Well, I didn't go down to the Pan Handle after all. I just fatten on a new variety of entertainment an' the sample that Bill was puttin' out amused me to the limit. Me an' Bill drove down to Danders on the first o' May to get some grub. Most o' this breed has a purty tol'able active thirst, but Bill was unusual harmless when it came to storin' away liquor. About the only excitement Danders held out to a temperance crank was goin' down to the depot to watch the train come in. This time the west-bound had to take a sidin' and wait twenty minutes for the cast bound; an' a feller got his dog out o' the baggage car an' started to climb the mountains.
You fellers all know how this air is, but a stranger thinks he can spit on a mountain that's ten miles off. When the whistle blew, he made a good run an' got on all right; but the pup was havin' the time of his life an' missed his chance of gettin' on the same car that the feller did. He was game all right an' give a purty jump onto the front platform of the last car, where a big buck nigger was standin' with a white coat on. He give the pup a kick under the chin an' sent him rollin' over backward.
"Why, the vile wretch!" yells Bill, at the same time snatchin' my gun out of the holster. I had barely time to bump up his arm, an' even as it was he knocked the paint off right above the coon's head. Bill turned on me with his eyes snappin' sparks, an' in a voice as cold as the click of a Winchester, he sez, "Next time, John Hawkins, I'll thank you to mind your own business." An' he held the gun kind o' friendly like, with the muzzle pointin' at my watch pocket.
I own up I was jarred; he'd been as gentle as a butterfly up to that minute, an' here he was lookin' into me with the chilly eyes of a killin' man; but I put a little edge on my own voice an' sez, "Heretofore, I allus counted it my business to look after what my own gun was engaged in doin'. When you're sure that you're all through with it, I'll thank you to return it to where you found it."
Then I turned on my heel an' strode up toward town; but he grabbed me by the shoulder an' whirled me around. "Here's your gun, Happy." sez he. "You know I didn't aim to offend you. It was that confounded Zulu 'at riled me up."
The pup had give up his chase after the train an' was comin' back the track to town, lookin' mighty down in the mouth—he had a purty prominent mouth, too, the pup had. He was a brindle bull; not one o' these that look like an Injun idol, but a nice, clean-built, upstandin' feller with a quiet, business-like air.
"Purty tough on the pup to be turned out to starve this way," sez I.
"Who's goin' to let him starve?" sez Bill. "Come here, old feller." "Better look out," sez I, "bulldogs is fierce."
"So is men," sez Bill; "an' besides, this ain't no bulldog, this is a London brindle bull-terrier, an' a crackerjack. Look at the brass collar he's wearin'. This is ain't no stray. I'll telegraph ahead an' see if they want him expressed."
Bill caught the feller at the next station, an' he telegraphed back that he'd been havin' trouble with the pup all along the line; an' if we'd keep him a month, he'd stop an' get him on his way back. He sent us ten dollars to pay expenses. I never believed that they could send money by telegraph before; but I saw the agent give it to Bill, with my own eyes.
We all went to the hotel for dinner, the pup lookin' miserable sorrowful. Frenchy was goin' to kick the pup out—he was a low-grade heathen, but he was big an' he didn't mind a little trouble now and again.
"If this dog can't eat here, neither can I," sez Bill, "but as for your kickin' him out, you 'd better pray for guidance before you tackle that job."
"Do you think I'm afraid o' that cur?" sneers Frenchy.
"Cur!" yells Bill. "Cur? Why you maul-headed, misshapen blotch on the face o' nature, what do you mean by callin' this dog a cur! I never saw this dog before to-day; but I'll bet ten to one that I can find out who his great-great-grandfather's great-great-grandfather was; an' I doubt if you know who your own father happened to be."
Bill was firin' at random o' course, but it looked as if he had hit somethin'. Frenchy was fair crazy. He pulled out his gun an' came chargin' down on us. Bill tried to get mine again, but I thought I'd better run it myself just then. I covered Frenchy, Frenchy covered Bill, an' the bull pup turned his back on us and looked down toward the depot, to see if his train was comin' back.
"Better put up your gun, Frenchy," I sez, soft as a wood dove, "or you'll get this office all mussed up."
Well, he knew me; so we arbitrated a little an' then we all went in an' the pup et his dinner like any other Christian, payin' for it himself out of his own money. First thing after dinner, Bill went out an' bought a gun of his own, an' I scented trouble. He wasn't old enough to shoot only from principle, not merely for practice.
