by Wister, Owen
"See here," urged the drummer, "if I take you I'm safe from drawing some party I might not care so much about. This here sleeping proposition is a lottery."
"Well," said the Virginian (and his hesitation was truly masterly), "if you put it that way—"
"I do put it that way. Why, you're clean! You've had a shave right now. You turn in when you feel inclined, old man! I ain't retiring just yet."
The drummer had struck a slightly false note in these last remarks. He should not have said "old man." Until this I had thought him merely an amiable person who wished to do a favor. But "old man" came in wrong. It had a hateful taint of his profession; the being too soon with everybody, the celluloid good-fellowship that passes for ivory with nine in ten of the city crowd. But not so with the sons of the sagebrush. They live nearer nature, and they know better.
But the Virginian blandly accepted "old man" from his victim: he had a game to play. "Well, I cert'nly thank yu'," he said. "After a while I'll take advantage of your kind offer."
I was surprised. Possession being nine points of the law, it seemed his very chance to intrench himself in the bed. But the cow-puncher had planned a campaign needing no intrenchments. Moreover, going to bed before nine o'clock upon the first evening in many weeks that a town's resources were open to you, would be a dull proceeding. Our entire company, drummer and all, now walked over to the store, and here my sleeping arrangements were made easily. This store was the cleanest place and the best in Medicine Bow, and would have been a good store anywhere, offering a multitude of things for sale, and kept by a very civil proprietor. He bade me make myself at home, and placed both of his counters at my disposal. Upon the grocery side there stood a cheese too large and strong to sleep near comfortably, and I therefore chose the dry-goods side. Here thick quilts were unrolled for me, to make it soft; and no condition was placed upon me, further than that I should remove my boots, because the quilts were new, and clean, and for sale. So now my rest was assured. Not an anxiety remained in my thoughts. These therefore turned themselves wholly to the other man's bed, and how he was going to lose it.
I think that Steve was more curious even than myself. Time was on the wing. His bet must be decided, and the drinks enjoyed. He stood against the grocery counter, contemplating the Virginian. But it was to me that he spoke. The Virginian, however, listened to every word.
"Your first visit to this country?"
I told him yes.
"How do you like it?"
I expected to like it very much.
"How does the climate strike you?"
I thought the climate was fine.
"Makes a man thirsty though."
This was the sub-current which the Virginian plainly looked for. But he, like Steve, addressed himself to me.
"Yes," he put in, "thirsty while a man's soft yet. You'll harden."
"I guess you'll find it a drier country than you were given to expect," said Steve.
"If your habits have been frequent that way," said the Virginian.
"There's parts of Wyoming," pursued Steve, "where you'll go hours and hours before you'll see a drop of wetness."
"And if yu' keep a-thinkin' about it," said the Virginian, "it'll seem like days and days."
Steve, at this stroke, gave up, and clapped him on the shoulder with a joyous chuckle. "You old son-of-a!" he cried affectionately.
"Drinks are due now," said the Virginian. "My treat, Steve. But I reckon your suspense will have to linger a while yet."
Thus they dropped into direct talk from that speech of the fourth dimension where they had been using me for their telephone.
"Any cyards going to-night?" inquired the Virginian.
"Stud and draw," Steve told him. "Strangers playing."
"I think I'd like to get into a game for a while," said the Southerner. "Strangers, yu' say?"
And then, before quitting the store, he made his toilet for this little hand at poker. It was a simple preparation. He took his pistol from its holster, examined it, then shoved it between his overalls and his shirt in front, and pulled his waistcoat over it. He might have been combing his hair for all the attention any one paid to this, except myself. Then the two friends went out, and I bethought me of that epithet which Steve again had used to the Virginian as he clapped him on the shoulder. Clearly this wild country spoke a language other than mine—the word here was a term of endearment. Such was my conclusion.
The drummers had finished their dealings with the proprietor, and they were gossiping together in a knot by the door as the Virginian passed out.
