Happy Hawkins Part 3

"Oh, h.e.l.l," he moaned, an' he meant every word of it, an' more.

"Now see here, cook," sez I, in a mild voice, "I hate trouble, an' I don't intend to be pestered with it. Do you know how to cook?"

"Yes," he muttered.

"Speak out free an' easy," I sez; "no blood at all is better than bad blood, an' if you don't feel able to forgive me an' go about your work in a friendly way, why I'll feel compelled to remove you from our midst. You're not injured none, only bruised a bit, and I'm famished for my supper. I'm always quick tempered when I'm hungry an' I'm gettin' hungrier every minute. Are you ready to begin?"

He slowly got up to his feet an' looked at me. "Come over to the fire an' have a good look," I said, as though we were old friends.

He followed me over to the fire an' he sure gave me a lookover. "You're bigger'n I thought you was, an' you've been purty well seasoned. I ain't never yet been licked without a gun an' I didn't think it could be did. Will you fight me again--without weapons?" "I'll never fight you again but once," sez I, an' my lips were smiling, but all of a sudden a hatred of his cruel, evil eyes came over me, an' my lips curled back over my teeth. "If you had known I was your foreman an' had mixed with me I'd 'a' killed you a few moments ago. The very next time you cross me I'll kill you. I sleep light--when I do sleep. Are you goin' to cook my supper?"

"Yes, you blasted rattler," sez he, with a grin, "you're the killin'

kind an' you're the killin' age, but I know when the jig's up. I know your name all right, but hanged if I can see through your game. I ain't goin' to try, either. As long as you choose to play at bein' foreman, I'll play at bein' cook, an' when you start on again, I'm willin' to join ya. I'll get your supper in a jiffey, Kid."

I sauntered over to the fair-hair, tryin' to act as if this was an every day occurrence. He had never changed his position all through it, although his hands were tremblin'.

I sat down beside him an' he chuckled softly--I liked that chuckle. It was boyish an' friendly, but most of all it showed a good foundation.

He was new to the game, but he was the kind that learned.

"I suppose I'm purt nigh as old as you," he blurted out.

"In some things, mebbe--not in the cattle business," sez I.

"No," he grinned, "nor in the man-handlin' business, but I want to tell you right now that I have enjoyed this evenin's performance, no matter what happens from it. I ain't carryin' much cash with me," he added after a moment's thought.

"I ain't carryin' any," sez I.

He looked into my face again an' gave his chuckle. A feller couldn't help but echo when that fair-hair chuckled. "I heard the cook say he knew you an' he called you Kid--I suppose you are the Pan Handle Kid?"

he asked.

"I didn't know the' was a Pan Handle Kid, but they're pretty common an'

they're all a good bit alike. Forced to begin killin' before they're able to put the right value on life, an' once they begin, no way to stop. Now I'll tell you confidential that I'm not the Pan Handle, nor any other kind of a kid, although I once was the makin' of one. Still, it will make matters easier if this bunch thinks I am, so we'll just let it go at that. My name is Happy Hawkins; what might I call you?"

"Happy?"--he opens his eyes like saucers an' then he laughs like a boy.

"Well, I watched you goin' after the cook with the neck yoke an' I never in the world would have called you Happy."

"Well, you'll see me trail in this bunch o' beef cattle, smooth an'

contented an' with every man jack rollin' fat an' dimpled to the knuckles. They've had their last fuss. I'll feed 'em an' I'll work 'em from now on, an' you won't know 'em when we hit the market. Where you headin' for, K.C.?

"Yes. My name is Mister Jamison--James Jamison."

"This is a warm climate," sez I.

"Yes," he sez sort o' surprised, "it is."

"It has an awful meltin' effect on names," I continued.

He chuckled again. "I'm mighty glad you arrived, Happy," sez he. "What do you suppose'll happen to my name?"

"Well" I sez, "if you get yours before they learn to like you, it'll probably be James Jamison on the headboard, but if you make good, it'll be Jim Jimison on Sundays an' jest plain Jim for every day." "That suits me," sez he. "I'm entered for the whole race, an' I'm glad to get off as soon as possible."

"Supper's ready," called the cooks, an' when I gave a whoop an' bolted for it he giggled like a big fat mammy. I had turned up the side of his nature 'at would be most useful to our business. I took a sip o' the coffee while he kept his eyes glued on me. "Come over here, Jim," I called.

Jim came over lookin' a little anxious. "Taste that stuff," sez I.

He tasted it an' his face changed as though he had caught a vision of the better world, but I kept my face like the face of an angry bear.

"What do you call this stuff?" I asked the cook, an' his face grew dark as a thunder cloud.

"That's coffee!" he roared.

"When was the pot cleaned?" I asked, with my brows drawn down to the bridge of my nose.