The' was another young feller at Frenchy's with a lot o' hot money in his clothes. He seemed to have a deep-felt prejudice against fire, too, the way he was blowin' it in. When Bill came back, the young feller tried to buy the dog from him. Bill was polite an' refused to sell, givin' as the main reason that the dog didn't fully belong to him yet, but the feller pestered around until finally he offered Bill two hundred dollars for the dog.
"You ain't no fool when it comes to a dog," sez Bill, "but I'm givin' you the honest truth. This here pup don't belong to me—though if I can buy him I sure intend to do it."
"How far would you go when it came to payin' for him?" sez the man.
"Well, I'd give two fifty for him just on speculation," sez Bill. "He's put together, this pup is; but I didn't suppose 'at you people out here in the cattle country would know enough about the points of a dog, to offer two hundred for just a fancy one."
"I don't know nothin' about the points o' that dog," sez the feller. "I never even saw a dog like that one before; but when I see a man willin' to go the pace you went for this dog, I'd kind o' sort o' like to own the dog."
Bill got interested in the feller an' began pumpin' him for what he called copy. The young feller had punched cattle most of his life, blowin' in his wages at variegated intervals. About a month before he had slipped over to Laramie an' had gone against Silver Dick's game, winnin' over eleven hundred dollars. He said that Silver Dick was plumb on the square an' that he never intended to work again, just spend down to his last hundred an' then go an' play at Silver Dick's. Bill got a paper an' figured out what he called percents, showin' how an outsider was bound to lose to the game in the end; but most o' the fellers there had been up against Dick's game an' they took sides against Bill, tryin' to prove that they stood a show to win, until finally Bill give it up an' we started back home.
When we started home, Bill was still discoursin' about us Westerners. He said that we wasn't nothin' but a lot o' children playin' games an' believin' in fairy tales, that we never provided for the future, that we was allus willin' to risk anything we had on some fool thing that wouldn't benefit us none, an' so on until I got weary of it, an' after I'd took a shuffle I dealt him out this hand.
"An' the''s another breed," sez I, "that ain't nothin' but children an' that's the writers. An idea comes along an' stings 'em like a bee, an' they immejetly begin to swell. They swell an' swell until the whole earth ain't nothin' but the background for that bee-sting. They howl about it as if it was the most important thing in creation; but if you call around next week, you find that swellin' gone down an' they're howlin' just as fierce over a new swellin' where a different idea has stung 'em; ain't it so?"
"Not exactly," sez Bill; "for we set down our thoughts an' emotions while we're smartin' from the sting an' the other fellers can get the sense of 'em an' pass judgment on 'em in cold blood without gettin' stung at all."
"Well, you landed there," sez I, "but the' wasn't one o' those fellers there to-day, who was a quarter whit more childish'n what you was. Talk about providin' For their future! Why, the way you went on over this stray pup, purt' nigh put you in the position of a man who didn't have no future to provide for, an' what in thunder good can this here pup ever do you, no matter what happens?"
The pup was sittin' with his head between Bill's knees, an' Bill pulled his ear a time or two, an' then sez, "I reckon you're right; the whole earth ain't nothin' but a kindergarten. We all play different games an' when you stop an' look at it they all cost about the same in the end an' they all bring in about the same profit; but I'm glad I'm livin' anyhow; an' I'm glad I've got this dog. I'm special fond o' dogs."
You couldn't help likin' Bill; he allus played in the open an' when he kept score, he give you all the points you made without fussin' over 'em; but I didn't like the look o' that new outfit on his hip. He was too impulsive to carry a gun, an' he was too young. Take it when a man has had some experience in gun-fightin', he gets purty sober over the effect of it; but a young feller—well, who on earth knows what way a young feller is goin' to jump when he gets touched up a little?
"That's a purty likely lookin' gun you got there, Bill," sez I. "Do you savvy how to run one?"
He took it out of his pocket an' looked around, but the' wasn't nothin' in sight that needed killin', so he began to pop at an old single-tree lyin' about thirty yards away. The ponies were trottin' along purty jerky, but hanged if he didn't hit it four times out of six.
"It don't just hang to suit me," sez Bill, "but I'll learn it after a bit."
I looked at him a moment, but he was merely speakin' his mind, an' I sez: "Bill, where in Goshen did you get to be a killin' man?"
"Me?" sez Bill. "I never shot a man in my life, but I used to knock down glass balls purty accurate, an' I've hunted big game in Africa an' India. I don't want no trouble, but I'm set in my ways about dogs. It's a heap o' responsibility to raise a pup; but I'm goin' to give this one a fair show, an' I'm goin' to own him some way or another—I feel it in my bones that this here dog was sent to me. I had a dog, the livin' picture o' this feller once, an' he traded his life for mine, out there in the Indian Jungle. Now don't ask me any questions about it."
