Claim Number One

by Ogden, George W

  “Do I see any more of your money, gents? Do I git sight of any more? Lowest bet’s one dollar, gents, and you might as well git in on the finish and let the old man go up with a whoop. I’m game, gents; I go the limit. Do I see any more of your money? Do I see any more?”

  He did. He saw considerably more than he had seen at one time since he opened the game in Comanche. He seemed greatly affected by the sight, shaking his head with solemnity and casting his eye around with reproach.

  “That’s right! That’s right!” said he. “Sock it to a old feller when you’ve got him down! That’s the way of this cold world. Well, all I ask of you, gents”–he paused in his request to shake the box again, holding it poised for the throw–“is this: When you clean me I ask you to stake me, between you, to twenty-seven dollars. Twenty-seven’s my lucky number; I was borned on the 27th day of Jannewarry, and I always bet on twenty-seven.”

  He poured the dice upon the table, reaching for his pile of bills and gold as if to cash in on the winnings as he set the box down, even while the dice were rolling and settling. But at that point the one-eyed man stayed his hand, bending over the dice as if he could not believe his eye.

  “Well, bust me!” said he, sighing as if honestly disappointed in the throw. “M’ luck’s turned! Dang me, fellers, if I didn’t win!”

  Without enthusiasm, still shaking his head sadly, he drew the winnings over the table, sorting the bills, shuffling them into neat heaps, adding them to his enticing pile, which lay heaped upon a green cloth at his hand.

  “I don’t know why I stick to this game, gents,” said he, “for it’s all ag’in’ me. I don’t win once in nine hundred times. This here’s more money than I’ve took in at any one time since I come to Comanche, and it’s more’n I ever expect to take in ag’in if I stay here forty-nine years.

  “But it’s in m’ blood to bet on twenty-seven. I can’t help it, boys. It’ll be the ruination of me ag’in, like it’s ruined me many a time before; but I got to roll ’em! I got to roll ’em! And if anybody wants to git in, let him put his money down!”

  The young man seemed a little dazed by the quick change of the gambler’s luck, but his reason had no voice to speak against the clamor of his desires. He produced more money, bills of large denomination, and counted out a thousand dollars, defiantly flourishing every bill. He whacked the pile down on the table with a foolishly arrogant thump of his fist.

  “I’m with you to the finish,” he said, his boyish face bright with the destructive fire of chance. “Roll ’em out!”

  Other players crowded forward, believing perhaps that the queer freak of fortune which had turned the gambler’s luck would not hold. In a few minutes there was more money on the table than the one-eyed man had stood before in many a day.

  Sorry for the foolish young man, and moved by the sacrifice which he saw in preparation, Dr. Slavens pressed against the table, trying to flash the youth a warning with his eyes. But the physician could not get a look into the young man’s flushed face; his eyes were on the stake.

  The one-eyed man was gabbing again, running out a continual stream of cheap and pointless talk, and offering the dice as usual for inspection. Some looked at the cubes, among the number the young man, who weighed them in his palm and rolled them on the table several times. Doubtless they were as straight as dice ever were made. This test satisfied the rest. The one-eyed man swept the cubes into his hand and, still talking, held that long, bony member hovering over the mouth of the box.

  At that moment Dr. Slavens, lurching as if shoved violently from behind, set his shoulder against the table and pushed it, hard and suddenly, against the one-eyed man’s chest, all but throwing him backward against the wall of the tent. The gambler’s elbows flew up in his struggle to keep to his feet, and the hand that hovered over the dicebox dropped the dice upon the board.

  Instantly a shout went up; instantly half a hundred hands clawed at the table to retrieve their stakes. For the one-eyed man had dropped not five dice, but ten.

  He waited for no further developments. The tent-wall parted behind him as he dived through into the outer darkness, taking with him his former winnings and his “bank,” which had been cunningly arranged on the green cloth for no other purpose; his revolver and his dice, leaving nothing but the box behind.

  The young man gathered up his stake with nervous hands and turned his flushed face to the doctor, smiling foolishly.

