Ain’t it funny what little bits of things can sorta change a feller’s life all ’round ev’ry which direction–shuffle it up, you might say, and throw him out a brand new deal? Now, take my case: If a sassy greaser from the Lazy X ranch hadn’t ’a’ plugged Bud Hickok, Briggs City ’d never ’a’ got the parson; if the parson hadn’t ’a’ came, I’d never ’a’ gone to church; and mebbe if I hadn’t never ’a’ gone to church, it wouldn’t ’a’ made two cents diff’rence whether ole man Sewell was down on me ’r not–fer the reason that, likely, I’d never ’a’ met up with Her.
Now, I ain’t a-sayin’ I’m a’ almanac, ner one of them crazies that can study the trails in the middle of you’ hand and tell you that you’re a-goin’ to have ham and aigs fer breakfast. No, ma’am, I ain’t neither one. But, just the same, the very first time I clapped my lookers on the new parson, I knowed they was shore goin’ to be sev’ral things a-happenin’ ’fore long in that particular section of Oklahomaw.
As I said, Bud was responsible fer the parson comin’. Bud tied down his holster just oncet too many. The greaser called his bluff, and pumped lead into his system some. That called fer a funeral. Now, Mrs. Bud, she’s Kansas City when it comes to bein’ high-toned. And nothin’ would do but she must have a preacher. So the railroad agent got Williams, Arizonaw, on his click-machine, and we got the parson.
He was a new breed, that parson, a genuwine no-two-alike, come-one-in-a-box kind. He was big and young, with no hair on his face, and brownish eyes that ’peared to look plumb through y’ and out on the other side. Good-natured, y’ know, but actin’ as if he meant ev’ry word he said; foolin’ a little with y’, too, and friendly as the devil. And he didn’t wear parson duds–just a grey suit; not like us, y’ savvy–more like what the hotel clerk down to Albuquerque wears, ’r one of them city fellers that comes here to run a game.
Wal, the way he talked over pore Bud was a caution. Say! they was no “Yas, my brother,” ’r “No, my brother,” and no “Heaven’s will be done” outen him–nothin’ like it! And you’d never ’a’ smelt gun-play. Mrs. Bud ner the greaser that done the shootin’-up (he was at the buryin’) didn’t hear no word they could kick at, no, ma’am. The parson read somethin’ about the day you die bein’ a darned sight better ’n the day you was born. And his hull razoo was so plumb sensible that, ’fore he got done, the passel of us was all a-feelin’, somehow ’r other, that Bud Hickok had the drinks on us!
We planted Bud in city style. But the parson didn’t shassay back to Williams afterwards. We’d no more’n got our shaps on again, when Hairoil blowed in from the post-office up the street and let it out at the “Life Savin’ Station,” as Dutchy calls his thirst-parlour, that the parson was goin’ to squat in Briggs City fer a spell.
“Wal, of all the dog-goned propositions!” says Bill Rawson, mule-skinner over to the Little Rattlesnake Mine. “What’s he goin’ to do that fer, Hairoil?”
“Heerd we was goin’ to have a polo team,” answers Hairoil. “Reckon he’s kinda loco on polo. Anyhow, he’s took my shack.”
“Boys,” I tole the crowd that was wettin’ they whistles, “this preachin’ gent ain’t none of you’ ev’ry day, tenderfoot, hell-tooters. Polo, hey? He’s got savvy. Look a leedle oudt, as Dutchy, here, ’d put it. Strikes me this feller’ll hang on longer ’n any other parson that was ever in these parts ropin’ souls.”
Ole Dutch lay back his ears. “Better he do’n make no trubbles mit me,” he says.