Faro Nell and Her Friends Part 19

barkeep, Jack is. Mebby it's his genius for forbearance, that a-way, which loores this Turner person into attemptin' them outrages on his sens'bilities.

"The Turner person stands at the bar, sloppin' out the legit'mate forty drops. With nothin' said or done to stir him up, he c.o.c.ks his eye at Jack--for all the world like a crow peerin into a bottle--an'

says,

"'Which your feachers is displeasin' to me, an' I don't like your looks.'

"Jack keeps on swabbin' off the bar for a spell, an' all as mild as the month of May.

"'Is that remark to be took sarkastic?' he asks at last, 'or shall we call it nothin' more'n a brainless effort to be funny?'

"'None whatever!' retorts the Turner person; 'that observation's made in a serious mood. Your countenance is ondoubted the facial failure of the age, an' I requests that you turn it the other way while I drinks.'

"Not bein' otherwise engaged at the moment, an' havin' time at his command, Jack repairs from behind the bar, an' seizes the Turner person by the y'ear.

"'An' this is the boasted hospital'ty of the West!' howls the Turner person, strugglin' to free himself from Jack, who's slowly but voloominously bootin' him towards the street.

"It's Nell who tries to save him.

"'Yere, you Jack!' she sings out, 'don't you-all go hurtin' that pore tenderfoot none.'

"Nell's a shade too late, however; Jack's already booted him out.

"Sh.o.r.e, Jack apologizes.

"'Beg parding, Nellie,' he says; 'your least command beats four of a kind with me; but as to that ejected shorthorn, I has him all thrown out before ever you gets your stack down.'

"The Turner person picks himse'f out of the dust, an', while he feels his frame for dislocations with one hand, feebly menaces at Black Jack with t'other.

"'Some day, you rum-sellin' miscreent,' he says, 'you'll go too far with me.'

"As showin' how little these vicisitoodes preys on this Turner person, it ain't ten minutes till he's. .h.i.t the middle of Wolfville's princ.i.p.al causeway, roarin' at the top of his lungs,

"'Cl'ar the path! I'm the grey wolf of the mountings, an' gen'ral desolation follows whar I leads!'

"Yere he gives a prolonged howl.

"The hardest citizen that ever belted on a gun couldn't kick up no sech row as that in Wolfville, an' last as long as a drink of whiskey.

In half the swish of a coyote's tail, Jack Moore's got the Turner person corralled.

"'This camp has put up with a heap from you,' says Moore, 'an' now we tries what rest an' reeflection will do.'

"'I'm a wolf--!'

"'We savvys all about you bein' a wolf. Also, I'm goin' to tie you to the windmill, as likely to exert a tamin' inflooence.'

"Moore conveys the Turner person to the windmill, an' ropes his two hands to one of its laigs.

"'Thar, Wolf,' he says, makin' sh.o.r.e the Turner person is fastened secoore, 'I shall leave you ontil, with every element of wildness abated, you-all begins to feel more like a domestic anamile.'

"From whar we-all are standin' in front of the post office, we can see the Turner person roped to the windmill laig.

"'What do you reckon's wrong with that party?' asks Enright, sort o'

gen'ral like; 'I don't take it he's actchooally locoed none.'

"Thar's half a dozen opinions on the p'int involved. Tutt su'gests that the Turner person's wits, not bein' cinched on any too tight by nacher in the beginnin', mebby slips their girths same as happens with a saddle. Cherokee inclines to a notion that whatever mental deeflections he betrays is born primar'ly of him stoppin' that week in Red Dog. Cherokee insists that sech a s.p.a.ce in Red Dog sh.o.r.e ought to be s'fficient to give any sport, however firmly founded, a decisive slant.

"As ag'inst both the others, Boggs holds to the view that the onusual fitfulness observ'ble in the Turner person arises from a change of licker, an' urges that the sudden s.h.i.+ft from the beverages of Red Dog, which last is indoobitably no more an' no less than liquid loonacy, to the Red Lights Old Jordan, is bound to confer a twist upon the straightest intellectyooals.