  “Thank you, old man,” he said. “Oh, yes! I know you now,” he added, offering his hand with great warmth. “You were with her people at the dance.”

  “Of course,” smiled the doctor. “How much did you lose?”

  “Say, I ought to have a nurse!” said the young man abjectly. “If you hadn’t heaved that table into the old devil’s ribs just then he’d ’a’ skinned me right! Oh, about six hundred, I guess; but in ten minutes more he’d ’a’ cleaned me out. Walker’s my name,” he confided; “Joe Walker. I’m from Cheyenne.”

  Dr. Slavens introduced himself.

  “And I’m from Missouri,” said he.

  Joe Walker chuckled a little.

  “Yes; the old man’s from there, too,” said he, with the warmth of one relative claiming kinship with another from far-away parts; “from a place called Saint Joe. Did you ever hear of it?”

  “I’ve heard of it,” the doctor admitted, smiling to himself over the ingenuous unfolding of the victim whom he had snatched from the sacrifice.

  “They don’t only have to show you fellers from Missouri,” pursued Walker; “but you show them! That’s the old man’s way, from the boot-heels up.”

  They were walking away from the gambling-tent, taking the middle of the road, as was the custom in Comanche after dark, sinking instep deep in dust at every step.

  “What are you doing with all that money in a place like this?” the doctor questioned.

  “Well, it’s this way,” explained Walker with boyish confidence. “The old man’s going to set me up in a sheep-ranch between here and Casper. We’ve got a ranch bargained for with six miles of river-front, he sent me over here with five thousand dollars to cinch the business before the feller changed his mind.”

  “Why didn’t you bring a draft?” the doctor wondered.

  “Some of these sheepmen wouldn’t take government bonds. Nothing but plain cash goes with them.”

  “Oh, I didn’t think you had any particular use for even that, the way you’re slinging it around!” said the doctor, with no attempt to hide the feeling he held for any such recklessness.

  “Looked that way,” admitted Walker thoughtfully. “But I’ve got to meet that sheepman here at the bank in the morning, where he can have somebody that he’s got confidence in feel of the money and tell him it’s genuine, and I’ll have to put up some kind of a stall to cover the money I lost. Guess I can get away with it, somehow. Cripes! I sweat needles every time I think of what’d ’a’ happened to me if you hadn’t showed us suckers that one-eyed feller’s hand!”

  “Well, the important thing now, it seems to me, is to hang on to what’s left till you meet that rancher.”

  “Don’t you worry!” rejoined Walker warmly. “I’m going to sit on the edge of that little old bunk all night with my six-shooter in one hand and that money in the other! And any time in future that you see me bettin’ on any man’s game, you send for the fool-killer, will you?”

  “Yes, if I happen to be around,” promised the doctor.

  “I ought to know ’em; I was raised right here in Wyoming among ’em;” said Walker. “I thought that feller was square, or maybe off a little, because he talked so much. He was the first talkin’ gambler I ever met.”

  “Talk is his trick,” Slavens enlightened him. “That was old Hun Shanklin, the flat-game man. I’ve looked him up since I got here. He plays suckers, and nothing but suckers. No gambler ever bets on Hun Shanklin’s game. He talks to keep their eyes on his face while he switches the dice.”

  Walker was gravely sile
nt a little while, like a man who has just arrived at the proper appreciation of some grave danger which he has escaped.

  “I’ve heard of Hun Shanklin a long time, but I never saw him before,” he said. “He’s killed several men in his time. Do you suppose he knows you shoved his table, or does he think somebody back of you pushed you against it?”

  “I don’t suppose he needs anybody to tell him how it happened,” replied the doctor a little crabbedly.

  “Of course I’ve got my own notion of it, old feller,” prattled Walker; “but they were purty thick around there just then, and shovin’ a good deal. I hope he thinks it happened that way. But I know nobody shoved you, and I’m much obliged.”

  “Oh, forget it!” snapped Slavens, thinking of the six hundred dollars which had flown out of the young fellow’s hand so lightly. Once he could have bought a very good used automobile for four hundred.

