The Twins of Suffering Creek

by Ridgwell Cullum

But if he neglected to do so, it was otherwise with his friends, the other members of the Trust. The moment his back was turned they shed the story broadcast, each man competing with the other in his endeavor to make it thoroughly palatable to the sensation-loving ears of their fellow-townsmen. And probably of them all Sandy was the most successful.

In half-an-hour, loyally supported by his friends, he had the whole of Suffering Creek strung to such a pitch of nervous excitement that every man was set looking to his firearms, and all talk was directed towards the most adequate means of defending their homes and property.

In the briefest possible time, from a peaceful, industrious camp, Suffering Creek was transformed into a war base, every citizen stirred not only to defense of his own, but with a longing to march out to the fray, to seek these land pirates in the open and to exterminate them, as they would willingly exterminate any other vermin.

Men talked war. Brains were feverishly racked for strategy, and for historical accounts of a similar situation in which a town rose to arms and took the law into its own hands. Stories flew from lip to lip, and, as is usual under such stress, so did the convivial glass.

And the result which followed was quite in keeping with the occasion. Quarrels and bickerings occurred, which kept the place at fever-heat until the store closed down for the night and the supply of liquor was cut off. Then slumber brought its beneficent opiate to distracted nerves.

Throughout it all Minky kept his head level. Whatever he felt and thought, he had nothing to offer on the altar of public suggestion. He knew that of all these irresponsible debaters he had the most to lose. Nor did he feel inclined to expose anything of the risk at which he stood. It was a depressing time for him, so depressing that he could see very little hope. His risk was enormous. He felt that the probability was that this raiding gang were well enough posted as to the store of gold he held in his cellars. He felt that, should James or any of his people decide upon a coup, the attack would be well timed, when the miners were out at their work, and he and the camp generally were left defenseless.

What could he do? He must rid himself of the “dust” somehow. He must dispose of it secretly. A hiding––that seemed to him, amidst his trouble, to be the only thing. But where? That was the thing. He must consult Bill. To his mind Bill was the only man upon whom he could place any real reliance, upon whose judgment he could depend. So, with his shrewd eyes ever on the watch for strangers amongst his customers, he longed for the hours to pass until he could close his store and seek the gambler in his hut.

In the meantime Wild Bill had cut himself off from his fellows, spending the long evening hours in the solitude of his humble dwelling. The man was strangely calm, but his fierce eyes and pale face told of an enormous strain of thought driving him. His mind was sweeping along over a series of vivid pictures of past events, mixed up with equally vivid and strongly marked scenes of possible events to come. He was reviewing silently, sternly, a situation which, by some extraordinary kink in his vanity, he felt it was for him to assume the responsibility of. He felt, although with no feeling of pride, that he, and he alone, could see it through.

The fact of the matter was that, by some strange mental process, James’ doings––his approach to the camp, in fact his very existence––had somehow become a direct individual challenge to him. Without acknowledging it to himself, he in some subtle way understood that everything this desperado did was a challenge to him––a sneering, contemptuous challenge to him. James was metaphorically snapping his fingers under his very nose.

That these were his feelings was undeniable. That the thoughts of the possibilities of an attack on the camp were the mainspring of his antagonism to the man, that this voluntary guardianship of Scipio and his twins was the source of his rage against him, it was impossible to believe. They may have influenced him in a small degree, but only in a small degree. The man was cast in a very different mold from that of a simple philanthropist. It was the man’s vanity, the headstrong vanity of a strong and selfish man, that drove him. And as he sat silently raging under his thoughts of the happenings of that day, had he put his paramount feelings into words he would have demanded how James dared to exist in a district which he, Wild Bill of Abilene, had made his own.