Spider give a whoop, an’ then he laughed, an’ then he sobered up, an’ sez: “Well, you can’t do nothin’ now, anyway. The judges have decided it, ol’ man Dort has give it up, it ain’t your game nohow, an’ if you was to try to equal back those bets after they have been paid an’ mostly spent, you’d start a heap o’ blood-spillin’; an’ furthermore, as far as I’m concerned, I ain’t right sure but what a woodchuck, as you call it, ain’t some kind of a squirrel. We’ll just let this go an’ wait for a chance to put something over on Eugene.”
So that’s what we made up to do; but this gives you an idy of how fine a line the Friar drew on questions o’ sport. He knew ’at we weren’t full fledged angels, and that we had to have our little diversities; but when any professional hold-up men tried to ring in a brace game on us, he couldn’t see any joke in it, and he upset the money-changers’ tables, the same as they was upset that time, long ago, in the temple.
[CHAPTER THREE—ABOVE THE DUST]
I’m only about twice as old as I feel; but I’ve certainly seen a lot o’ changes take place out this way. I can look back to the time when what most of us called a town was nothin’ but a log shack with a barrel of cheap whiskey and a mail-bag wanderin’ in once a month or so, from goodness-knows-where. I’ve seen the cattle kings when they set their own bounds, made their own laws, and cared as little for government-title as they did for an Injun’s. Then, I’ve seen the sheep men creep in an inch at a time until they ate the range away from the cattle and began to jump claims an’ tyrannize as free and joyous as the cattle men had. Next came the dry farmer, and he was as comical as a bum lamb when he first hove into sight; but I reckon that sooner or later he’ll be the one to write the final laws for this section.
We’re gettin’ a good many towns on our map nowadays, we’re puttin’ up a lot o’ hay, we’re drinkin’ cow milk, and we’re eatin’ garden truck in the summer. The old West has dried up and blown away before our very eyes, and a few of us old timers are beginnin’ to feel like the last o’ the buffalo. The’s more money nowadays in boardin’ dudes ’n the’ is in herdin’ cattle, an’ that’s the short of a long, long story.
But still we hammered out this country from the rough, and no one can take that away from us. The flag follers trouble, an’ business follers the flag, an’ law follers business, an’ trouble follers the law; but always the first trouble was kicked up by boys who had got so ’at they couldn’t digest home cookin’ any longer and just nachely had to get out an’ tussle with nature an’ the heathen.
They’re a tough, careless lot, these young adventurers; an’ they’re always in a state of panic lest the earth get so crowded the’ won’t be room enough to roll over in bed without askin’ permission; so they kill each other off as soon as possible, and thus make room for the patienter ones who follow after. From what I’ve heard tell of history, this has been about the way that the white race has managed from the very beginning.
As a general rule it has been purt’ nigh a drawn fight between the dark-skins an’ the wild animals; then the lads who had to have more elbow-room came along, and the dark-skins and the wild animals had to be put onto reservations to preserve a few specimens as curiosities, while the lads fussed among themselves, each one tryin’ to settle down peaceable with his dooryard lappin’ over the horizon in all directions. Room, room, room—that was their constant cry. As soon as one would get a neighbor within a day’s ride, he’d begin to feel shut in an’ smothered.
Tyrrel Jones was one o’ the worst o’ this breed. He came out at an early date, climbed the highest peak he could find, and claimed everything ’at his gaze could reach in every direction. Then he invented the Cross brand, put it on a few cows, and made ready to defend his rights. The Cross brand was a simple one, just one straight line crossin’ another; and it could be put on in about one second with a ventin’ iron, or anything else which happened to be handy. Tyrrel thought a heap o’ this brand, an’ he didn’t lose any chances of puttin’ it onto saleable property. His herd grew from the very beginning.
His home ranch was something over a hundred miles northwest o’ the Diamond Dot; but I allus suspicioned that a lot of our doggies had the Cross branded on to ’em. Tyrrel was mighty particular in the kind o’ punchers he hired. He liked fellers who had got into trouble, an’ the deeper they was in, the better he liked ’em. Character seeks its level, the same as water; so that Tyrrel had no trouble in gettin’ as many o’ the breed he wanted as he had place for. They did his devilment free and hearty, and when they had a little spare time, they used to devil on their own hook in a way to shame an Injun.