“But say,” he cried, “what is this, anyhow? You don’t mean there is going to be a gunfight?”
“Don’t know whether there’ll be a fight or not,” answered one man, grimly. “But there’ll be some shootin’ — some good shootin’.”
The young man who had warned them waved his hand. “Oh, there’ll be a fight fast enough, if any one wants it. Anybody can get a fight out there in the street. There’s a fight just waiting.”
The drummer seemed to be swayed between the interest of a foreigner and a perception of personal danger.
“What did you say his name was?” he asked.
“Scratchy Wilson,” they answered in chorus.
“And will he kill anybody? What are you going to do? Does this happen often? Does he rampage around like this once a week or so? Can he break in that door?”
“No; he can’t break down that door,” replied the barkeeper. “He’s tried it three times. But when he comes you’d better lay down on the floor, stranger. He’s dead sure to shoot at it, and a bullet may come through.”
Thereafter the drummer kept a strict eye upon the door. The time had not yet been called for him to hug the floor, but, as a minor precaution, he sidled near to the wall. “Will he kill anybody?” he said again.
The men laughed low and scronfully at the question.
“He’s out to shoot, and he’s out for trouble. Don’t see any good in experimentin’ with him.”
“But what do you do in a case like this? What do you do?”
A man responded: “Why, he and Jack Potter—”
“But,” in chorus the other men interrupted, “Jack Potter’s in San Anton’.”
“Well, who is he? What’s he got to do with it?”
“Oh, he’s the town marshal. He goes out and fights Scratchy when he gets on one of these tears.”
“Wow!” said the drummer, mopping his brow. “Nice job he’s got.”
The voices had toned away to mere whisperings. The drummer wished to ask further questions, which were born of an increasing anxiety and bewilderment; but when he attempted them, the men merely looked at him in irritation and motioned him to remain silent. A tense waiting hush was upon them. In the deep shadows of the room their eyes shone as they listened for sounds from the street. One man made three gestures at the barkeeper; and the latter, moving like a ghost, handed him a glass and a bottle. The man poured a full glass of whiskey, and set down the bottle noiselessly. He gulped the whiskey in a swallow, and turned again toward the door in immovable silence. The drummer saw that the barkeeper, without a sound, had taken a Winchester from beneath the bar. Later he saw this individual beckoning to him, so he tiptoed across the room.
“You better come with me back of the bar.”
“No, thanks,” said the drummer, perspiring. “I’d rather be where I can make a break for the back door.”
Whereupon the man of bottles made a kindly but peremptory gesture. The drummer obeyed it, and, finding himself seated on a box with his head below the level of the bar, balm was laid upon his soul at sight of various zinc and copper fittings that bore a resemblance to armor plate. The barkeeper took a seat comfortably upon an adjacent box.
“You see,” he whispered, “this here Scratchy Wilson is a wonder with a gun — a perfect wonder — and when he goes on the war trail, we hunt our holes — naturally. He’s about the last one of the old gang that used to hang out along the river here. He’s a terror when he’s drunk. When he’s sober he’s all right — kind of simple — wouldn’t hurt a fly — nicest fellow in town. But when he’s drunk — whoo!”
There were periods of stillness. “I wish Jack Potter was back from San Anton’,” said the barkeeper. “He shot Wilson up once — in the leg — and he would sail in and pull out the kinks in this thing.”
Presently they heard from a distance the sound of a shot, followed by three wild yowls. It instantly removed a bond from the men in the darkened saloon. There was a shuffling of feet. They looked at each other. “Here he comes,” they said.
III
A man in a maroon-colored flannel shirt, which had been purchased for purposes of decoration, and made principally by some Jewish women on the East Side of New York, rounded a corner and walked into the middle of the main street of Yellow Sky. In either hand the man held a long, heavy, blue-black revolver. Often he yelled, and these cries rang through a semblance of a deserted village, shrilly flying over the roofs in a volume that seemed to have no relation to the ordinary vocal strength of a man. It was as if the surrounding stillness formed the arch of a tomb over him. These cries of ferocious challenge rang against walls of silence. And his boots had red tops with gilded imprints, of the kind beloved in winter by little sledding boys on the hillsides of New England.
