Authors: Nathanael West
“I don’t know,” said
Lem
, speaking the truth, for
Shagpoke
had kept secret their final destination.
“You do know, you
damned bourgeois.
Tell me or…” He was interrupted by the wild scream of
a siren. The car swerved and bucked wildly,
then
there
was a terrific crash.
Lem
felt as though he were being
whirled rapidly through a dark tunnel full of clanging bells. Everything went
black, and the last thing he was conscious of was a sharp, stabbing pain in his
left hand.
When the poor lad recovered
consciousness, he found himself stretched out upon a sort of a cot and he
realized that he was still being carried somewhere. Near his head sat a man in
a white suit, who was calmly smoking a cigar.
Lem
knew he was no longer in the limousine, for he saw that the rear end of the
conveyance was wide open and admitted a great deal of light and air.
“What happened?” he asked naturally
enough.
“So you are coming around, eh?” said
the man in the white suit. “Well, I guess you will get well all right.” “But
what happened?”
“You were in a bad smash-up.”
“A smash-up
?…
Where
are you taking me?”
“Don’t get excited and I’ll answer
your
questions.
The limousine in which you were riding
was struck by a fire engine and demolished. The driver must have run off, for
you were the only one we found at the wreck. This is the ambulance of the Lake
Shore Hospital and you are being taken there.”
Lem
now
understood what he had been through, and thanked God that he was still alive.
“I hope you are not a violinist,”
the interne added mysteriously.
“No, I don’t play, but why?”
“Because your left hand was badly
mangled and I had to remove a part of it.
The thumb, to be
explicit.”
Lem
sighed
deeply, but being a brave lad he forced himself to think of other things.
“What hospital is this ambulance
from did you say?”
“The Lake Shore.”
“Do you know how a patient called
Nathan Whipple is getting on? He was run over on the fair grounds by a
sightseeing bus.”
“We have no patient by that name.”
“Are you certain?”
“Absolutely.
I know every accident case in the hospital.” Of a sudden everything became
clear to
Lem
. “Then he tricked me with a lie!” he
cried.
“Who did?” asked the interne.
Lem
ignored his question. “What time is it?” he demanded.
“One o’clock.”
“I have still fifteen minutes to
make the train. Stop and let me off, please.”
The ambulance doctor stared at our
hero and wondered if the lad had gone crazy.
“I must get off,” repeated
Lem
frantically.
“As a private citizen you of course
can do as you like, but I advise you to go to the hospital.”
“No,” said
Lem
,
“please, I must get to the depot at once. I have to catch a train.”
“Well, I certainly admire your
pluck. By George, I have half a mind to help you.”
“Do,” begged
Lem
.
Without further argument, the
interne told his driver to head for the depot at top speed and to ignore all
traffic laws. After an exciting ride through the city, they arrived at their
destination just as “The Chief” was about to pull out.
As
Lem
had
suspected, Mr. Whipple and his other friends were safe on the train. When they
saw his bandaged hand, they demanded an explanation and the poor lad told the
story of his adventure with the agent of the Third International. They were
astounded and angered, as well they might be.
“One day,” Mr. Whipple said
ominously, “heads will roll in the sand, bearded and
unbearded
alike.”
The rest of the trip proved
uneventful. There happened to be an excellent doctor on board and he had our
hero’s hand in fair shape by the time the train reached southern California.
After several days of travel on
horseback, the little party arrived at the Yuba River in the high Sierra
Mountains. It was on one of the tributaries of this river that Jake Raven’s
gold mine was located.
Next to the diggings was a log
cabin, which the men of the party soon had in a livable condition. Mr. Whipple
and Betty occupied it, while
Lem
and the redskin made
their bed under the stars.
One evening, after a hard day’s work
at the mine, the four friends were sitting around a fire drinking coffee when a
man appeared who might have sat for the photograph of a Western bad man without
any alteration in his countenance or apparel.
He wore a red flannel shirt, pants
of leather with the hair still on them and a Mexican sombrero. He had a bowie
knife in his boot and displayed two pearl-handled revolvers very
ostentatiously.
When he was about two rods away from
the group, he hailed it.
“How are you, strangers?” he asked.
“Pretty comfortable,” said
Shagpoke
. “How fare you?”
“You’re a Yank,
ain’t
you?” he asked as he dismounted from his horse.
“Yes, from Vermont. Where might your
home be?”
“I’m from Pike County, Missouri,”
was the answer. “You’ve heard of Pike,
hain’t
you?”
“I’ve heard of Missouri,” said Mr.
Whipple with a smile, “but I can’t say as I ever heard of your particular
county.” The man with the leather pants frowned.
“You must have been born in the
woods not to have heard of Pike County,” he said. “The smartest fighters come
from there. I kin whip my weight in wildcats, am a match for a dozen Injuns to
oncet
, and can tackle a lion without
flinchin
’.”
“Won’t you stop and rest with us?”
said Mr. Whipple politely.
“I don’t care if I do,” was the
uncouth Missourian’s rejoinder. “You don’t happen to have a bottle of whisky
with you, strangers?” he asked.
“No,” said
Lem
.
The newcomer looked disappointed.
“I wish you had,” he said. “I feel
dry as a salt herring. What are you doing here?”
“Mining,” said Mr. Whipple.
