To restore completely the equanimity of the company, he announced supper. This he had calculated as a tremendous surprise. It was to have been served at mid-night, but the irruption of Delaney had dislocated the order of events, and the tables were brought in an hour ahead of time. They were arranged around three sides of the barn and were loaded down with cold roasts of beef, cold chickens and cold ducks, mountains of sandwiches, pitchers of milk and lemonade, entire cheeses, bowls of olives, plates of oranges and nuts. The advent of this supper was received with a volley of applause. The musicians played a quick step. The company threw themselves upon the food with a great scraping of chairs and a vast rustle of muslins, tarletans, and organdies; soon the clatter of dishes was a veritable uproar. The tables were taken by assault. One ate whatever was nearest at hand, some even beginning with oranges and nuts and ending with beef and chicken. At the end the paper caps were brought on, together with the ice cream. All up and down the tables the pulled “crackers” snapped continually like the discharge of innumerable tiny rifles.
The caps of tissue paper were put on—“Phrygian Bonnets,” “Magicians' Caps,” “Liberty Caps;” the young girls looked across the table at their vis-a-vis with bursts of laughter and vigorous clapping of the hands.
The harness room crowd had a table to themselves, at the head of which sat Annixter and at the foot Harran. The gun fight had sobered Presley thoroughly. He sat by the side of Vanamee, who ate but little, preferring rather to watch the scene with calm observation, a little contemptuous when the uproar around the table was too boisterous, savouring of intoxication. Osterman rolled bullets of bread and shot them with astonishing force up and down the table, but the others—Dyke, old Broderson, Caraher, Harran Derrick, Hooven, Cutter, Garnett of the Ruby rancho, Keast from the ranch of the same name, Gethings of the San Pablo, and Chattern of the Bonanza—occupied themselves with eating as much as they could before the supper gave out. At a corner of the table, speechless, unobserved, ignored, sat Dabney, of whom nothing was known but his name, the silent old man who made no friends. He ate and drank quietly, dipping his sandwich in his lemonade.
Osterman ate all the olives he could lay his hands on, a score of them, fifty of them, a hundred of them. He touched no crumb of anything else. Old Broderson stared at him, his jaw fallen. Osterman declared he had once eaten a thousand on a bet. The men called each others' attention to him. Delighted to create a sensation, Osterman persevered. The contents of an entire bowl disappeared in his huge, reptilian slit of a mouth. His cheeks of brownish red were extended, his bald forehead glistened. Colics seized upon him. His stomach revolted. It was all one with him. He was satisfied, contented. He was astonishing the people.
“Once I swallowed a tree toad.” he told old Broderson, “by mistake. I was eating grapes, and the beggar lived in me three weeks. In rainy weather he would sing. You don't believe that,” he vociferated. “Haven't I got the toad at home now in a bottle of alcohol.”
And the old man, never doubting, his eyes starting, wagged his head in amazement.
“Oh, yes,” cried Caraher, the length of the table, “that's a pretty good one. Tell us another.”
“That reminds me of a story,” hazarded old Broderson uncertainly; “once when I was a lad in Ukiah, fifty years.”
“Oh, yes,” cried half a dozen voices, “THAT'S a pretty good one. Tell us another.”
“Eh—wh—what?” murmured Broderson, looking about him. “I—I don't know. It was Ukiah. You—you—you mix me all up.”