The man’s face flamed in a rage begot of whiskey. His eyes, rolling, and yet keen for ambush, hunted the still doorways and windows. He walked with the creeping movement of the midnight cat. As it occurred to him, he roared menacing information. The long revolvers in his hands were as easy as straws; they were moved with an electric swiftness. The little fingers of each hand played sometimes in a musician’s way. Plain from the low collar of the shirt, the cords of his neck straightened and sank, straightened and sank, as passion moved him. The only sounds were his terrible invitations. The calm adobes preserved their demeanor at the passing of this small thing in the middle of the street.
There was no offer of fight — no offer of fight. The man called to the sky. There were no attractions. He bellowed and fumed and swayed his revolvers here and everywhere.
The dog of the barkeeper of the Weary Gentleman saloon had not appreciated the advance of events. He yet lay dozing in front of his master’s door. At sight of the dog, the man paused and raised his revolver humorously. At sight of the man, the dog sprang up and walked diagonally away, with a sullen head, and growling. The man yelled, and the dog broke into a gallop. As it was about to enter an alley, there was a loud noise, a whistling, and something spat the ground directly before it. The dog screamed, and, wheeling in terror, galloped headlong in a new direction. Again there was a noise, a whistling, and sand was kicked viciously before it. Fear-stricken, the dog turned and flurried like an animal in a pen. The man stood laughing, his weapons at his hips.
Ultimately the man was attracted by the closed door of the Weary Gentleman saloon. He went to it and, hammering with a revolver, demanded drink.
The door remaining imperturbable, he picked a bit of paper from the walk, and nailed it to the framework with a knife. He then turned his back contemptuously upon this popular resort and, walking to the opposite side of the street and spinning there on his heel quickly and lithely, fired at the bit of paper. He missed it by a half-inch. He swore at himself, and went away. Later, he comfortably fusilladed the windows of his most intimate friend. The man was playing with this town. It was a toy for him.
But still there was no offer of fight. The name of Jack Potter, his ancient antagonist, entered his mind, and he concluded that it would be a glad thing if he should go to Potter’s house, and by bombardment induce him to come out and fight. He moved in the direction of his desire, chanting Apache scalp-music.
When he arrived at it, Potter’s house presented the same still front as had the other adobes. Taking up a strategic position, the man howled a challenge. But this house regarded him as might a great stone god. It gave no sign. After a decent wait, the man howled further challenges, mingling with them wonderful epithets.
Presently there came the spectacle of a man churning himself into deepest rage over the immobility of a house. He fumed at it as the winter wind attacks a prairie cabin in the North. To the distance there should have gone the sound of a tumult like the fighting of two hundred Mexicans. As necessity bade him, he paused for breath or to reload his revolvers.
IV
Potter and his bride walked sheepishly and with speed. Sometimes they laughed together shamefacedly and low.
“Next corner, dear,
” he said finally.
They put forth the efforts of a pair walking bowed against a strong wind. Potter was about to raise a finger to point the first appearance of the new home when, as they circled the corner, they came face to face with a man in a maroon-colored shirt, who was feverishly pushing cartridges into a large revolver. Upon the instant the man dropped his revolver to the ground, and, like lightning, whipped another from its holster. The second weapon was aimed at the bridegroom’s chest.
There was a silence. Potter’s mouth seemed to be merely a grave for his tongue. He exhibited an instinct to at once loosen his arm from the woman’s grip, and he dropped the bag to the sand. As for the bride, her face had gone as yellow as old cloth. She was a slave to hideous rites, gazing at the apparitional snake.
The two men faced each other at a distance of three paces. He of the revolver smiled with a new and quiet ferocity.
“Tried to sneak up on me,” he said. “Tried to sneak up on me!” His eyes grew more baleful. As Potter made a slight movement, the man thrust his revolver venomously forward. “No; don’t you do it, Jack Potter. Don’t you move a finger toward a gun just yet. Don’t you move an eyelash. The time has come for me to settle with you, and I’m goin’ to do it my own way, and loaf along with no interferin’. So if you don’t want a gun bent on you, just mind what I tell you.”
