Curly Part 35

"I've got a roan hawss here who's run a hundred miles since daybreak."

"Bring him in, then."

"He says he's a vegetarian, and cayn't eat ham and eggs."

"I don't care," says Miss Blossom; "we killed our pig to-day, and the slops has just got to be eaten. Waste is ruin."

"My hawss says he'll eat the slops, ma'am, if he can have a drink of whisky along with supper."

"Huh! so you want your vile debaucheries in spite of all I've told you against drink. Well, I 'spose you'll have it."

She ran off to fetch the liquor, which gave me time to bury her salad in the manure heap, and get a decent feed of cornstalks down from the loft.

Then I used the whisky to rub down my weary horse, the same being medicine both for man and beast. I had some myself, while Miss Blossom stood by, talking of wicked waste, and how Curly had been neglected.

"Why, she's mo' like a man than a girl!"

"'Spose, ma'am," says I, "that you'd been working in a stable and got shot, then run into gaol, and pulled out through a hole in the wall, and doctored by a robber, and chased around the hills----"

"My habits are set," says Miss Blossom, "so I cayn't suppose any such thing. But that wig of Curly's, that skirt, those--now did yo' robber baron steal those things off a scarecrow, or did they grow by themselves?"

Then she grabbed my hands. "Thar," says she, "that's off my mind, so don't look worried. The dear little soul, she's the bravest, sweetest thing--and the way she bore all that pain! Why, you or any other man would have set around cursing all day and groaning all night, but Curly--why, she never even whimpered. Now I ask you, is it possible she shot those two men? I cayn't believe a word, so it's no use your talking."

"Was Miss Pansy very much scart with Curly's talk?"

"Miss Pansy, my good man, is a fool, although I say it. Of all the romantic nonsense and sentimental--but thar, she writes poetry, my dear, and that accounts for her. Why, if I hadn't locked her up in her room, that woman would have sent off a poem, all about lady outlaws, to the New York _Sunday Companion_. I burned the stuff, and she had to go off in hysterics. Shucks! She puts Curly off to sleep every night with her fool poems--and such tras.h.!.+ Now there she is, with her glue-glue harp singing to Curly. If she don't beat cats! You listen."

Away off in the house I could hear Miss Pansy's thin little voice and glue-glue harp; I thought it sounded fine.

"Lost, stole, or strayed on Tuesday night, The finder tries to hide it-- A woman's heart--he has no right, For there's a Love inside it.

"The owner fears 'twas s.n.a.t.c.hed away, But this is a reminder, That she is quite prepared to pay One half, with thanks, to finder."

Miss Blossom led me to the house. "You come right into the settin'-room," says she, "and keep yo' tearing spurs off my new carpet."

I did my best about the spurs, but it would take an Indian scout to find a safe trail across that parlour floor, the same being cluttered up with little fool tables. These same tables were of different breeds, three-legged, two-legged, one-legged, tumble-over, all-to-pieces, trip-you-up, and smash-the-crockery, so it was a sure treat to watch Miss Pansy curving around without the slightest accident. Her paws were folded in front, her tail came swis.h.i.+ng behind, her head came pecking along hen-fas.h.i.+on, and her smile was sweet enough to give me toothache.

"Oh," she bubbled, "I'm so glad you didn't get lynched by those horrid men who never wash themselves, or think of serious things; and it's so nice to see you looking so brown with that beautiful cherry silk kerchief round yo' neck, and the wonderful leather leggings, and that dreadful revolver, so picturesque, so----"

"You're making a fool of yo'self," says Miss Blossom, "and the man wants feeding. Picturesque! Bos.h.!.+ Shoo!" She chased Miss Pansy out of the room.

As to Curly, she lay on the sofa kicking high with joy. "Chalkeye," she howled, "you ole hoss-thief, keep yo' tearin' spurs off my new cyarpet.

You picturesque, beautiful, leather-faced, c.o.c.k-eyed robber! 'Ware tables, or they'll bite yo' laigs! Oh, gimme yo' paw to shake, and throw me a cigarette. Look out--that chair's goin' to buck!"

I sat on the edge of the chair, and grabbed her hand while she called me all sorts of pet names. Then it seems that Miss Pansy broke loose from Miss Blossom, and came surging back, for she heard the pet names, and shrieked--

"Oh! oh! Stop! What frightful language! Oh, please, if you're a lady--remember! Oh, Misteh Davies, you mustn't let her smoke!"