"See you later, old man!" This was the American drummer accosting his prospective bed-fellow.
"Oh, yes," returned the bed-fellow, and was gone.
The American drummer winked triumphantly at his brethren. "He's all right," he observed, jerking a thumb after the Virginian. "He's easy. You got to know him to work him. That's all."
"Und vat is your point?" inquired the German drummer.
"Point is—he'll not take any goods off you or me; but he's going to talk up the killer to any consumptive he runs across. I ain't done with him yet. Say," (he now addressed the proprietor), "what's her name?"
"Whose name?"
"Woman runs the eating-house."
"Glen. Mrs. Glen."
"Ain't she new?"
"Been settled here about a month. Husband's a freight conductor."
"Thought I'd not seen her before. She's a good-looker."
"Hm! Yes. The kind of good looks I'd sooner see in another man's wife than mine."
"So that's the gait, is it?"
"Hm! well, it don't seem to be. She come here with that reputation. But there's been general disappointment."
"Then she ain't lacked suitors any?"
"Lacked! Are you acquainted with cow-boys?"
"And she disappointed 'em? Maybe she likes her husband?"
"Hm! well, how are you to tell about them silent kind?"
"Talking of conductors," began the drummer. And we listened to his anecdote. It was successful with his audience; but when he launched fluently upon a second I strolled out. There was not enough wit in this narrator to relieve his indecency, and I felt shame at having been surprised into laughing with him.
I left that company growing confidential over their leering stories, and I sought the saloon. It was very quiet and orderly. Beer in quart bottles at a dollar I had never met before; but saving its price, I found no complaint to make of it. Through folding doors I passed from the bar proper with its bottles and elk head back to the hall with its various tables. I saw a man sliding cards from a case, and across the table from him another man laying counters down. Near by was a second dealer pulling cards from the bottom of a pack, and opposite him a solemn old rustic piling and changing coins upon the cards which lay already exposed.
But now I heard a voice that drew my eyes to the far corner of the room.
"Why didn't you stay in Arizona?"
Harmless looking words as I write them down here. Yet at the sound of them I noticed the eyes of the others directed to that corner. What answer was given to them I did not hear, nor did I see who spoke. Then came another remark.
"Well, Arizona's no place for amatures."
This time the two card dealers that I stood near began to give a part of their attention to the group that sat in the corner. There was in me a desire to leave this room. So far my hours at Medicine Bow had seemed to glide beneath a sunshine of merriment, of easy-going jocularity. This was suddenly gone, like the wind changing to north in the middle of a warm day. But I stayed, being ashamed to go.
Five or six players sat over in the corner at a round table where counters were piled. Their eyes were close upon their cards, and one seemed to be dealing a card at a time to each, with pauses and betting between. Steve was there and the Virginian; the others were new faces.
"No place for amatures," repeated the voice; and now I saw that it was the dealer's. There was in his countenance the same ugliness that his w
ords conveyed.
"Who's that talkin'?" said one of the men near me, in a low voice.
"Trampas."
"What's he?"
"Cow-puncher, bronco-buster, tin-horn, most anything."
"Who's he talkin' at?"
"Think it's the black-headed guy he's talking at."
"That ain't supposed to be safe, is it?"
"Guess we're all goin' to find out in a few minutes."
"Been trouble between 'em?"
"They've not met before. Trampas don't enjoy losin' to a stranger."
"Fello's from Arizona, yu' say?"
"No. Virginia. He's recently back from havin' a look at Arizona. Went down there last year for a change. Works for the Sunk Creek outfit." And then the dealer lowered his voice still further and said something in the other man's ear, causing him to grin. After which both of them looked at me.
There had been silence over in the corner; but now the man Trampas spoke again.
"AND ten," said he, sliding out some chips from before him. Very strange it was to hear him, how he contrived to make those words a personal taunt. The Virginian was looking at his cards. He might have been deaf.