"'Which I knows a party,' says Boggs, 'who once immerses a ten-penny nail in a quart of Red Dog licker, an' at the end of the week he takes it out a corkscrew.'

"'Go an' get him, Jack,' says Enright, p'intin' to the Turner person; 'him bein' tied thar that a-way is an inhooman spectacle, an' if little Enright Peets should come teeterin' along an' see him, it'd have a tendency to harden the innocent child. Fetch him yere, an' let me question him.'

"'Front up,' says Moore to the Turner person, when he's been conveyed before Enright; 'front up now, frank an' cheerful, an' answer questions. Also, omit all ref'rences to bein' a wolf. Which you've worn that topic thread-bar'; an' besides it ain't calc'lated to do you credit.'

"'Whatever's the matter with you?' asks Enright, speakin' to the Turner person friendly like. 'Which I begins to think thar's somethin'

wrong with your system. The way you go knockin' about offendin' folks, it won't be no time before every social circle in the Southwest'll be closed ag'inst you. Whatever's wrong?'

"'Them's the first kind words,' ejacyoolates the Turner person, beginnin' to weep, 'which has been spoke to me in months. Which if you-all will ask me into yon s'loon, an' protect me from that murderer of a barkeep while I buys the drinks, I'll show you that I've been illyoosed to a degree whar I'm no longer reespons'ble for my deeds.

It's a love affair,' he adds, gulpin' down a sob, 'an' I've been crooelly misonderstood.'

"'A love affair,' repeats Enright plenty soft, for the mention of love never fails to hit our old warchief whar thar't a palin' off his fence. 'I ain't been what you-all'd call in love none since the Purple Blossom of Gingham Mountain marries Polly Hawkes over on the Painted Post. Polly was a beauty, with a arm like a canthook, an' at sech dulcet exercises as huggin' she's got b'ars left standin' sideways.

However, that's back in Tennessee, an' many years ago.'

"Enright, bres.h.i.+n' the drops from his eyes, herds the Turner person into the Red Light an' signals to Black Jack.

"'Onfold,' he says; 'tell me as to that love affair wharin you gets cold-decked.'

"Nell abandons her p'sition on the lookout stool, an' shows up interested an' intent at Enright's shoulder.

"Ain't I in this?' she asks.

"'Be thar any feachures,' says Enright to the Turner person, 'calc'lated to offend the y'ears of innocence?'

"'None whatever,' says the Turner person. 'Which I'm oncapable of shockin' the most fastid'yous.'

"'Is thar time,' asks Nell of Enright, 'for me to round up Missis Rucker an' Tucson Jennie? Listenin' to love tales, that a-way, is duck soup to both of 'em.'

"'You-all can tell 'em later, Nellie,' returns Enright. Then, to the Turner person, 'Roll your game, _amigo_, an' if you needs refreshment, yere it is.'

"'It ain't no mighty reecital,' says the Turner person loogubriously, 'an' yet it ought to go some distance, among fa'r-minded gents, in explainin' them vain elements of the weird an' ranikaboo which more or less enters into my recent conduct. I'm from Missouri; an' for a livelihood, an' to give the wolf a stand-off, I follows the profession of a fooneral director. My one weakness is my love for Peggy Parks, who lives with her folks out in the Sni-a-bar hills.

"'The nuptual day is set, an' I goes hibernatin' off to Kansas City to fetch the license.'

"'How old be you?' breaks in Enright.

"'Me? I'm twenty-six the last Joone rise of the old Missouri. As I was sayin', I hitches my hoss in Market Squar', an' takes to reeconoiterin' along Battle Row, wonderin' wharever them licenses is for sale, anyway. Final, I discovers a se'f satisfied lookin' party, who's pattin' a dog. I goes to talkin' about the dog, an' allowin'

I'm some on dogs myse'f, all by way of commencin' a conversation; an' winds up by askin' whar I go for to get a license. "Over thar,"

says the dog party p'intin' across to a edifice he a.s.sh.o.r.es me is a City Hall. "First floor, first door, an' the damage is a dollar."