The Virginian-a Horseman of the Plains

by Wister, Owen

  All spring he had ridden trail, worked at ditches during summer, and now he had just finished with the beef round-up. Yesterday, while he was spending a little comfortable money at the Drybone hog-ranch, a casual traveller from the north gossiped of Bear Creek, and the fences up there, and the farm crops, the Westfalls, and the young schoolmarm from Vermont, for whom the Taylors had built a cabin next door to theirs. The traveller had not seen her, but Mrs. Taylor and all the ladies thought the world of her, and Lin McLean had told him she was "away up in G." She would have plenty of partners at this Swinton barbecue. Great boon for the country, wasn't it, steers jumping that way?

  The Virginian heard, asking no questions; and left town in an hour, with the scarf and trousers tied in his slicker behind his saddle. After looking upon the ford again, even though it was dry and not at all the same place, he journeyed in attentively. When you have been hard at work for months with no time to think, of course you think a great deal during your first empty days. "Step along, you Monte hawss!" he said, rousing after some while. He disciplined Monte, who flattened his ears affectedly and snorted. "Why, you surely ain' thinkin' of you'-self as a hero? She wasn't really a-drowndin', you pie-biter." He rested his serious glance upon the alkali. "She's not likely to have forgot that mix-up, though. I guess I'll not remind her about grippin' me, and all that. She wasn't the kind a man ought to josh about such things. She had a right clear eye." Thus, tall and loose in the saddle, did he jog along the sixty miles which still lay between him and the dance.

  X. WHERE FANCY WAS BRED

  Two camps in the open, and the Virginian's Monte horse, untired, brought him to the Swintons' in good time for the barbecue. The horse received good food at length, while his rider was welcomed with good whiskey. GOOD whiskey—for had not steers jumped to seventy-five?

  Inside the Goose Egg kitchen many small delicacies were preparing, and a steer was roasting whole outside. The bed of flame under it showed steadily brighter against the dusk that was beginning to veil the lowlands. The busy hosts went and came, while men stood and men lay near the fire-glow. Chalkeye was there, and Nebrasky, and Trampas, and Honey Wiggin, with others, enjoying the occasion; but Honey Wiggin was enjoying himself: he had an audience; he was sitting up discoursing to it.

  "Hello!" he said, perceiving the Virginian. "So you've dropped in for your turn! Number—six, ain't he, boys?"

  "Depends who's a-runnin' the countin'," said the Virginian, and stretched himself down among the audience.

  "I've saw him number one when nobody else was around," said Trampas.

  "How far away was you standin' when you beheld that?" inquired the lounging Southerner.

  "Well, boys," said Wiggin, "I expect it will be Miss Schoolmarm says who's number one to-night."

  "So she's arrived in this hyeh country?" observed the Virginian, very casually.

  "Arrived!" said Trampas again. "Where have you been grazing lately?"

  "A right smart way from the mules."

  "Nebrasky and the boys was tellin' me they'd missed yu' off the range," again interposed Wiggin. "Say, Nebrasky, who have yu' offered your canary to the schoolmarm said you mustn't give her?"

  Nebrasky grinned wretchedly.

  "Well, she's a lady, and she's square, not takin' a man's gift when she don't take the man. But you'd ought to get back all them letters yu' wrote her. Yu' sure ought to ask her for them tell-tales."

  "Ah, pshaw, Honey!" protested the youth. It was well known that he could not write his name.

  "Why, if here ain't Bokay Baldy!" cried the agile Wiggin, stooping to fresh prey. "Found them slippers yet, Baldy? Tell yu' boys, that was turruble sad luck Baldy had. Did yu' hear about that? Baldy, yu' know, he can stay on a tame horse most as well as the schoolmarm. But just you give him a pair of young knittin'-needles and see him make 'em sweat! He worked an elegant pair of slippers with pink cabbages on 'em for Miss Wood."

  "I bought 'em at Medicine Bow," blundered Baldy.