"Curly," says I, "you're shot, and you got to be good in a small voice, or----"

"Good," says Curly; "I'm a wolf. I come from Bitter Creek. The higher up, the worse the waters, and I'm from the source, and it's my night to how-w-l. Yow-ow-ow!"

"Well," Miss Pansy shrieked, "I call it disgraceful, so there!"

"I don't care," says Curly. "I won't be good in a small voice, and I'll call this dear ole hoss-thief all the names I please. Why, Chalkeye and me punched cows at Holy Cross! Say, Chalkeye, d'you remember when I stuck burrs in under yo' saddle, and you got pitched to glory? Why, that's the very old hat I shot full of holes, and oh, I do enjoy to see you so much, you dear ole villain!"

Then Miss Blossom dragged Miss Pansy away to cook supper, and Curly settled down with her little paw in my fist.

"My habits," says she, "is a sure scandal, and I ain't got no more manners nor a bear. My language ain't becoming to a young gentlewoman, and my eating would disgrace a pinto hawss. They cayn't refawm me a lil'

bit, and when I tries to set up on my tail, and look pretty, they tell me rebukes for crossin' my laigs like a cowboy. Oh, take me away, ole Chalkeye, take me away to the range and the camps, to feel the night-frosts agin, to sleep with the stars, to see the sun come up, to ride in the heat. This roof sets down on me at night. I cayn't see for walls; I cayn't get air to breathe. These ladies has roped me, and thrown me, tied down for branding, ears in the dust. Oh, take me away from this!"

"When that bandage is off yo' arm I'll take you, Curly."

"Not till then?"

She had scarcely strength yet to travel, and yet if she fretted like this at being shut up in a house, would she ever get well at all?

When I reflect what Curly looked like then it makes me wonder what sort of raging lunatic I had been to leave her in that house. By way of disguise she had a wig all sideways, and female clothes which she'd never learned to wear. They made her look like a man. Her skin had the desert tan; she moved and talked like a cowboy. But most of all, her eyes gave her dead away--the steel-blue eyes of a scout, more used to gun-fights than to needlework, which bored right through me. Only a frontiersman has eyes like that; only the outlaw has the haunted look which comes with slaying of men, and Curly was branded that way beyond mistake.

This poor child was wanted as McCalmont's son, hunted like a wild beast, with a price on her head for murder and for robbery under arms. And yet she was a woman!

"Say, Curly," I asked, "what has these ladies done to account for yo'

being here in theyr home?"

She reached to a table, and gave me cuttings from the _Weekly Obituary_.

I fell to reading these:--

The burial of Buck Hennesy at La Soledad.

Dog-gone Hawkins' report of not finding robbers.

The rescue of McCalmont's prisoners out of the Jim Crow shaft, and the story of the posse which tracked the robbers north until the signs scattered out all over the country and every trace was lost.

The attempt of the Stranglers to lynch a horse-thief at Las Salinas, the same being me.

Then came a paragraph about a young lady staying at the home of the Misses Jameson.

"We are informed that Miss Hilda Jameson, of Norfolk, Va., arrived last week on a visit to her aunts, the Misses Jameson. We regret to hear that on her journey westward this young lady met with an unfortunate accident, being severely bruised on the arm by the fall of a valise out of an upper bunk in the sleeping-car. This bruise has developed a formidable abscess, which the Misses Jameson are treating by the peculiar methods of Christian Science, of which craze they are well-known exponents. For our part we would suggest the calling in of a doctor; but as these ladies are way-up experts at nursing, we trust that their efforts will be successful, and that in a few days more we shall see the young lady around, enjoying all the pleasures of Grave City society. In the meantime Miss Blossom Jameson wishes us to say that the patient needs absolute quiet, and friends are requested not to call at the house until further notice."

"As to the pleasures of Grave City sa.s.siety," says Curly, "I'm plumb fed up already. 'Spose they dream that I'll go back to shoveling manure in that stable?"

I asked her if there had been any visitors at the house.

"They came every day to inquire, and Miss Blossom insulted them regular in the front yard. Now they've quit."

"But n.o.body saw these ladies meeting a guest at the train."

"No, but you should hear Miss Blossom telling lies out thar in the yard!

She's surely an artist."