“I didn’t see no water barrel,” Tom answered. “I reckon they make dry camp. They had a stove that smoked, and three benches with some kinda shelf for their books, and the girl was using a strip of tar-paper for a blackboard. But there was no water.”
“Say, what sort of country is this Black Rim, anyway?” Lance studied the end of his cigarette, lifting his left eyebrow just as his father had done five minutes before. “I hope to heck I haven’t come home to remodel the morals of the country, or to strut around and play college-young-man like a boob; but on the square, folks, it looks 125 to me as though the Rim needs a lesson in citizenship. It doesn’t mean anything in our lives, whether there is a schoolhouse in the country or not. Belle has looked out for us boys, in the matter of learning the rudiments and a good deal besides. Say, Belle, do you know they took my voice and fitted a glee club to it? I was the glee. And a real, live professor told me I had technique. I told him I must have caught it changing climates––but however, what you couldn’t give us with the books, you handed us with the quirt––and here and now I want to say I appreciate it.”
“All right, I appreciate your appreciation, and I wish to heaven you wouldn’t ramble all over the range when you start to say a thing. That’s one thing you learned in school that I’d like to take outa you with a quirt.”
“I was merely pointing out how we, ourselves, personally, do not need a schoolhouse. But I was also saying that the Rim ought to have a lesson in real citizenship. They call the Lorrigans bad. All right; that’s a fine running start. I’d say, let’s give ’em a jolt. I’m game to donate a couple of steers toward a schoolhouse––a regular schoolhouse, with the Stars and Stripes on the front end, and a bench behind the door for the water bucket, and a blackboard up in front, and a woodshed behind––with a door into it so the schoolmarm needn’t put on her overshoes and mittens every time she tells one of the Swedes to put a stick of 126 wood in the stove. I’d like to do that, and not say a darn word until it’s ready to move into. And then I’d like to stick my hands in my pockets and watch what the Rim would do about it.
“I’ve wondered quite a lot, in the last two years, whether it’s the Black Rim or the Lorrigan outfit that’s all wrong. I know all about grandad and all the various and sundry uncles and forbears that earned us the name of being bad; it makes darn interesting stuff to tell now and then to some of the fellows who were raised in a prune orchard and will sit and listen with watering mouths and eyes goggling. I’ve been a hero, months on end, just for the things that my grandad did in the seventies. Of course,” he pulled his lips into their whimsical smile, “I’ve touched up the family biography here and there and made heroes of us all. But the fact remains there are degrees and differences in badness. I’ve a notion that the Black Rim, taken by and large, is a damn sight worse than the Devil’s Tooth outfit. I’d like to try the experiment of making the AJ and old Scotty ashamed of themselves. I’d like to try a schoolhouse on ’em, and see if they’re human enough to appreciate it.”
Duke, turning his head slowly, glanced at Al, and from him to Tom. Without moving a muscle of their faces the two returned his look. Al slid his cigarette stub thoughtfully into his coffee cup and let his breath out carefully in a long sigh that 127 was scarcely audible. Tom took a corner of his lower lip between his teeth, matching Lance, who had the same trick.
“Honey, that’s fine of you! There aren’t many that realize what a lot of satisfaction there is in doing something big and generous and making the other fellow ashamed of himself. And it would be a God’s mercy to Mary Hope, poor child. Leave it to the AJ and whatever other outfit there is to send pupils, and Mary Hope could teach in the Whipple shack till it rattled down on top of them. I know what the place is. I put up there once in a hailstorm. It isn’t fit for cattle, as Tom says, unless they’ve fixed it a lot. I’ll donate the furniture; I’ll make out the order right this evening for seats and blackboard and a globe and everything, and make it a rush order!” Belle pushed back her chair and came around to Lance, slipped her arms around his neck and tousled his wavy mop of hair with her chin. “If the rest won’t come through you and I’ll do it, honey––”
“Who said we wouldn’t?” Tom got up, stretching his arms high above his head,––which was very bad manners, but showed how supple he still was, and how well-muscled. “No one ever called me a piker––and let me hear about it. Sure, we’ll build a schoolhouse for ’em, seeing they’re too cussed stingy to build one themselves. There’s the lumber I had hauled out for a new chicken house; to-morrow I’ll have it hauled up to 128 some good building spot, and we’ll have it done before the AJ wakes up to the fact that anything’s going on.”
“I’ll chip in enough to make her big enough for dances,” volunteered Duke. “Darn this riding fifteen or twenty miles to a dance!”
“I’ll paint ’er, if you let me pick out the color,” said Al. “Where are you going to set ’er?”