  “But don’t you suppose–” Walker lowered his voice to a whisper, looking cautiously around in the dark as he spoke–“that you stand a chance to hear from Hun Shanklin again?”

  “Maybe,” answered Slavens shortly. “Well, here’s where I turn off. I’m stopping at the Metropole down here.”

  “Say!”

  Walker caught his arm appealingly.

  “Between you and me I don’t like the looks of that dump where I’ve got a bed. You’ve been here longer than I have; do you know of any place where a man with all this blamed money burnin’ his hide might pull through till morning with it if he happened to slip a cog and go to sleep?”

  “There’s a spare cot in our tent,” said the doctor, “and you’re welcome to it if you feel that you can trust yourself in our company. We mess together in a sort of communistic fashion.”

  Walker was profuse in his gratitude.

  “I’ll feel easy among decent people!” he declared. “I’m mostly decent myself, and my family’s one of the best in this state. Don’t you size me up by what you saw me do tonight, will you?”

  “The best of us slip up once in a while,” Slavens said.

  Walker had some business of clearing his throat. And then:

  “Are you–that is–is she, related to you?”

  “Oh, no,” laughed the doctor. “I’m sorry she isn’t.”

  “She’s a peach; don’t you think so?”

  “Undoubtedly,” admitted the doctor. “Well, here we are–at home.”

  They stood outside a little while, their faces turned toward the town. It was quieting down now. Here and there a voice was raised in drunken song or drunken yelp; here and there a pistol-shot marked the location of some silly fellow who believed that he was living and experiencing all the recklessness of the untamed West. Now and then the dry, shrill laughter of a woman sounded, without lightness, without mirth, as if it came from the lips of one who long, long ago, in the fever of pain and despair, had wept her heart empty of its tears. Now and again, also, a wailing cornet lifted its lone voice, dying away dimly like a disappearing light.

  “The wolves are satisfied for one night; they’ve stopped howling,” the doctor said.

  * * *

  CHAPTER V

  SKULKERS

  There remained but one day until chance should settle the aspirations of the dusty thousands who waited in Comanche; one day more would see Claim Number One allotted for selection to some more or less worthy American citizen.

  The young man, Walker, had been received on a footing of fellowship into the commune of the circus-tent. He said that he had concluded happily the arrangements for the purchase of the sheep-ranch, and that he intended to go and take possession of it in a few days. Meantime, he appeared to be considerably shot up over June. In spite of Mrs. Reed’s frowns, he hung around her like a hornet after a soft pear.

  There was considerable excitement in the camp of the communists that morning, owing to preparations which were going forward for an excursion over the land where somebody’s Number One lay shrouded in green greasewood and gray sage. For this important occasion Walker had engaged the most notable stage-driver in that part of the country, whose turn it was that day to lie over from the run between Comanche and Meander.

  The party was to use his stage also, and carry lunch along, and make a grand day of it along the river, trying for trout if conditions held favorable. Smith was the name of the driver.

  Smith was smiling like a baker as he drove up, for Smith could not behold ladies without blushing and smiling. Smith had the reputation of being a terror to holdup men. Also, the story was current in Comanche that he had, in a bare-handed, single encounter with a bear, choked the animal to death. There was some variance over the particulars as to the breed of bear, its color, age, size, and weight. Some–and they were the unromantic, such as habitually lived in Wyoming and kept saloons–held that it was a black cub with a broken back; others that it was a cinnamon bear with claws seven inches long; while the extremists would be satisfied with nothing short of a grizzly which stood five feet four at the shoulders and weighed eighteen hundred pounds!

  But, no matter what romance had done for Smith, it could not overdo his ancient, green vehicle, with the lettering,

  BIG HORN VALLEY

  along its side near the roof. It was a Concord stage, its body swinging on creaking straps. It had many a wound of arrowhead in its tough oak, and many a bullet-hole, all of which had been plugged with putty and painted over long years ago for the assurance and comfort of nervous passengers, to whom the evidence of conflict might have been disturbing.