  "So yu' did!" assented the skilful comedian. "Baldy he bought 'em. And on the road to her cabin there at the Taylors' he got thinkin' they might be too big, and he got studyin' what to do. And he fixed up to tell her about his not bein' sure of the size, and how she was to let him know if they dropped off her, and he'd exchange' 'em, and when he got right near her door, why, he couldn't find his courage. And so he slips the parcel under the fence and starts serenadin' her. But she ain't inside her cabin at all. She's at supper next door with the Taylors, and Baldy singin' 'Love has conqwered pride and angwer' to a lone house. Lin McLean was comin' up by Taylor's corral, where Taylor's Texas bull was. Well, it was turruble sad. Baldy's pants got tore, but he fell inside the fence, and Lin druv the bull back and somebody stole them Medicine Bow galoshes. Are you goin' to knit her some more, Bokay?"

  "About half that ain't straight," Baldy commented, with mildness.

  "The half that was tore off yer pants? Well, never mind, Baldy; Lin will get left too, same as all of yu'."

  "Is there many?" inquired the Virginian. He was still stretched on his back, looking up at the sky.

  "I don't know how many she's been used to where she was raised," Wiggin answered. "A kid stage-driver come from Point of Rocks one day and went back the next. Then the foreman of the 76 outfit, and the horse-wrangler from the Bar-Circle-L, and two deputy marshals, with punchers, stringin' right along,—all got their tumble. Old Judge Burrage from Cheyenne come up in August for a hunt and stayed round here and never hunted at all. There was that horse thief—awful good-lookin'. Taylor wanted to warn her about him, but Mrs. Taylor said she'd look after her if it was needed. Mr. Horse-thief gave it up quicker than most; but the schoolmarm couldn't have knowed he had a Mrs. Horse-thief camped on Poison Spider till afterwards. She wouldn't go ridin' with him. She'll go with some, takin' a kid along."

  "Bah!" said Trampas.

  The Virginian stopped looking at the sky, and watched Trampas from where he lay.

  "I think she encourages a man some," said poor Nebrasky.

  "Encourages? Because she lets yu' teach her how to shoot," said Wiggin. "Well—I don't guess I'm a judge. I've always kind o' kep' away from them good women. Don't seem to think of anything to chat about to 'em. The only folks I'd say she encourages is the school kids. She kisses them."

  "Riding and shooting and kissing the kids," sneered Trampas. "That's a heap too pussy-kitten for me."

  They laughed. The sage-brush audience is readily cynical.

  "Look for the man, I say," Trampas pursued. "And ain't he there? She leaves Baldy sit on the fence while she and Lin McLean—"

  They laughed loudly at the blackguard picture which he drew; and the laugh stopped short, for the Virginian stood over Trampas.

  "You can rise up now, and tell them you lie," he said.

  The man was still for a moment in the dead silence. "I thought you claimed you and her wasn't acquainted," said he then.

  "Stand on your laigs, you polecat, and say you're a liar!"

  Trampas's hand moved behind him.

  "Quit that," said the Southerner, "or I'll break your neck!"

  The eye of a man is the prince of deadly weapons. Trampas looked in the Virginian's, and slowly rose. "I didn't mean—" he began, and paused, his face poisonously bloated.

  "Well, I'll call that sufficient. Keep a-standin' still. I ain' going to trouble yu' long. In admittin' yourself to be a liar you have spoke God's truth for onced. Honey Wiggin, you and me and the boys have hit town too frequent for any of us to play Sunday on the balance of the gang." He stopped and surveyed Public Opinion, seated around in carefully inexpressive attention. "We ain't a Christian outfit a little bit, and maybe we have most forgotten what decency feels like. But I reckon we haven't forgot what it means. You can sit down now, if you want."

  The liar stood and sneered experimentally, looking at Public Opinion. But this changeful deity was no longer with him, and he heard it variously assenting, "That's so," and "She's a lady," and otherwise excelle
ntly moralizing. So he held his peace. When, however, the Virginian had departed to the roasting steer, and Public Opinion relaxed into that comfort which we all experience when the sermon ends, Trampas sat down amid the reviving cheerfulness, and ventured again to be facetious.