That night after we'd got the supper things red up, Bill sez; "Now I don't want no one to punish this dog but me, till he gets his edication. I don't care a bean for a trick dog; all I expect him to learn is jest English an' a part o' the sign langwidge, so as he'll be pleasant company an' useful in an emergency. I'll pay for any property he destroys, but please don't punish him."
The pup was about fifteen months old when he came, an' at first he sorrowed a heap for his old boss; but purty soon he see that Bill knew more about dogs'n he did himself, so he just transferred his affections over to Bill. Bill never raised his voice, he never whipped him nor even threatened him; he just reasoned with him an' explained why it was necessary to learn the conventionalities o' polite society. It took him a solid week to learn that pup how to shake hands, an' yet Bill told us confidential that he was certain that the pup knew it all the while; but at the end of the week the pup gave in, an' from that on he was as eager for knowledge as a new-born baby.
Cupid was the name of the pup, engraved right on to his brass collar, an' when he set his mind on acquirin' an edication, he made me an' the Kid leery 'at he'd beat us at the finish in spite of our start. He could walk on his hind legs an' speak an' open an' shut doors an' wipe his feet on the door-mat an' roll over an' pray an'—oh, well he knew 'em all an' six more; but Bill said it wasn't learnin' the tricks that counted, it was learnin' to think for himself. Bill used to put obstacles in his way, so that the pup would have to cipher a while to figger out how to work it, an' this was what Bill called stretchin' his intellect to match his envirament. He was some the solemnest pup I ever see, an' it was kind o' creepy to see him come to the shack, open the door, slam it after him, wipe his feet on the burlap, look into Bill's face, an' give a short bark. This was to ask if Bill had any new jobs for him.
I had it all planned out that the pup was to sleep in the wagon shed; but this didn't look good to the pup, nor to Bill, neither. When night would come, Cupid would go through his lessons, eat his supper, an' fling himself slaunchways on the wide bunk. He didn't weigh more'n sixty pounds, but they was the solidest sixty ever wrapped up in a dog hide. He wouldn't mind no one but Bill, an' it was all I could do to get room enough on the perch to hang on. Then Bill would open up his vau-dee-ville show, an' when he'd simmer down, the pup would begin to chase jackrabbits, which was the most devilish-lookin' sight I ever see. He'd lay there with his eyelids rolled up, an' his eyes turned inside out, givin' short barks an' jerkin' his legs.
"Bill," I sez one night, "I ain't no chronic coward, but doggone me if I want to be mistook for a jack-rabbit, an' have this bulldog sock his ivories into me."
"He ain't no bulldog," snaps Bill. "It looks to me as if you might learn purty soon that he's a brindle bull-terrier!"
"Oh, I know that all right, an' I'm willin' to swear to it," sez I, "but just now it's his teeth, not his ancestors, that are botherin' me. If I'm to be mistook for a jack-rabbit, I ain't nowise particular just which kind of a bulldog is goin' to do the mistakin'."
Bill, he smiled sadly an' walked over an' stuck his naked finger right into the pup's mouth. I looked to see it bit off, but the pup only opened his eyes, looked foolish, an' tramped down another acre of imaginary grass; finally goin' to sleep again an' usin' my feet for a piller.
Talk about grit! That little cuss was willin' to fight any-thing that walked. We took him out to the herd one day, an' after he'd been kicked an' tossed an' trampled, he got on to throwin' a steer by the nose, an' from that on it was his favorite pastime. He played the game so enthusiastic, that I finally sez to Bill, "Bill, you mustn't forget that Colonel Scott has other uses for these cattle besides usin' 'em for dog exercisers." From that on, Bill made the pup be a little more temperate in the use o' steers.
The muscles on that pup got to be like hard rubber, an' you couldn't pinch him hard enough to make him squeak. He allus took a serious view o' life except when the' was a chance for a little rough an' tumble; then his face would light up like an angel's. Pullin' on a rope was his idee o' draw poker, an' he could wear out the whole bunch of us at it. Bill fair idolized him—fact is, we all thought a heap of him; but I'd 'a' liked him a mite better if the' 'd been more bunks in the shack.
If he got cold, he'd scratch your face till you let him under the covers, an' then when he got too hot, he'd pull the covers off an' roll 'em into a nice soft heap, with himself on top. He never overlooked himself much, the pup didn't. First I knew, I got to missin' a right smart o' sleep that really belonged to me; 'cause, while I'm opposed to speakin' ill o' the absent, I'd just about as soon try to sleep with a colicky hoss as with Bill an' the pup. When the pup wasn't chasin' imaginary jack-rabbits or live fleas, Bill was jumpin' up an' down to write somethin' new into his book; until Kid Porter swore that if any more came, he was goin' to leave.
