Emerson's Wife and Other Western Stories

by Florence Finch Kelly

"For fall he did, at last, when a big enough temptation came along. And then he got whizzing, whooping, roaring drunk. It was a wilder, madder, more devilish drunk than any he had ever taken in the old days when he was only a dirty Piute buck, without ambitions or achievements. It seemed as if he were making up for all the time he had lost while he was respectable, and condensing into one all the drunks he might have taken and had n't.

"He kept it up for three weeks. Part of the time he was with the Indians, part in Virginia City, and part in Carson. How he managed to escape arrest is more than I can tell, and how it happened that he did n't massacre the whole population of Nevada is still more of a mystery. He had fights with Indians and with whites, with men who were drunk and men who were sober, and they drew guns, knives, and fists. But Johnson didn't get hurt, and nobody else got killed.

"After it was all over and he had sobered up, Johnson came to me and he was so repentant and humiliated that, I declare, I never felt so sorry for anybody in all my life. He thought it was all up with him, that he had ruined all his good repute and influence, that nobody would ever believe him, or trust him, or respect him after that, and that it was quite useless for him to try to be a good Indian again. Of course he did n't put it in so many words—he expressed more by gestures and looks and grunts than by words—but that was the meaning of it all.

"I felt so sorry for him that I made up my mind I 'd give him a lift; and as I began to talk and try to encourage him I had an inspiration that was just the thing.

"'Don't you be so discouraged, Johnson,' I said. 'We can make things all right again. We 'll get the Legislature to repeal this drunk of yours and that'll set you right up where you were before. I 'm going over to Carson to-morrow, and I 'll have the Legislature make a law that will wipe out the whole business and fix everything for you as if you had n't been drunk at all.'

"Johnson was delighted, but he did n't feel quite sure about it. So I had to make him understand that I knew what I was talking about.

"'It's all straight,' I said. 'They do that every session for somebody. Why, So-and-So'—and I mentioned the name of a prominent citizen—'was on an awful drunk last winter; and just as soon as he sobered up he went right over to Carson and had the Legislature pass a bill repealing his spree, and you know that he is just as much respected as he was before. I'll attend to your business myself to-morrow, and then I 'll publish the whole thing in the paper and everybody will read it and know that you are all right again. But you must remember one thing, Johnson,' I said. 'You must remember that as you are an Indian the Legislature can't do this for you more than once. If you were a white man you could have as many drunks repealed as you wanted. But being an Indian this is your last chance, and you must keep straight after this.'

"Well, the upshot of it was that Johnson put his trust in me; and I flatter myself that I was just the man he needed in the emergency. You 've lived in the West, and you know what the Nevada Legislature is, and always has been. There never was one that you couldn't count on to do anything under the sun that tickled its sense of humor. I thought that bill about Johnson's drunk would strike 'em in just about the right place, and it did. They dropped everything else and sent it through with a hurrah.

"There was a long preamble, telling about Johnson Sides's prominence and influence and the great importance of his retaining the high position in the respect of the community which he had won, and about the misfortune into which he had fallen, and how it was the universal wish that he should be reinstated in public esteem. And then there was a resolution which declared that Johnson Sides's drunk should be and was thereby repealed, destroyed, wiped out, for ever and ever, and that all statutes not in accordance with that act were thereby annulled from that time forth. They passed it through both houses unanimously, and the next day I published the bill verbatim and all the proceedings in our paper.

"Johnson's face fairly shone with joy when I read it to him. It was his patent of respectability, and he stowed it away in his breast pocket as carefully as if it had been his passport to heaven. He carried it there until it was worn out, and then he came after another. He's worn out three or four since then, but he always keeps one in his pocket.