"AND twenty," said the next player, easily.
The next threw his cards down.
It was now the Virginian's turn to bet, or leave the game, and he did not speak at once.
Therefore Trampas spoke. "Your bet, you son-of-a—."
The Virginian's pistol came out, and his hand lay on the table, holding it unaimed. And with a voice as gentle as ever, the voice that sounded almost like a caress, but drawling a very little more than usual, so that there was almost a space between each word, he issued his orders to the man Trampas: "When you call me that, SMILE." And he looked at Trampas across the table.
Yes, the voice was gentle. But in my ears it seemed as if somewhere the bell of death was ringing; and silence, like a stroke, fell on the large room. All men present, as if by some magnetic current, had become aware of this crisis. In my ignorance, and the total stoppage of my thoughts, I stood stock-still, and noticed various people crouching, or shifting their positions.
"Sit quiet," said the dealer, scornfully to the man near me. "Can't you see he don't want to push trouble? He has handed Trampas the choice to back down or draw his steel."
Then, with equal suddenness and ease, the room came out of its strangeness. Voices and cards, the click of chips, the puff of tobacco, glasses lifted to drink,—this level of smooth relaxation hinted no more plainly of what lay beneath than does the surface tell the depth of the sea.
For Trampas had made his choice. And that choice was not to "draw his steel." If it was knowledge that he sought, he had found it, and no mistake! We heard no further reference to what he had been pleased to style "amatures." In no company would the black-headed man who had visited Arizona be rated a novice at the cool art of self-preservation.
One doubt remained: what kind of a man was Trampas? A public back-down is an unfinished thing,—for some natures at least. I looked at his face, and thought it sullen, but tricky rather than courageous.
Something had been added to my knowledge also. Once again I had heard applied to the Virginian that epithet which Steve so freely used. The same words, identical to the letter. But this time they had produced a pistol. "When you call me that, SMILE!" So I perceived a new example of the old truth, that the letter means nothing until the spirit gives it life.
III. STEVE TREATS
It was for several minutes, I suppose, that I stood drawing these silent morals. No man occupied himself with me. Quiet voices, and games of chance, and glasses lifted to drink, continued to be the peaceful order of the night. And into my thoughts broke the voice of that card-dealer who had already spoken so sagely. He also took his turn at moralizing.
"What did I tell you?" he remarked to the man for whom he continued to deal, and who continued to lose money to him.
"Tell me when?"
"Didn't I tell you he'd not shoot?" the dealer pursued with complacence. "You got ready to dodge. You had no call to be concerned. He's not the kind a man need feel anxious about."
The player looked over at the Virginian, doubtfully. "Well," he said, "I don't know what you folks call a dangerous man."
"Not him!" exclaimed the dealer with admiration. "He's a brave man. That's different."
The player seemed to follow this reasoning no better than I did.
"It's not a brave man that's dangerous," continued the dealer. "It's the cowards that scare me." He paused that this might sink home.
"Fello' came in here las' Toosday," he went on. "He got into some misunderstanding about the drinks. Well, sir, before we could put him out of business, he'd hurt two perfectly innocent onlookers. They'd no more to do with it than you have," the dealer explained to me.
"Were they badly hurt?" I asked.
"One of 'em was. He's died since."
"What became of the man?"
"Why, we put him out of business, I told you. He died that night. But there was no occasion for any of it; and that's why I never like to be around where there's a coward. You can't tell. He'll always go to shooting before it's necessary, and there's no security who he'll hit. But a man like that black-headed guy is (the dealer indicated the Virginian) need never worry you. And there's another point why there's no need to worry about him: IT'D BE TOO LATE."
