flatter Buck laid in the sage-brush.”

  “I remember,” said Stirling. “I was cutting calves by the corral.”

  “Duke was able to sit up in the hospital and have the dentist work on his cavities. And the dentist edged the spaces with gold, and he cleaned all the teeth till you could notice them whenever Duke laughed. So he got well and rode out to camp and praised Doc Barker for a sure good doctor. He meant his arm of course that Doc had slashed open when they expected he was dying and sent for his brother.

  “Duke never thought to speak about the dentist that had come into Drybone and gone on to Buffalo, and the Kid naturally thought it was Doc Barker who had done the job on Duke’s teeth. And Buck he said nothing. So Kid drops in to the hospital next time he’s in town for a spree at the hog ranch, and invites the Doc to put a gold edging on his teeth for him.

  “ ‘Not in my line,’ says Doc. ‘I’m a surgeon. And I’ve got no instruments for such a job.’

  “ ‘You had ’em for Duke Gardiner,’ says the Kid. ‘Why not for me?’

  “ ‘That was a dentist,’ says Doc, ‘while I was getting Duke’s arm into shape.’

  “So Toothpick he goes out. He feels offended at a difference being made between him and Duke, and he sits in the hog ranch thinking it over and comforting himself with some whisky. He doesn’t believe in any dentist, and about four o’clock in the afternoon he returns to Doc’s office and says he insists on having the job done. And Doc he gets hot and says he’s not a dentist and he orders Toothpick out of the office. And Toothpick he goes back to the hog ranch feeling awful sore at the discrimination between him and the Duke.

  “Well, about two o’clock a.m. Doc wakes up with a jump, and there’s Toothpick. Toothpick thumps a big wad of bills down on the bureau – he’d been saving his time for a big spree, and he had the best part of four or five months’ pay in his wad – and Doc saw right away Toothpick was drunk clear through. And Toothpick jams his gun against the Doc’s stomach. ‘You’ll fix my teeth,’ he says. ‘You’ll fix ’em right now. I’m just as good as Duke Gardiner or any other blankety-blank hobo in this country, and my money’s just as good as Duke’s, and I’ve just as much of it, and you’ll do it now.’ ”

  “I remember, I remember,” said Marshal. “That’s what the Kid told Doc.” He beat his fist on the table and shook with enjoyment.

  “Well, of course Doc Barker put on his pants at once. Doc could always make a quick decision. He takes the Kid out where he keeps his instruments and he lights his lamp; and he brings another lamp, and he lights two candles and explains that daylight would be better, but that he’ll do the best he can. And he begins rummaging among his knives and scissors which make a jingling, and Toothpick sits watching him with deeper and deeper interest. And Doc Barker he keeps rummaging, and Toothpick keeps sitting and watching, and Doc he brings out a horrible-looking saw and gives it a sort of a swing in the air.

  “ ‘Are you going to use that thing on me?’ inquires Toothpick.

  “ ‘ Open your mouth,’ says Doc.

  “Toothpick opens his mouth but he shuts it again. ‘ Duke didn’t mention it hurt him,’ says he.

  “ ‘ It didn’t, not to speak of,’ says Doc. ‘How can I know how much it will hurt you, if you don’t let me see your teeth?’ So the Kid’s mouth goes open and Doc takes a little microscope and sticks it in and looks right and left and up and down very slow and takes out the microscope. ‘My, my, my,’ he says, very serious.

  “ ‘ Is it going to hurt bad?” inquires Toothpick.

  “ ‘I can do it,’ says Doc, ‘I can do it. But I’ll have to charge for emergency and operating at night.’

  “ ‘ Will it take long?’ says the Kid.

  “ ‘ I must have an hour, or I decline to be responsible,’ says the Doc; ‘the condition is complicated. Your friend Mr Gardiner’s teeth offered no such difficulties.’ And Doc collects every instrument he can lay his hands on that comes anywhere near looking like what dentists have. ‘My fee is usually two hundred dollars for emergency night operations,’ says he, ‘but that is for folks in town.’