I like a dog the full limit, but I never hankered to sleep with 'em, not when they have fleas; an' when they don't, they allus put me in mind of a man 'at uses perfumery. I tried to devise a plan for sleepin' on the floor, but I couldn't engineer it through.
"No," sez Bill, in a hurt kind of a tone, "I wouldn't inconvenience you for the world. Me an' Cupid will sleep on the floor." Well, there I was. I'm as tender-hearted as a baby antelope, so I just turned it off as a joke, an' got to sleepin' in the saddle on the return trip.
Nothin' on earth made Bill so mad as to call the pup a bulldog, though if he wasn't one, he sure looked the part. I knowed it wouldn't do to take too many chances, so me an' the Kid used to post the boys, an' when one of 'em would drop in an' say as natural as though he was chattin' about the weather: "That's a mighty fine London, brindle, bull-terrier you-uns have got," Bill's face would light up as if he was the mother of it, an' he would turn in an' preach us a sermon on dogs. That was why you liked Bill; he was just the same all the way through an' if he was friendly when it paid, you was certain sure he'd be just as friendly when it cost.
Colonel Scott's niece came out to visit him some time in May, an' we heard of her long before we saw her. 'Bout every one we met had somethin' to tell about what a really, truly heart-buster she was. She learned to ride, an' one afternoon she an' the Colonel struck our outfit just in front of a howlin' storm.
The' wasn't no show to get back to headquarters that night, so we smoothed out the wide bunk for the lady, an' us men planned to flop in the shed. She sure had dandy manners! She pitched in an' helped us get supper, an' we had about everything to eat that a man could think of—side meat an' boiled beans an' ham an' corn-bread an' baked beans an' flapjacks an' fried potatoes an' bean soup, an' coffee so stout that you couldn't see the bottom in a teaspoonful of it. We just turned ourselves loose an' gave her a banquet.
As soon as the dishes was off our hands, we started in to be jovial. Me an' the Kid wasn't just altogether at home, but Bill was right in his element. He played, an' him an' her sang, an' they talked, an' it was the most festive function I ever see; until the pup came in an' jumped up on the wide bunk where she was settin'. "Oh, take that horrid bull-dog away!" she squealed.
I dreaded the result; but I sez to myself, "Now surely that doggone ijit won't throw a call-down into the lady." but he did. "Miss Johnston," sez he, "that ain't no bulldog. That's a high-bred London bull-terrier. How would you like to be called a Chinaman? Come here, Cupid."
It was like throwin' a bucket o' water on a bed o' coals. Bill was like an oyster from that on, an' the girl looked as if she'd been slapped. I was mad all the way through. It's all right for a man to be crazy, if he'll only keep it private, but the' ain't no sense in tryin' to get the whole balance o' creation over to his side.
The Colonel thought it a mighty prime joke to have his niece called down over a bull pup, an' he chuckled about it consid'able. Next mornin' he made Bill promise to come over an' visit him; but the girl said HER good-byes to me an' the Kid. From that on, Bill was over to headquarters half his time, but it didn't do him much good. The girl wouldn't stand for the pup, an' Bill wouldn't go back on him; so it looked purty much like a deadlock.
One Sunday about the first of August, we was all sittin' in the shade of the shack, lookin' down into the valley. The shack backed up against a massive crag on the edge of a high plateau. The road from headquarters came in from the North, wound around a steep butte, then along the top o' the cliff to where it slid down into the valley to Danders.
We heard the thud o' hoofs an' turnin' around, we saw the Colonel's niece tearin' down the road on a big hoss. It was a plain case of runaway, an' I felt something break inside my chest. They were headin' straight for the top o' the cliff, the hoss was goin' too fast to make the turn, an' we was too far off to beat him to it.
We simply stood there like a flock o' sheep, without a single thought among us. The' didn't seem to be a thing to do, but just watch 'em plunge two hundred feet into the ravine. I glanced at Bill, but I hardly knew him. His brows was drawn down like a wildcat's, his jaws was clamped so tight you could hear 'em grit, an' his eyes seemed to smoke.
I looked back to the road again, an' there was the pup, standin' down by the road watchin' the hoss runnin' toward him. I touched Bill on the shoulder, an sez, "Can the pup do anything, Bill?" Bill gave a sigh as though he had just come back from the dead, an' in a voice that wavered an' trembled, but still rang out like a trumpet, he yelled: "Throw him, Cupid, throw him!" Lord, man! I wish you could have seen it. The mane bristled up on that dog's back an' his muscles bulged out till he looked like a stone image. We heard him give a low whine, like as if he knowed it was too big a job for a little feller like him. But did he try to flunk it? Not him. Then I knew 'at he wasn't neither a bulldog nor a bull-terrier, but a little sixty-pound hero, willin' to pass out his life any time 'at Bill would draw a check for it.