Potter looked at his enemy. “I ain’t got a gun on me, Scratchy,” he said. “Honest, I ain’t.” He was stiffening and steadying, but yet somewhere at the back of his mind a vision of the Pullman floated: the sea-green figured velvet, the shining brass, silver, and glass, the wood that gleamed as darkly brilliant as the surface of a pool of oil — all the glory of the marriage, the environment of the new estate. “You know I fight when it comes to fighting, Scratchy Wilson; but I ain’t got a gun on me. You’ll have to do all the shootin’ yourself.”
His enemy’s face went livid. He stepped forward, and lashed his weapon to and fro before Potter’s chest. “Don’t you tell me you ain’t got no gun on you, you whelp. Don’t tell me no lie like that. There ain’t a man in Texas ever seen you without no gun. Don’t take me for no kid.” His eyes blazed with light, and his throat worked like a pump.
“I ain’t takin’ you for no kid,” answered Potter. His heels had not moved an inch backward. “I’m takin’ you for a damn fool. I tell you I ain’t got a gun, and I ain’t. If you’re goin’ to shoot me up, you better begin now. You’ll never get a chance like this again.”
So much enforced reasoning had told on Wilson’s rage. He was calmer. “If you ain’t got a gun, why ain’t you got a gun?” he sneered. “Been to Sunday school?”
“I ain’t got a gun because I’ve just come from San Anton’ with my wife. I’m married,” said Potter. “And if I’d thought there was going to be any galoots like you prowling around when I brought my wife home, I’d had a gun, and don’t you forget it.”
“Married!” said Scratchy, not at all comprehending.
“Yes, married. I’m married,” said Potter, distinctly.
“Married?” said Scratchy. Seemingly for the first time, he saw the drooping, drowning woman at the other man’s side. “No!” he said. He was like a creature allowed a glimpse of another world. He moved a pace backward, and his arm, with the revolver, dropped to his side. “Is this the lady?” he asked.
“Yes; this is the lady,” answered Potter.
There was another period of silence.
“Well,” said Wilson at last, slowly, “I s’pose it’s all off now.”
“It’s all off if you say so, Scratchy. You know I didn’t make the trouble.” Potter lifted his valise.
“Well, I ‘low it’s off, Jack,” said Wilson. He was looking at the ground. “Married!” He was not a student of chivalry; it was merely that in the presence of this foreign condition he was a simple child of the earlier plains. He picked up his starboard revolver, and, placing both weapons in their holsters, he went away. His feet made funnel-shaped tracks in the heavy sand.
The Wise Men: A Detail of American Life in Mexico
They were youths of subtle mind. They were very wicked, according to report, and yet they managed to have it reflect credit upon them. They often had the well informed and the great talkers of the American colony engaged in reciting their misdeeds, and facts relating to their sins were usually told with a flourish of awe and fine admiration.
One was from San Francisco, and one was from New York; but they resembled each other in appearance. This is an idiosyncrasy of geography.
They were never apart in the City of Mexico, at any rate, excepting, perhaps, when one had retired to his hotel for a respite; and then the other was usually camped down at the office, sending up servants with clamorous messages: “ Oh, get up, and come on down.”
They were two lads, — they were called the Kids, — and far from their mothers. Occasionally some wise man pitied them, but he usually was alone in his wisdom; the other folk frankly were transfixed at the splendor of the audacity and endurance of these Kids.
“When do those two boys ever sleep?” murmured a man, as he viewed them entering a café about eight o’clock one morning. Their smooth, infantile faces looked bright and fresh enough, at any rate. “Jim told me he saw them still at it about four-thirty this morning.”
“Sleep?” ejaculated a companion, in a glowing voice. “They never sleep! They go to bed once in every two weeks.” His boast of it seemed almost a personal pride.
“They’ll end with a crash, though, if they keep it up at this pace,” said a gloomy voice from behind a newspaper.