  "Shut your rank mouth," said Wiggin to him, amiably. "I don't care whether he knows her or if he done it on principle. I'll accept the roundin' up he gave us—and say! You'll swallo' your dose, too! Us boys'll stand in with him in this."

  So Trampas swallowed. And what of the Virginian?

  He had championed the feeble, and spoken honorably in meeting, and according to all the constitutions and by-laws of morality, he should have been walking in virtue's especial calm. But there it was! he had spoken; he had given them a peep through the key-hole at his inner man; and as he prowled away from the assemblage before whom he stood convicted of decency, it was vicious rather than virtuous that he felt. Other matters also disquieted him—so Lin McLean was hanging round that schoolmarm! Yet he joined Ben Swinton in a seemingly Christian spirit. He took some whiskey and praised the size of the barrel, speaking with his host like this: "There cert'nly ain' goin' to be trouble about a second helpin'."

  "Hope not. We'd ought to have more trimmings, though. We're shy on ducks."

  "Yu' have the barrel. Has Lin McLean seen that?"

  "No. We tried for ducks away down as far as the Laparel outfit. A real barbecue—"

  "There's large thirsts on Bear Creek. Lin McLean will pass on ducks."

  "Lin's not thirsty this month."

  "Signed for one month, has he?"

  "Signed! He's spooning our schoolmarm!"

  "They claim she's a right sweet-faced girl."

  "Yes; yes; awful agreeable. And next thing you're fooled clean through."

  "Yu' don't say!"

  "She keeps a-teaching the darned kids, and it seems like a good growed-up man can't interest her."

  "YU' DON'T SAY!"

  "There used to be all the ducks you wanted at the Laparel, but their fool cook's dead stuck on raising turkeys this year."

  "That must have been mighty close to a drowndin' the schoolmarm got at South Fork."

  "Why, I guess not. When? She's never spoken of any such thing—that I've heard."

  "Mos' likely the stage-driver got it wrong, then."

  "Yes. Must have drownded somebody else. Here they come! That's her ridin' the horse. There's the Westfalls. Where are you running to?"

  "To fix up. Got any soap around hyeh?"

  "Yes," shouted Swinton, for the Virginian was now some distance away; "towels and everything in the dugout." And he went to welcome his first formal guests.

  The Virginian reached his saddle under a shed. "So she's never mentioned it," said he, untying his slicker for the trousers and scarf. "I didn't notice Lin anywheres around her." He was over in the dugout now, whipping off his overalls; and soon he was excellently clean and ready, except for the tie in his scarf and the part in his hair. "I'd have knowed her in Greenland," he remarked. He held the candle up and down at the looking-glass, and the looking-glass up and down at his head. "It's mighty strange why she ain't mentioned that." He worried the scarf a fold or two further, and at length, a trifle more than satisfied with his appearance, he proceeded most serenely toward the sound of the tuning fiddles. He passed through the store-room behind the kitchen, stepping lightly lest he should rouse the ten or twelve babies that lay on the table or beneath it. On Bear Creek babies and children always went with their parents to a dance, because nurses were unknown. So little Alfred and Christopher lay there among the wraps, parallel and crosswise with little Taylors, and little Carmodys, and Lees, and all the Bear Creek offspring that was not yet able to skip at large and hamper its indulgent elders in the ball-room.

  "Why, Lin ain't hyeh yet!" said the Virginian, looking in upon the people. There was Miss Wood, standing up for the quadrille. "I didn't remember her hair was that pretty," said he. "But ain't she a little, little girl!"

  Now she was in truth five feet three; but then he could look away down on the top of her head.

  "Salute your honey!" called the first fiddler. All partners bowed to each other, and as she turned, Miss Wood saw the man in the doorway. Again, as it had been at South Fork that day, his eyes dropped from hers, and she divining instantly why he had come after half a year, thought of the handkerchief and of that scream of hers in the river, and became filled with tyranny and anticipation; for indeed he was fine to look upon. So she danced away, carefully unaware of his existence.

