"THE PRIDE OF THE WEST"
Whitey wandered over to the Star Circle Ranch house. He wanted to see Walt Lampson, who had paid little attention to him since the night of the fight. Whitey was getting tired of staying at the Star Circle, and thought Walt might be ready now to ship the cattle to the Bar O, and thus give Whitey something to do.
Walt was not in the living-room, which was a large, untidy place that also served as an office. There was a great, flat desk in one corner, and lying on it—among some dusty papers, reports and stock books—was a six-gun, with its belt and holster, a silver watch, a knife, and other odds and ends. These were the property of poor Buck Milton, waiting till they were claimed, or would be disposed of.
Whitey looked at them sadly. Near the watch lay a crumpled and soiled piece of paper, and as Whitey glanced at it his own name caught his eye. Surprised, he picked the paper up and read it through before he realized what it was—Bill Jordan's letter to Dan Brayton, of the T Up and Down, the letter Whitey had delivered. It ran:
Friend Dan—
Whitey Sherwood, the kid what fetches this here letter, is tired uv school. He had ruther fish. This here letter is sposed to be on importunt business uv his dads, the owner uv this here ranch. The business is to make Whitey tireder out uv school than what he was in it. I started the ball rollin. Kin you keep it goin?
Hopin this will find you the same
Yours truly
Wm Jordan
There were two notations in pencil at the bottom of the letter. One read:
Walt—Im passin the kid along to you. Get busy.
Dan
And the other, Buck's:
Dont kill this kid but come as near to it as you kin.
Walt
A great light broke in on Whitey. So this was the meaning of it all? the twenty-five mile walk to Cal Smith's house; the singular conduct of the men at the T Up and Down; the nester's lending him that jack Felix, that he knew would run home and leave Whitey alone on the plains; and Walt Lampson's sending him out on the range, in the face of a storm. And as a sort of high peak in his mountain range of troubles Whitey remembered Little Thompson's talk about funerals. Whitey buried his head in his hands and groaned at the thought. He had dreamed of funerals ever since. He determined to make a will and put in it that Little Thompson should not be allowed to come to his (Whitey's) funeral.
They had passed him along from one to another, making a fool of him, and laughing behind his back all the time. He knew how rough cowmen often were in their fun, and the only wonder was that they hadn't treated him worse. He supposed that they would have done so had his father not been a ranch-owner. So! they probably thought he was something of a molly-coddle. He was angry enough, but this thought made him angrier—that he hadn't been treated worse. Which goes to show what a reasonable thing anger is!
Whitey went out, sat down behind the cook's shack, and gave way to gloomy reflections. He reviewed his past life for quite a way back, and everything in it seemed to be wrong. He wanted to do big things, and he always was just missing them. If he had been earlier when he followed those train robbers, he might have warned the people on the train, and been a sort of hero. If, if, if—oh, what was the use?
But it certainly is bitter to think you might make yourself a hero, and find that some one else has made a fool of you. Whitey remembered a saying that the first time a fellow is fooled it is the other fellow's fault—and the next time it is his own. They wouldn't fool him again. He'd do something big yet. He'd show them!
The first thing to do was to find Injun. The next thing to do was to leave that Star Circle Ranch. Whitey hated it there, anyway. And the next was a thing not to do—not to go back to the Bar O, and have Bill Jordan and the others laugh at him. The first thing proved easy, and Whitey proceeded to tell Injun his troubles.
"Huh," said Injun. "Better'n him school."
"I know it's better than school," said Whitey, annoyed, as we always are when we seek sympathy and get facts. "I'd rather do 'most anything than go to that awful school. But what I object to is being made a fool of." He was suffering from mortification, which is a sort of ingrowing anger, and the more it sunk in, the angrier he got.
And here was the plan he unfolded to Injun; the plan to get even with Bill Jordan. They would go to Moose Lake, in the foothills of the mountains. You may remember that on the southwestern shore of this lake was a cabin, which had been the scene of some of the boys' former adventures. They would make this cabin their headquarters. Bill Jordan never would suspect that they were there. They would live by fishing and hunting, which were good at that time of year. As for other provisions, Whitey had some money, and they could buy them at Jimtown, on the way. No one knew them there. Whitey even planned getting a message to Bill Jordan that he, Whitey, was dead. Bill would feel pretty sorry then, at the result of his silly trick. And when Whitey thought Bill was sorry enough, he would return, and advise Bill never to be so silly again. You see, he was in a very savage mood. He would get over that, but he didn't realize it then.