  Now that there was no longer any reason for concealment, the owners had allowed the paint to crumble and the putty to fall away, baring the veteran’s scars. These were so thick that it seemed a marvel that anybody who took passage in it in those perilous days escaped. In a sun-cracked and time-curled leather holster tacked to the seat at Smith’s right hand, a large revolver with a prodigious black handle hung ready for the disciplining of bandits or bears, as they might come across Smith’s way.

  Smith rounded up before the tent with a curve like a skater, bringing his four horses to a stop in fine style. No matter how Smith’s parts might be exaggerated by rumor or humor in other ways, as a teamster he stood without a peer between Cody and Green River. He leaped to the ground with surprising agility and set himself about arranging the interior of the coach for the accommodation of his passengers. He was chewing on something which might have been bear-meat or buckskin, from its apparent tenacious and unyielding nature.

  Agnes Horton was to ride on the box with Smith, for she had a camera and wanted to catch some views. Smith grew so red over handing her up that Dr. Slavens began to fear lest he might take fire from internal heat and leave them with only the ashes of a driver on their hands. But they all got placed without any such melancholy tragedy, with a great many cries of “Oh, Mr. Smith!” here, and “Oh, Mr. Smith!” there, and many head-puttings-out on the part of the ladies inside, and gallantries from Mr. Walker and Mr. Horace Bentley, the lawyer.

  William Bentley, the toolmaker, with the basket of lunch upon his knees, showered the blessing of his kindly smile upon them all, as if he held them to be only children. Mrs. Mann, her black bag on her arm, squeaked a little when the coach lurched on the start, knocking her head and throwing her hat awry.

  Smith, proud of his load, and perhaps a little vain on account of so much unusual loveliness at his side, swung down the main street with its early morning crowds. People waved at them the friendly signals of the highroad of adventure, and June, in defiance of terrible eyebrows and admonishing pokes, waved back at them, her wild hair running over her cheeks. So they set out in the bright morning to view the promised land.

  They struck off down the Meander stage-road, which ran for the greater part of its way through the lands awaiting the disposition of chance. Mainly it followed the survey of the railroad, which was to be extended to Meander, and along which men and teams were busy even then, throwing up the roadbed.

  To the north there was a ri
se of land, running up in benched gradations to white and barren distant heights; behind them were brown hills. Far away in the blue southwest–Smith said it was more than eighty miles–there stood the mountains with their clean robes of snow, while scattered here and there about the vast plain through which they drove, were buttes of blue shale and red ledges, as symmetrical of side and smooth of top as if they had been raised by the architects of Tenochtitlán for sacrifice to their ugly gods.

  “Old as Adam,” said Smith, pointing to one gray monument whose summit had been pared smooth by the slow knife of some old glacier. The sides of the butte looked almost gay in the morning light in their soft tones of blue and red.

  “From appearances it might very well be,” agreed Agnes.

  She looked at Smith and smiled. There was the glory of untrammeled space in her clear eyes, a yearning as of the desert-born on the far bounds of home. Smith drove on, his back very straight.

  “Older,” said he with laconic finality after holding his peace for a quarter of a mile.

  Smith spoke as if he had known both Adam and the butte for a long time, and so was an unquestionable authority. Agnes was not disposed to dispute him, so they lurched on in silence along the dust-cushioned road.

  “That ain’t the one the Indian girl jumped off of, though,” said Smith, meditatively.

  “Isn’t it?”

  She turned to him quickly, ready for a story from the picturesque strangler of bears. Smith was looking between the ears of the off-leader. He volunteered no more.

  “Well, where is the one she jumped from?” she pressed.

  “Nowhere,” said Smith.

  “Oh!” she said, a bit disappointed.

  “Everywhere I’ve went,” said he, “they’ve got some high place where the Indian girl jumped off of. In Mezoury they’ve got one, and even in Kansas. They’ve got one in Minnesota and Illinoy and Idaho, and bend my eyebrows if I know all the places they ain’t got ’em! But don’t you never let ’em!take you in on no such yarns. Them yarns is for suckers.”