"Not more'n ten minutes ago," he yelled; and I got up an' holding my cup in my hand I danced about twenty different dances, while that cook like to split his sides laughin'. He was a cook, the' was no gettin'

around it, an' Jim, he turned in an' fed his face while first his cheeks would dimple with the gladness o' the moment, an' then his eyes would sadden as he thought of all the good eatin' he had missed by not knowin' the proper kind o' diplomacy to use in handlin' a cook. An'

me!--say, I mowed away until my skin begun to creak under the strain an' I couldn't roll my eyes more'n two degrees. Then I got up an' I shook hands with the cook.

"Cook," I sez, "no matter how devilish wicked you've been in the past, an' no matter how faithful you live up to your inner nature in the future, you're sure of a number nine crown an' a spotless robe jest fer this one meal"; an' the cook, he fairly glistened in the firelight.

Well, this was about all they was to that expedition. We all got to be so friendly with one another that by the time we had trailed that bunch into the stock yards, we was like one big family of elder brothers, an'

Jim, he teased me into goin' back to the Pan Handle with him.

Jim was an Englishman--a younger brother. Up to that time I had allus supposed 'at bein' a younger brother was somewhat in the nature of an accident, an' not a thing to be hurled in a feller's teeth; but over in England it's looked upon as a heinius crime, an' the only thing a younger brother can do to square himself is to get out o' sight. That's how Tim happened to be in the Texas Pan Handle with a tidy little fortune his aunt had left him, tucked away in a good-sized, well-stocked ranch.

I took a good deal o' pains with him, 'cause he didn't have nothin' but a book education, an' it wasn't altogether easy to get him to see the true value o' things. He used to talk about Eton an' Oxford purty solemn, until one night he helped me mill the herd durin' a Norther', an' after that he took more kindly to the vital things o' life, but he was a man, Jim was, an' he kept raisin' my wages right along until I got that opulent feelin'. I never could stand prosperity those days; just as soon as I had a weight o' money 'at I could notice, I begun to grow restless, an' nothin' 'at Jim could do or say had much effect.

If things hadn't run in oil, I'd a-stayed right along, I reckon; but it got so 'at the' wasn't a hitch from week to week, an' I couldn't stand it. I never had a better friend in the world'n that cook was after he'd saved my life.

Jim had a kid sort o' chorin' around the place an' keepin' us from gettin' old an' stupid. One nice bright winter's day the kid went out for a ride; his pony came lopin' in just at sun down in the face of a blizzard, an' I went out to look for the kid. I found him trudgin'

toward home an' cussin' his luck somethin' terrible. I put him up behind me an' by that time the wind was shootin' needles o' sleet into my face 'till I couldn't see a yard ahead. The kid snuggled up to me an' went to sleep, an' I gave the pony his head an' trusted to luck--no, come to think about it, that night I trusted to somethin'

higher than luck, 'cause it was a perfect demon of a night.

The pony dropped from a lope to a walk an' then he put his nose to the ground an' fairly shuffled along. I was wearin' sheepskin with the wool on, but after a time the needles began to creep in an' I grew numb as a stone, while my flesh seemed shook loose from my bones, an' it hurt me to breathe. Oh, Lord, but it was cold! If it hadn't 'a' been for the kid I'd have gotten down an' walked alongside the pony, but as it was, he was out o' the wind an' sleepin' peaceful, so I just sat an' took it.

At last I sort o' drowsed off myself. I didn't sleep, but I wasn't awake; I seemed to be back at the Diamond Dot an' playin' in a little sheltered dell with Barbie. She had made up a game called Fairy Princess; sometimes she was the Fairy Princess an' sometimes I was, an'

it was a mighty amusin' sort of a game, but different from most o' the games I was familiar with.

Well, that night out in the Texas blizzard I was playin' that game with little Barbie, an' all of a sudden--smas.h.!.+ Before I knowed what had happened we had been run into an' knocked down a ravine an' both the kid an' the pony was lyin' on top o' me. The kid got up an' begun to cuss as usual, but the pony never moved. I'd a heap sight rather had the conditions reversed, 'cause the pony was on my right leg an' my right leg was on a sharp stone.

"Shut up, kid," sez I, "this ain't no time for such talk. Here, you curl up alongside the pony an' I'll spread part o' my coat over you."

That kid was a home-maker all right; nothin' ever surprised him, an'

wherever he lit he made himself comfortable. In two minutes he was asleep, while I began to puzzle it out. We were in a sheltered spot an'

the wind swept above us; but it was so dark that you couldn't see ten inches. The wind was from the no'th, an' I went over every bit o'

landscape in the country until at last I figgered out the' was only one place in Texas that filled the bill. A path swung around a crag an'

the' was a shelf of stone ten feet below it an' eight feet wide, then it cut off sheer, fifty feet to the rocky bank of a creek. I reached out with my hand an' felt the edge of it, an' it give me an awful chill. I don't like to come quite so close.

After a time the wind veered around a little more to the east an' then it sucked up through the cut an' I began to freeze. I didn't care a great deal 'cause it stopped the horrid hurtin' in my leg; but the dead pony began to cool, an' I knew it was only a question o' minutes.

Finally I awoke the kid. "Where is your gun, kid?" I sez.