Cool and sweet and fresh, from maiden leagues of clean, brown earth the desert winds made whisper in grass and fragrant shrub; yucca, mesquite and greasewood swayed—so softly, you had not known save as the long shadows courtesied and danced.
Leo flung up his hand. The air was wine to him. A year had left the desert still new and strange. “Gee!” he said eloquently.
Headlight nodded. “You’re dead right on that point, son. If Christopher K. Columbus had only thought to beach his shallops on the sundown side of this here continent he might have made a name for himself. Just think how much different, hysterically, these United States——”
“This United States,” corrected Pringle dispassionately. Their fathers had disagreed on the same grammatical point.
Headlight scowled. “By Jings! ‘That this United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States,’” he quoted. “I was goin’ to give you something new to exercise your talons on. You sit here every night, ridin’ broncs and four-footin’ steers, and never grab a horn or waste a loop, not once. Sure things ain’t amusin’. Some variety and doubtful accuracy, now, would develop our guessin’ gifts.”
Aforesaid Smith brandished the end-gate rod. “Them speculations of yours sorter opens up of themselves. If California had been settled first the salmon would now be our national bird instead of the potato. Think of Arizona, mother of Presidents! Seat of government at Milipitas; center of population about Butte; New Jersey howlin’ about Nevada trusts!” He impaled a few beef ribs and held them over the glowing embers.
“Georgia and South Carolina would be infested by cow-persons in décolleté leather panties,” said Jeff Bransford. “New York and Pennsylvania would be fondly turning a credulous ear to the twenty-fourth consecutive solemn promise of Statehood—with the Senator from Walla Walla urging admission of both as one mighty State with Maryland and Virginia thrown in for luck.”
Headlight forgot his pique. “Wouldn’t the railroads sound funny, though? Needles and Eastern, Northern Atlantic, Southern Atlantic, Union, Western, Kansas and Central Atlantic! Earnest and continuous demand for a President from east of the Mississippi. All the prize-fights pulled off at Boston.”
“Columbus done just right,” said Pringle decisively. “You fellers ain’t got no imagination a-tall. If this Western country’d been settled first, the maps would read: ‘Northeast Territory.—Uninhabitable wilderness; region of storm and snow, roaming savages and fierce wild beasts.’ When the intrepid explorer hit the big white weather he’d say, ‘Little old San Diego’s good enough for me!’ Yes, sir!”
“Oh, well, climate alone doesn’t account for the charm of this country—nor scenery,” said Leo. “You feel it, but you don’t know why it is.”