"Yep—in a way he was." Once more that devilish chuckle.
I saw the old man evidently had a story concealed about his person and that, with his usual contrariness the more we crowded him the longer he would be in getting it out of his system. I dropped angrily into the porch swing, where I could watch his face, while the madam sat herself down on the steps of the porch apparently utterly oblivious of everything but the sage-dotted prairie spread out before us. Finally the aged provision spoiler began to emit words.
"The last time the outfit shipped steers over at the railroad," he said slowly, "the kid he tanked up pretty consid'able till he's a feeling his oats, an' imaginin' hisself a reg'lar wild man from Borneo, and everything leading up to his gittin' into trouble before he was many hours older. Comes trotting down the sidewalk old man Kates, the Justice of the Peace who, on account of his gittin' the fees in all cases brought up before him, was allers on the lookout for biz. Also he done set into a poker game the night before and lose his whole pile, which didn't tend to make him view this here world through no very rosy specs. The kid comes swaggering along and the two meets up jist in front of the 'Bucket of Blood' saloon. You know Kates he allers wears a plug hat, one of them there old timers of the vintage of '73 or thereabouts, an' the kid he bein' a comparative stranger in these parts, and not knowin' who the judge was nor havin' seen any such headgear for some time, he ses to hisself, 'Right here's where I gits action on that sombrero grande,' and he manages to bump into the judge in such a way as to knock off the tile, and before it hits the ground the kid was filling it so full of holes that it looked like some black colander.
"Every one came pouring out of the saloon and nearby stores to see what was up, and the judge he takes advantage of the kid's having to stop and reload his six pistol, to relieve hisself of some of the most expressive and profane language ever heard in the burg before or since, windin' up by informin' the gent from ole Missou that he was goin' straight to his office and swear out a warrant for him and send him down to Yuma by the next train.
"When the boys tells the kid who he's been tamperin' with he gits onto his hoss and tears outa town like hell a-beatin' tanbark, he havin' no particular likin' for court proceedin's, owing to several little happenin's in that line down on the Pecos in Texas. About a week later the sheriff he gits a tip that the kid's probably hangin' out at Deafy Morris's sheep camp up on Wild Cat, so he saunters up that a-way and nabs the young gent as he's a helpin' Deafy fix up his shearin' pens. Sheriff he sort of throws a skeer into the kid, tellin' him Kates is liable to send him up for ten years for assaultin' the honor and dignity of a J. P., but the kid's mighty foxy and also plumb sober by that time, and he tells the sheriff he's willing to go back to town and take his medicine.
"Next morning Deafy he ses as how he's a-goin' down to town, and the sheriff, havin' got track of somebody else he's a wantin' up on the mountain, and believin' the kid's story about bein' willing to go to town, he deputizes Deafy to take him in and deliver him at the 'Hoosgow.'[D]
[D] Jusgado—The prisoner's dock in a Spanish criminal court.
"Deafy he tells the sheriff he's not a goin' clean through to town that day, but is a-goin' to camp at the Jacob's Well, a place about half way down, on the edge of the pines, where he's arranged to meet up with the camp rustler of one of his bands of sheep grazin' in that section. Ever been at that there Jacob's Well?" And the old man looked at me inquiringly. I nodded affirmatively.
The Jacob's Well was located in the center of a very large level mass of sandstone covering perhaps three or four acres, with a dense thicket of cedar and piñon trees all about it. It was a fairly round hole about five feet wide and perhaps ten deep, bored down into the sandstone formation either by human agency or some peculiar action of nature. The lay of the rocks all about it was such as to form a regular watershed, so that the natural drainage from the rain and snow kept it nearly filled almost all the year round.
Just what made this well was a moot question in the country. A scientific investigator promptly put it down to the action of hard flint rocks lying in a small depression and rolled about by the wind until they dug a little basin in the rock, then the water collecting in it continued the attrition until, finally, after what may have been ages, the well was the result. My private opinion was that it was the work of prehistoric or even modern Indians who, wishing to secure a supply of water at this particular point, possibly for hunting purposes, formed the hole by fire. A large fire was built upon the rock, then when at a white heat water was thrown upon it, causing the stone to flake and crack so it could easily be removed. This was a slow process, of course, but having myself once seen a party of Apache squaws by the same primitive means remove over half of a huge boulder that lay directly in the line of an irrigating ditch they were digging, and which they otherwise could not get around, I am convinced the scientific person missed the true methods employed to excavate the hole.