As Injun heard these plans, he considered them. He was very well satisfied where he was. There had been fighting there, there might be more, and he liked fighting. Fishing and hunting were all very well, but he'd had a lot of them in his young life, and they were no novelty. It was like asking a sailor to go for a sail, on his day off. And Injun couldn't fully understand Whitey's wanting to do all these things. But do you think he voiced his objections to them? He did not. For in one way Injun was like a faithful dog he accepted things he didn't understand. So one liked his loyalty more than one pitied his ignorance.
No one paid any attention to the boys when they rode away from the Star Circle Ranch. They might be going hunting, or just for a ride, for all the ranchmen knew or cared. They struck off toward the northwest, in which direction lay Jimtown, with Moose Lake far beyond, nestling in the foothills of the Rockies.
It was a beautiful day, with the haze of fall shrouding the distance, a hint of brown tingeing the prairie grass, the sun a bit milder with its rays and paler in its face than in midsummer. And the old sun seemed a trifle lazy, as if lying back awaiting the frost that would nip the rolling mesa, to be followed by the gales that would sweep across it, then by the whirling blizzards that would hold the plains in their frigid grasp. Yes, it was a beautiful day—a day on which it was very hard to stay mad.
Creeping across the northern distance the boys saw two wagons. Evidently they had come from Jimtown. Wagons are as interesting sights on a prairie as they are uninteresting in a city, so the boys shifted their course slightly that they might investigate. And these were the rarest wagons that crawled across the plains, for they carried a show!
During the many months that Whitey had been in the West only one show had come to the Junction, and that at a time when Injun and Whitey had been hunting in the mountains. Lives there a boy with soul so dead that he does not hunger for a show? I leave you to answer that, and to guess how hungry Whitey was for one.
But if you have in your mind any big, gilded wagons, with pictures of beautiful women on their sides, and drawn by many prancing white horses with red plumes on their heads, get that vision right out of your mind. These were "prairie schooners," covered with old, weather-beaten canvas, creaking along on wheels on which mud had long taken the place of paint, and drawn by mules!
And the only things to indicate their character were letters painted on the old canvas sides, where they drooped between the wooden arches that supported them; letters which read: "The Mildini Troupe. Pride of the West." And that was enough. For everybody in that part of Montana knew the Mildinis. They came once a year—if nothing happened to prevent.
There were three in the company—Mr. Mildini, who was short and fat, and had a twinkle in his eye, and had been born Murphy; Mrs. Mildini, who was slim and sharp-featured, and whose eyes were bright, without any twinkle in them; and Signor Antolini, who was of medium height and rather thin, and had a nose like a hawk, and had been born on Mulberry Street, in New York City. Two thirds of this troupe remained the same, year after year, but sometimes Signor Antolini was Signor Somebody Else.
This doesn't seem to offer much chance for entertainment, does it? To Injun it was a wonderful troupe. To Whitey, who had been to all sorts of entertainments in the East, it was a novelty. Perhaps it would be bad enough to be good. Anyway, it was a show. Thoughts of revenge against Bill Jordan could be abandoned for the time being. They would have to wait. Meanwhile, Injun and Whitey would follow the show.
Mr. Mildini, who drove the first wagon, was very friendly, and smoked a pipe. Signor Antolini, who drove the second wagon, was also friendly, and smoked cigarettes. Mrs. Mildini, who slept in the first wagon, expressed no feelings at all. That wagon contained the trunks and chattels of Mildini and wife, and in it they made their home. The other wagon held the instruments and properties of the show, the cooking utensils, and the bed of Signor Antolini. It was all very simple, and very fascinating, when you thought of it, to be traveling around the country in the sunshine, pausing at different places to entertain admiring audiences.
Where were they from? From Jimtown, where they had showed the night before. And where bound? To the Hanley Ranch, a big wheat ranch, about twenty miles east. It was threshing-time there, and there would be plenty of men to make an audience. Mr. Mildini meant plenty from his point of view. A settlement of five houses looked good to him.
Oh, yes, Whitey knew the Hanley Ranch. It was fourteen miles west of the Bar O. Oh, no, Mr. Mildini didn't mind their riding along with the troupe. He was glad of the company. They could have dinner with them, too, if they liked. And perhaps they wouldn't mind helping with the stock, if they didn't make the ranch that day, and had to camp.
Sometimes they had trouble with the wagons; they were old. Sometimes they got stuck in the mud. You never could tell. Yes, the show business was fascinating, but very uncertain. Mr. Mildini was chatty and not a bit stand-offish, as one might think a talented person would be.
So, when that old fall sun sank down toward the west, it outlined two shabby wagons, crawling along the lonely prairie. Near one rode an eager white boy, occasionally leaning over and drinking in the wisdom that fell from the lips of a little Irishman; near the other, a pink-shirted Indian lad, stolid and silent, but in his breast burning the fever that stirs every boy who is going to a show.