These good words ended the moralizing of the dealer. He had given us a piece of his mind. He now gave the whole of it to dealing cards. I loitered here and there, neither welcome nor unwelcome at present, watching the cow-boys at their play. Saving Trampas, there was scarce a face among them that had not in it something very likable. Here were lusty horsemen ridden from the heat of the sun, and the wet of the storm, to divert themselves awhile. Youth untamed sat here for an idle moment, spending easily its hard-earned wages. City saloons rose into my vision, and I instantly preferred this Rocky Mountain place. More of death it undoubtedly saw, but less of vice, than did its New York equivalents.
And death is a thing much cleaner than vice. Moreover, it was by no means vice that was written upon these wild and manly faces. Even where baseness was visible, baseness was not uppermost. Daring, laughter, endurance—these were what I saw upon the countenances of the cow-boys. And this very first day of my knowledge of them marks a date with me. For something about them, and the idea of them, smote my American heart, and I have never forgotten it, nor ever shall, as long as I live. In their flesh our natural passions ran tumultuous; but often in their spirit sat hidden a true nobility, and often beneath its unexpected shining their figures took on heroic stature.
The dealer had styled the Virginian "a black-headed guy." This did well enough as an unflattered portrait. Judge Henry's trustworthy man, with whom I was to drive two hundred and sixty-three miles, certainly had a very black head of hair. It was the first thing to notice now, if one glanced generally at the table where he sat at cards. But the eye came back to him—drawn by that inexpressible something which had led the dealer to speak so much at length about him.
Still, "black-headed guy" justly fits him and his next performance. He had made his plan for this like a true and (I must say) inspired devil. And now the highly appreciative town of Medicine Bow was to be treated to a manifestation of genius.
He sat playing his stud-poker. After a decent period of losing and winning, which gave Trampas all proper time for a change of luck and a repairing of his fortunes, he looked at Steve and said amiably: "How does bed strike you?"
I was beside their table, learning gradually that stud-poker has in it more of what I will call red pepper than has our Eastern game. The Virginian followed his own question: "Bed strikes me," he stated.
Steve feigned indifference. He was far more deeply absorbed in his bet and the American drummer than he was in this game; but he chose to take out a fat, florid gold watch, consult it elaborately, and remark, "It's only eleven."
"Yu' forget I'm from the country," said th
e black-headed guy. "The chickens have been roostin' a right smart while."
His sunny Southern accent was again strong. In that brief passage with Trampas it had been almost wholly absent. But different moods of the spirit bring different qualities of utterance—where a man comes by these naturally. The Virginian cashed in his checks.
"Awhile ago," said Steve, "you had won three months' salary."
"I'm still twenty dollars to the good," said the Virginian. "That's better than breaking a laig."
Again, in some voiceless, masonic way, most people in that saloon had become aware that something was in process of happening. Several left their games and came to the front by the bar.
"If he ain't in bed yet—" mused the Virginian.
"I'll find out," said I. And I hurried across to the dim sleeping room, happy to have a part in this.
They were all in bed; and in some beds two were sleeping. How they could do it—but in those days I was fastidious. The American had come in recently and was still awake.
"Thought you were to sleep at the store?" said he.
So then I invented a little lie, and explained that I was in search of the Virginian.
"Better search the dives," said he. "These cow-boys don't get to town often."
At this point I stumbled sharply over something.
"It's my box of Consumption Killer," explained the drummer; "Well, I hope that man will stay out all night."
"Bed narrow?" I inquired.
"For two it is. And the pillows are mean. Takes both before you feel anything's under your head."
He yawned, and I wished him pleasant dreams.
At my news the Virginian left the bar at once; and crossed to the sleeping room. Steve and I followed softly, and behind us several more strung out in an expectant line. "What is this going to be?" they inquired curiously of each other. And upon learning the great novelty of the event, they clustered with silence intense outside the door where the Virginian had gone in.
We heard the voice of the drummer, cautioning his bed-fellow. "Don't trip over the Killer," he was saying. "The Prince of Wales barked his shin just now." It seemed my English clothes had earned me this title.