“
Grubbin
’
in the ground,” said the stranger with disgust. “That’s no job for a gentleman.”
This last was uttered in such a
magnificent tone of disdain that everyone smiled. In his red shirt, coarse
leather breeches and brown, not
overclean
skin, he
certainly didn’t look much like a gentleman in the conventional sense of the
term.
“It’s well enough to be a gentleman,
if you’ve got money to fall back on,” remarked
Lem
sensibly but not offensively.
“Is that personal?” demanded the
Pike County man, scowling and half rising from the ground.
“It’s personal to me,” said
Lem
quietly.
“I accept the apology,” said the
Missourian fiercely. “But you’d better not rile me, stranger, for I’m powerful
bad. You don’t know me, you don’t. I’m a rip-tail
roarer
and a ring-tail squealer, I am. I always kills the man what riles me.”
After this last bloodthirsty
declaration, the man from Pike County temporarily subsided. He partook quietly
of the coffee and cake which Betty served him. Suddenly he flared up again.
“
Hain’t
that an Injun?” he shouted, pointing at Jake Raven and reaching for his gun.
Lem
stepped hastily in front of the redskin, while
Shagpoke
grabbed the ruffian’s wrist.
“He’s a good friend of ours,” said
Betty.
“I don’t give a darn,” said the
ring-tail squealer. “Turn me loose and I’ll
massacree
the Banged
aboriginee
.”
Jake Raven, however, could take care
of himself. He pulled his own revolver and pointing it at the bad man said, “Rascal
shut up or me kill um pronto
quick
.”
At the sight of the Indian’s drawn
gun, the ruffian calmed down.
“All right,” he said, “but it’s my
policy always to shoot an Injun on sight. The only good Injun is a dead one, is
what I
alluz
say.”
Mr. Whipple sent Jake Raven away
from the fire and there was a long silence, during which everyone stared at the
cheery flames. Finally the man from Pike County again broke into speech, this
time addressing
Lem
.
“How about a game of cards, sport?”
he asked. With these words he drew a greasy pack out of his pocket and shuffled
them with great skill.
“I have never played cards in my
life,” said our hero. “Where
was
you raised?” demanded
the Missourian contemptuously.
“Ottsville, State of Vermont,” said
Lem
. “I don’t know one card from another, and don’t want to
know.”
In no way abashed, the Pike man
said, “I’ll
larn
you.
How about a
game of poker?”
Mr. Whipple spoke up. “We do not
permit gambling in this camp,” he said firmly.
“That’s
durn
foolishness,” said the stranger, whose object it was to victimize his new
friends, being an expert gambler.
“Perhaps it is,” said Mr. Whipple. “But
that’s our business.”
“Look here, hombre,” blustered the
bully. “I reckon you don’t realize who you’re a-talking to. ‘
Tarnal
death and
massacreeation
,
I’m the rip-tail
roarer
, I am.”
“You told us that before,” said Mr.
Whipple quietly.
“Blood and
massacreeation
,
if I don’t mean it, too,” exclaimed the Missourian with a fierce scowl. “Do you
know how I treated a man last week?”
“No,” said Mr. Whipple, truthfully.
“We
was
ridin
’ together over in
Almeda
County. We’d, met
permiscuous
, like we’ve met
tonight. I was
tellin
’ him
how four
b’ars
attacked me to
oncet
,
and how I fit ‘
em
all single-handed, when he laughed
and said he reckoned I’d been
drinkin
’ and seed
double. If he’d a-
know’d
me better he wouldn’t have
done it.”
“What did you do?” asked Betty in
horror.
“What did I do, madam?” echoed the
Pike County man ferociously. “I told him he didn’t realize who he’d insulted. I
told him I was a ring-tail squealer and a rip-tail
roarer
.
I told him that he had to fight, and asked him how it would be.
Foot and fist, or tooth and nail, or claw and
mudscraper
,
or knife, gun and
tommyhawk
.”
“Did he fight?” asked
Lem
.
“He had to.”
“How did it come out?”
“I shot him through the heart,” said
the Missourian coldly. “His bones are
bleachin
’ in
the canyon where he fell.”
The next day, the Pike County man
lay on his blankets until about eleven o’clock in the morning. He only got up
when
Lem
, Jake and
Shagpoke
returned from their work on the creek to eat lunch. They were surprised to see
him still in camp, but said nothing out of politeness.
Although they did not know it, the
Missourian had not been sleeping. He had been lying under a tree, thinking
dirty thoughts as he watched Betty go about her household chores.
“I’m hungry,” he announced with
great truculence. “When do we eat?”
“Won’t you share our lunch?” asked
Mr. Whipple with a sarcastic smile that was completely lost on the uncouth’
fellow.
“Thank ye, stranger, I don’t mind if
I do,” the Pike County man said. “My fodder give out just before I made your
camp, and I
hain’t
found a place to stock up.” He
displayed such an appetite that Mr. Whipple regarded him with anxiety. The camp
was short of provisions, and if the stranger kept eating like that he would
have to take a trip into town that very afternoon for more food.
“You have a healthy appetite, my
friend,” Mr. Whipple said.
“I generally have,” said the Pike
man. “You’d
orter
keep some whisky to wash these
vittles down with.”
“We prefer coffee,” said
Lem
.
“Coffee is for children, whisky for
strong men,” was the ring-tail squealer’s rejoinder.