The “Café Colorado” has a front of white and gold, in which are set larger plate-glass windows than are commonly to be found in Mexico. Two little wings of willow, flip-flapping incessantly, serve as doors. Under them small stray dogs go furtively into the café, and are shied into the street again by the waiters. On the sidewalk there is always a decorative effect in loungers, ranging from the newly arrived and superior tourist to the old veteran of the silver-mines, bronzed by violent suns. They contemplate, with various shades of interest, the show of the street — the red, purple, dusty white, glaring forth against the walls in the furious sunshine.
One afternoon the Kids strolled into the Café Colorado. A half-dozen of the men, who sat smoking and reading with a sort of Parisian effect at the little tables which lined two sides of the room, looked up, and bowed, smiling; and although this coming of the Kids was anything but an unusual event, at least a dozen men wheeled in their seats to stare after them. Three waiters polished tables, and moved chairs noisily, and appeared to be eager. Distinctly these Kids were of importance.
Behind the distant bar the tall form of the old “Pop” himself awaited them, smiling with broad geniality. “Well, my boys, how are you?” he cried in a voice of profound solicitude. He allowed five or six of his customers to languish in the care of Mexican bartenders, while he himself gave his eloquent attention to the Kids, lending all the dignity of a great event to their arrival. “How are the boys to-day, eh?”
“You’re a smooth old guy,” said one, eying him. “Are you giving us this welcome so we won’t notice it when you push your worst whisky at us?”
Pop turned in appeal from one Kid to the other Kid. “There, now! Hear that, will you?” He assumed an oratorical pose. “Why, my boys, you always get the best — the very best — that this house has got.”
“Yes; we do!” The Kids laughed. “Well, bring it out, anyhow; and if it’s the same you sold us last night, we’ll grab your cash-register and run.”
Pop whirled a bottle along the bar, and then gazed at it with a rapt expression. “Fine as silk,” he murmured. “Now just taste that, and if it is n’t the finest whisky you ever put in your face, why, I’m a liar, that’s all.”
The Kids surveyed him with scorn, and poured out their allowances. Then they stood for a time, insulting Pop about his whisky. “Usually it tastes exactly like new parlor furniture,” said the San Francisco
Kid. “Well, here goes; and you want to look out for your cash-register.”
“Your healthy, gentlemen,” said Pop, with a grand air; and as he wiped his bristling gray mustache he wagged his head with reference to the cash-register question. “I could catch you before you got very far.”
“Why, are you a runner?” said one, derisively.
“You just bank on me, my boy,” said Pop, with deep emphasis. “I’m a flier.”
The Kids set down their glasses suddenly, and looked at him. “You must be,” they said. Pop was tall and graceful, and magnificent in manner, but he did not display those qualities of form which mean speed in the animal. His hair was gray his face was round and fat from much living. The buttons of his glittering white vest formed a fine curve, so that if the concave surface of a piece of barrel-hoop had been laid against Pop, it would have touched each button. “You must be,” observed the Kids again.
“Well, you can laugh all you like, but — no jolly, now, boys — I tell you I’m a winner. Why, I bet you I can skin anything in this town on a square go. When I kept my place in Eagle Pass, there was n’t anybody who could touch me. One of these sure things came down from San Anton’. Oh, he was a runner, he was — one of these people with wings. Well, I skinned ‘im. What? Certainly I did. Never touched me.”
The Kids had been regarding him in grave silence; but at this moment they grinned, and said, quite in chorus: “Oh, you old liar!”
Pop’s voice took on a whining tone of earnestness: “Boys, I’m telling it to you straight. I’m a flier.”
One of the Kids had had a dreamy cloud in his eye, and he cried out suddenly: “Say, what a joke to play this on Freddie!”
The other jumped ecstatically. “Oh, wouldn’t it be, though? Say, he wouldn’t do a thing but howl! He’d go crazy!”
They looked at Pop as if they longed to be certain that he was, after all, a runner. “Say, now, Pop, — on the level,” said one of them, wistfully,—”can you run?”
Complete Works of Stephen Crane Page 109