We fair helt our breath as he backed away from the road an' took a little easy gallop until the hoss was near even with him. Another dog would have blown his lungs loose, tellin' what he was a-goin' to do; but Cupid never said a word. His lip curled up till you could catch the glisten of those wicked white teeth of his, an' then when the hoss was right alongside an' it looked as if he had lost his chance, he gave a couple of short jumps an' threw himself for the critter's nose.
Well, I can't rightly tell you just what did happen then. I saw him make his spring an' swing around full sweep, hangin' on to the hoss's nose; but from that on the whole earth seemed to be shook loose. The boss keeled over like he was shot, the girl seemed to turn a somerset in the air, an' light all in a heap, with one arm hangin' over the edge of the cliff. We heard a shriek, a little smothered yelp, an' then we ran down to them.
Bill looked first toward the girl an' then toward the pup, an' it was tearing his heart apart to tell which one he would go to first. Finally he ran to the girl an' carried her back from the cliff. He knelt an' put his ear to her heart, then he took her wrist an' after what seemed a mighty long time, he gave a little sigh, an' sez, "Kid, run for some water. Run! What do you stand lookin' at me for?"
The Kid, he certainly did run, while Bill stepped over to where Cupid was layin', still an' quiet, but with a piece o' the hoss's nose still in his grip. The hoss's right shoulder was broke an' he couldn't get up, but was thrashin' an' strugglin' around. "Get your gun an' put that hoss out of his misery, Happy," sez Bill, an' the' was somethin' in his tone that filled me plumb full o' the spirit of action.
When I came back, the Kid was pourin' a bucket o' water over the girl, an' Bill, with the tears rollin' down his cheeks, was feelin' over the body of the little bull-pup. I put the muzzle to within an inch o' the soft spot in the hoss's forehead, an' fired. The hoss's head sank, an' then I gulped a couple o' times like a flabby galoot, an' sez, "Bill, do you reckon the brindle bull-terrier'll pull through?"
"Get me some o' that water," sez Bill. When I got it, he showed me a place where the whole o' the pup's scalp had been kicked loose. I couldn't see what good water was goin' to do, but Bill wouldn't give up. "I can't find where the skull is broke," he sez, "an' maybe the water'll fetch him around."
He poured some water over the little feller's face, but it didn't seem to be no use. He just lay still with his head on Bill's knee, an' I knew it was all up with little Cupid; but just to please Bill, I gave him a flask, I happened to have, an' sez, "Give the little feller a drink, Bill. He never was used to hittin' it none, an' it'll have a powerful effect on him." Bill opened the pup's mouth an' poured in a tol'able stiff swig, an' by cracky, the pup opened his eyes, an' when he saw Bill bendin' down over him, he tried to wag his little tail.
Well, Bill took that pup up in his arms an' hugged him—an' if the' 's any one in this crowd that feels like laughin', it'll be healthier for 'im to step outside.
Then Bill picked up the pup, an' motioned for me an' the Kid to tote the lady up to the shack, an' we did it, though it wasn't fittin' work for a couple o' ridin men. She had fully come to when we reached the shack, an' we laid her on the wide bunk. Bill put the pup on the narrow bunk, washed out the hole in his head, an' tied it up with a clean handkerchief. Then he crossed over an' spoke to the girl. I could easy tell by his voice that the last time they had parted it had been a little stormy.
"Miss Johnston," he sez in a low tone, "are you sufferin' much?"
She owned up to a perfectly rippin' headache, an' said she was sore all over; but it was her ankle 'at pained her most. Bill started to look at it; but she reddened up an' tried to draw it under her. Bill never paid any attention to her, but sez calmly, "I've had consid'able experience, Miss Johnston. A great deal depends on promptness. Now just let the limb lay natural till I remove the shoe."
Me an' the Kid started to break for the foothills, but he set me to makin' bandages, an' sent the Kid after some more water. We was losin' our age fast, an' Bill's voice sounded like grandpa's. He said it was a corkin' bad sprain, but he tied it up an' wet down the bandages; an' then he sent me to headquarters after the spring-wagon, an' the Kid to Danders for the doctor.
We both got back before daylight, an' by that time Bill an' the girl had come to a purty harmonious agreement concernin' the proper standin' of a brindle bull-terrier. When I came in he was holdin' the lady's hand—an' I was the only one what reddened up.
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