Webster—Man's Man

CONTENTS


WHEN John Stuart Webster, mining engineer and kicker-up-of-dust on distant trails, flagged the S. P., L. A. & S. L. Limited at a blistered board station in Death Valley, California, he had definitely resolved to do certain things. To begin, he would invade the dining car at the first call to dinner and order approximately twenty dollars' worth of ham and eggs, which provender is, as all who know will certify, the pinnacle of epicurean delight to an old sour-dough coming out of the wilderness with a healthy bankroll and a healthier appetite; for even as the hydrophobic dog avoids water, so does the adventurer of the Webster type avoid the weird concoctions of high-priced French chefs until he has first satisfied that void which yawns to receive ham and eggs.
Following the ham and eggs, Mr. Webster planned to saturate himself from soul to vermiform appendix with nicotine, which he purposed obtaining from tobacco with nicotine in it. It was a week since he had smoked anything, and months since he had tasted anything with an odour even remotely like tobacco, for the August temperature in Death Valley is no respecter of moisture in any man or his tobacco. By reason of the fact that he had not always dwelt in Death Valley, however, John Stuart Webster knew the dining-car steward would have in the ice chest some wonderful cigars, wonderfully preserved.
Webster realized that, having sampled civilization thus far, his debauch would be at an end until he reached Salt Lake City-unless, indeed, he should find aboard the train something fit to read or somebody worth talking to. Upon arrival in Salt Lake City, however, his spree would really begin. Immediately upon leaving the train he would proceed to a clothing shop and purchase a twenty-five-dollar ready-to-wear suit, together with the appurtenances thereunto pertaining or in any wise belonging. These habiliments he would wear just long enough to shop in respectably and without attracting the attention of the passing throng; and when later his “tailor-mades” and sundry other finery should be delivered, he would send the store clothes to one Ubehebe Henry, a prospector down in the Mojave country, who would appreciate them and wear them when he came to town in the fall to get drunk.