  "First lady, centre!" said her partner, reminding her of her turn. "Have you forgotten how it goes since last time?"

  Molly Wood did not forget again, but quadrilled with the most sprightly devotion.

  "I see some new faces to-night," said she, presently.

  "Yu' always do forget our poor faces," said her partner.

  "Oh, no! There's a stranger now. Who is that black man?"

  "Well—he's from Virginia, and he ain't allowin' he's black."

  "He's a tenderfoot, I suppose?"

  "Ha, ha, ha! That's rich, too!" and so the simple partner explained a great deal about the Virginian to Molly Wood. At the end of the set she saw the man by the door take a step in her direction.

  "Oh," said she, quickly, to the partner, "how warm it is! I must see how those babies are doing." And she passed the Virginian in a breeze of unconcern.

  His eyes gravely lingered where she had gone. "She knowed me right away," said he. He looked for a moment, then leaned against the door. "'How warm it is!' said she. Well, it ain't so screechin' hot hyeh; and as for rushin' after Alfred and Christopher, when their natural motheh is bumpin' around handy—she cert'nly can't be offended?" he broke off, and looked again where she had gone. And then Miss Wood passed him brightly again, and was dancing the schottische almost immediately. "Oh, yes, she knows me," the swarthy cow-puncher mused. "She has to take trouble not to see me. And what she's a-fussin' at is mighty interestin'. Hello!"

  "Hello!" returned Lin McLean, sourly. He had just looked into the kitchen.

  "Not dancin'?" the Southerner inquired.

  "Don't know how."

  "Had scyarlet fever and forgot your past life?"

  Len grinned.

  "Better persuade the schoolmarm to learn it. She's goin' to give me instruction."

  "Huh!" went Mr. McLean, and skulked out to the barrel.

  "Why, they claimed you weren't drinkin' this month!" said his friend, following.

  "Well, I am. Here's luck!" The two pledged in tin cups. "But I'm not waltzin' with her," blurted Mr. McLean grievously. "She called me an exception."

  "Waltzin'," repeated the Virginian quickly, and hearing the fiddles he hastened away.

  Few in the Bear Creek Country could waltz, and with these few it was mostly an unsteered and ponderous exhibition; therefore was the Southerner bent upon profiting by his skill. He entered the room, and his lady saw him come where she sat alone for the moment, and her thoughts grew a little hurried.

  "Will you try a turn, ma'am?"

  "I beg your pardon?" It was a remote, well-schooled eye that she lifted now upon him.

  "If you like a waltz, ma'am, will you waltz with me?"

  "You're from Virginia, I understand?" said Molly Wood, regarding him politely, but not rising. One gains authority immensely by keeping one's seat. All good teachers know this.

  "Yes, ma'am, from Virginia."

  "I've heard that Southerners have such good manners."

  "That's correct." The cow-puncher flushed, but he spoke in his unvaryingly gentle voice.

  "For in New England, you know," pursued Miss Molly, noting his scarf and clean-shaven chin, and then again steadily meeting his eye, "gentlemen ask to be presented to ladies before they ask them to waltz."

  He stood a moment before her, deeper and deeper scarlet; and the more she saw his handsome face, the keener rose her excitement. She waited for him to speak of the river; for then she wa
s going to be surprised, and gradually to remember, and finally to be very nice to him. But he did not wait. "I ask your pardon, lady," said he, and bowing, walked off, leaving her at once afraid that he might not come back. But she had altogether mistaken her man. Back he came serenely with Mr. Taylor, and was duly presented to her. Thus were the conventions vindicated.

  It can never be known what the cow-puncher was going to say next; for Uncle Hughey stepped up with a glass of water which he had left Wood to bring, and asking for a turn, most graciously received it. She danced away from a situation where she began to feel herself getting the worst of it. One moment the Virginian stared at his lady as she lightly circulated, and then he went out to the barrel.