  “Toothpick brings out his wad and shoves it at Doc, and Doc he counts it and hands back twenty dollars. ‘I’ll accept a hundred and fifty,’ he says, ‘and I’ll do my best for you.’

  “By this time Toothpick’s eyes are bulging away out of his head, but he had put up too much of a play to back down from it. ‘Duke didn’t mention a thing about its hurting him,’ he repeats.

  “ ‘I think I can manage,’ says Doc. ‘You tell me right off if the pain is too much for you. Where’s my sponge?’ So he gets the sponge, and he pours some ether on it and starts sponging the Kid’s teeth.

  “The Kid he’s grabbing the chair till his knuckles are all white. Doc lets the sponge come near the candle, and puff! up it flares and Toothpick gives a jump.

  “ ‘It’s nothing,’ says Doc. ‘But a little more, and you and I and this room would have been blown up. That’s why I am obliged to charge double for these night emergency operations. It’s the gold edging that’s the risk.’

  “ ‘I’d hate to have you take any risk,’ says Toothpick. ‘Will it be risky to scrape my teeth, just to give them a little scrape, y’know, like you done for Duke?’

  “ ‘Oh, no,’ says Doc, ‘that will not be risky.’ So Doc Barker he takes an ear cleaner and he scrapes, while Toothpick holds his mouth open and grabs the chair. ‘There,’ says Doc. ‘Come again.’ And out flies Toothpick like Indians were after him. Forgets the hog ranch and his night of joy waiting for him there, jumps on his horse and makes camp shortly after sunrise. It was that same morning Buck heard about Toothpick and Doc Barker, and laid flat down in the sage-brush.”

  “Buck sure played it on the Kid at that Wolf Dance,” said Work. “Toothpick thought the ladies had stayed after the storm.”

  Again Marshal beat his fist on the table. We had become a lively
company.

  “On the Crow reservation, wasn’t it?” said Henry.

  “Right on that flat between the Agency and Fort Custer, along the river. The ladies were all there.”

  “She always stayed as pretty as a bride,” said Old Man Clarke.

  “Have another drink, Uncle Jerry.”

  “No more, no more, thank you just the same. I’m just a-sittin’ here for a while.”

  “The Kid had on his buckskin and admired himself to death. Admired his own dancing. You remembered how it started to pour. Of course the Kid’s buckskin pants started to shrink on him. They got up to his knees. About that same time the ladies started to go home, not having brought umbrellas, and out runs Buck into the ring. He whispers to Kid: ‘Your bare legs are scandalous. Look at the ladies. Go hide yourself. I’ll let you know when you can come out.’

  “Away runs Kid till he finds a big wet sage brush and crawls into it deep. The sun came out pretty soon. But Toothpick sat in his wet sage brush, waiting to be told the ladies had gone. Us boys stayed till the dance was over and away runs Buck to the sage brush.

  “ ‘My,’ says he, ‘I’m sorry, Kid. The ladies went two hours ago. I’ll have to get Doc Barker to fix up my memory.’ ”

  “I used to be hell and repeat,” said Old Man Clarke from his chair. “Play that again. Play that quadrille,” he ordered peremptorily.

  The fiddler smiled and humored him. We listened. There was silence for a while.

  “ ‘ Elephant and Castle’,” said the man at the back of the room. “Near London.”

  “That is senseless, too,” said Henry. “We have more sensible signs in this country.”

  Jed Goodland played the quadrille quietly, like a memory, and as they made their bets, their boots tapped the floor to its rhythm.

  “Swing your duckies,” said Old Man Clarke. “Cage the queen. All shake your feet. Doe se doe and doe doe doe. Sashay back. Git away, girls, git away fast. Gents in the center and four hands around. There you go to your seats.”

  “Give us ‘ Sandy Land’ again,” said Stirling. And Jed played “Sandy Land”.

  “Doc Barker became Governor of Wyoming,” said Work, “about 1890.”