I don’t reckon that machine would do very well in Paradise. But them Paradise and Yaller Horse folks will buy raffle chances on anythin’. They are so danged crooked themselves that they think Piperock is goin’ to pull a crooked deal on the raffle. And me with the only ticket in Piperock! I don’t know what the odds are against me, but if they’ve already got enough money to build the new church, them Paradisers and Yaller Horses has shore dug deep in the old sock. But it’s all right with me—I’m lookin’ for competition. I don’t want the danged machine. I’ve got a horse and a burro, and that’s plenty rollin’ stock for one man in my position. I ain’t even goin’ to the entertainment. I’m goin’ to stand Buck off for a couple quarts and spend a quiet evenin’ beside my own fire.
Well, I got the couple quarts all right, and I packed plenty wood into the old shack for the evenin’. Then I put my gun on the table beside me, declared plenty peace on earth, good will toward all men, and settled down to enjoy life. Once in a while I can hear a few shots fired uptown, but nothin’ to speak about. Christmas is usually quiet thataway, and mostly always it’s so danged bitter cold that it freezes up the grease in a six-gun so badly that you can’t shoot it outdoors. Most of our killin’s are done indoors durin’ the winter months.
I’m setting there by the fire, kinda dreamin’, when all to once the door flies open and there is Magpie and Tellurium.
“Merry Christmas,” says Tellurium. “Git on your hat, Ike.”
“I don’t wear no hat in the house,” says I, reachin’ for my gun, but Magpie beat me to it. Without that gun, I’m outnumbered.
“Here’s the whole thing in a nutshell, Ike,” says Magpie. “Wick Smith fell down the chimbley durin’ rehearsal a while ago, and he busted his collarbone. You’re the only man who can take his place on short notice. Git your hat.”
“Nothin’ less than murder will git me up in that hall,” says I. “Right now I’m filled with the milk of human kindness, but don’t agitate me. All I crave is to be left alone.”
Well, they both talked with me plenty, and like a fool I let ’em lead me uptown. I don’t know what they want of me, but what chance have I got against two men, both bigger ’n I am, and three guns? If Wick Smith, sober, fell down and busted his collarbone, what’ll happen to me? Gravity is somethin’ I ain’t never found out how to defy, and if there’s any rubber in my system, it shore crawls to the upper side every time I fall off anythin’. I pleads a plenty, but it falls on deaf ears; so I resigns myself to fate, reservin’ the right to kill both of ’em as soon as I git around to an even break.
They leads me up to the Mint Hall, where everybody in the world is congregated, and takes me around to the rear of the big platform, across the front of which is stretched a big black curtain. They’ve shore cut a big hole in the side of the wall to git that autymobile through, and there she sets on a couple saw horses and some heavy planks. They’ve got the old hall decorated with green branches, and the orchestra is already murderin’ “Sweet Marie”, playin’ it in jig time. After while they’ll play it for a march, play it for the openin’ hymn, and then change the time for the first waltz. I looks over the assemblage with fear and tremblin’. There ain’t a paid murderer in the whole gang— They do their stuff for nothin’.