Well, all the lammings Hank laid on never done me any good. It seemed like I was jest natcherally cut out to have no success in life, and no amount of whaling could change it, though Hank, he was faithful. Before I was twelve years old the hull town had seen it, and they wasn't nothing else expected of me except not to be any good.
That had its handy sides to it, too. They was lots of kids there that had to go to school, but Hank, he never would of let me done that if I had ast him, and I never asted. And they was lots of kids considerably bothered all the time with their parents and relations. They made 'em go to Sunday School, and wash up reg'lar all over on Saturday nights, and put on shoes and stockings part of the time, even in the summer, and some of 'em had to ast to go in swimming, and the hull thing was a continuous trouble and privation to 'em. But they wasn't nothing perdicted of me, and I done like it was perdicted. Everybody 'lowed from the start that Hank would of made trash out'n me, even if I hadn't showed all the signs of being trash anyhow. And if they was devilment anywhere about that town they all says, “Danny, he done it.” And like as not I has. So I gets to be what you might call an outcast. All the kids whose folks ain't trash, their mothers tells 'em not to run with me no more. Which they done it all the more fur that reason, on the sly, and it makes me more important with them.
But when I gets a little bigger, all that makes me feel kind o' bad sometimes. It ain't so handy then. Fur folks gets to saying, when I would come around:
“Danny, what doyouwant?”
And if I says, “Nothing,” they would say:
“Well, then, you get out o' here!”
Which they needn't of been suspicioning nothing like they pertended they did, fur I never stole nothing more'n worter millions and mush millions and such truck, and mebby now and then a chicken us kids use to roast in the woods on Sundays, and jest as like as not it was one of Hank's hens then, which I figgered I'd earnt it.
Fur Hank, he had streaks when he'd work me considerable hard. He never give me any money fur it. He loafed a lot too, and when he'd loaf I'd loaf. But I did pick up right smart of handiness with tools around that there shop of his'n, and if he'd ever of used me right I might of turned into a purty fair blacksmith. But it wasn't no use trying to work fur Hank. When I was about fifteen, times is right bad around the house fur a spell, and Elmira is working purty hard, and I thinks to myself:
“Well, these folks has kind o' brung you up, and you ain't never done more'n Hank made you do. Mebby you orter stick to work a little more when they's a job in the shop, even if Hank don't.”
Which I tried it fur about two or three years, doing as much work around the shop as Hank done and mebby more. But it wasn't no use. One day when I'm about eighteen, I seen awful plain I'll have to light out from there. They was a circus come to town that day. I says to Hank:
“Hank, they is a circus this afternoon and agin to-night.”
“So I has hearn,” says Hank.
“Are you going to it?” says I.
“I mout,” says Hank, “and then agin I moutn't. I don't see as it's no consarns of yourn, nohow.” I knowed he was going, though. Hank, he never missed a circus.
“Well,” I says, “they wasn't no harm to ast, was they?”
“Well, you've asted, ain't you?” says Hank.
“Well, then,” says I, “I'd like to go to that there circus myself.”
“They ain't no use in me saying fur you not to go,” says Hank, “fur you would go anyhow. You always does go off when you is needed.”
“But I ain't got no money,” I says, “and I was going to ast you could you spare me half a dollar?”
“Great Jehosephat!” says Hank, “but ain't you getting stuck up! What's the matter of you crawling in under the tent like you always done? First thing I know you'll be wanting a pair of these here yaller shoes and a stove-pipe hat.”
“No,” says I, “I ain't no dude, Hank, and you know it. But they is always things about a circus to spend money on besides jest the circus herself. They is the side show, fur instance, and they is the grand concert afterward. I calkelated I'd take 'em all in this year—the hull dern thing, jest fur oncet.”
Hank, he looks at me like I'd asted fur a house 'n' lot, or a million dollars, or something like that. But he don't say nothing. He jest snorts.
“Hank,” I says, “I been doing right smart work around the shop fur two, three years now. If you wasn't loafing so much you'd a noticed it more. And I ain't never ast fur a cent of pay fur it, nor—”
“You ain't wuth no pay,” says Hank. “You ain't wuth nothing but to eat vittles and wear out clothes.”
“Well,” I says, “I figger I earn my vittles and a good 'eal more. And as fur as clothes goes, I never had none but what Elmira made out'n yourn.”
“Who brung you up?” asts Hank.
“You done it,” says I, “and by your own say-so you done a dern poor job at it.”
“You go to that there circus,” says Hank, a-flaring up, “and I'll lambaste you up to a inch of your life. So fur as handing out money fur you to sling it to the dogs, I ain't no bank, and if I was I ain't no ijut. But you jest let me hear of you even going nigh that circus lot and all the lammings you has ever got, rolled into one, won't be a measly little sarcumstance to what youwillget. They ain't no leather-faced young upstart with weepin'-willow hail going to throw up to me how I brung him up. That's gratitood fur you, that is!” says Hank. “If it hadn't of been fur me giving you a home when I found you first, where would you of been now?”
“Well,” I says, “I might of been a good 'eal better off. If you hadn't of took me in the Alexanderses would of, and then I wouldn't of been kep' out of school and growed up a ignoramus like you is.”
“I never had no trouble keeping you away from school, I notice,” says Hank, with a snort. “This is the first I ever hearn of you wanting to go there.”
Which was true in one way, and a lie in another. I hadn't never wanted to go till lately, but he'd of lammed me if I had of wanted to. He always said he would. And now I was too big and knowed it.
Well, Hank, he never give me no money, so I watches my chancet that afternoon and slips in under the tent the same as always. And I lays low under them green benches and wiggled through when I seen a good chancet. The first person I seen was Hank. Of course he seen me, and he shook his fist at me in a promising kind of way, and they wasn't no trouble figgering out what he meant. Fur a while I didn't enjoy that circus to no extent. Fur I was thinking that if Hank tries to lick me fur it I'll fight him back this time, which I hadn't never fit him back much yet fur fear he'd pick up something iron around the shop and jest natcherally lay me cold with it.
I got home before Hank did. It was nigh sundown, and I was waiting in the door of the shop fur Elmira to holler vittles is ready, and Hank come along. He didn't waste no time. He steps inside the shop and he takes down a strap and he says:
“You come here and take off your shirt.”
But I jest moves away. Hank, he runs in on me, and he swings his strap. I throwed up my arm, and it cut me acrost the knuckles. I run in on him, and he dropped the strap and fetched me an openhanded smack plumb on the mouth that jarred my head back and like to of busted it loose. Then I got right mad, and I run in on him agin, and this time I got to him, and wrastled with him.
Well, sir, I never was so surprised in all my life before. Fur I hadn't had holt on him more'n a minute before I seen I'm stronger than Hank is. I throwed him, and he hit the ground with considerable of a jar, and then I put my knee in the pit of his stomach and churned it a couple. And I thinks to myself what a fool I must of been fur better'n a year, because I might of done this any time. I got him by the ears and I slammed his head into the gravel a few times, him a-reaching fur my throat, and a-pounding me with his fists, but me a-taking the licks and keeping holt. And I had a mighty contented time fur a few minutes there on top of Hank, chuckling to myself, and batting him one every now and then fur luck, and trying to make him holler it's enough. But Hank is stubborn and he won't holler. And purty soon I thinks, what am I going to do? Fur Hank will be so mad when I let him up he'll jest natcherally kill me, without I kill him. And I was scared, because I don't want neither one of them things to happen. Whilst I was thinking it over, and getting scareder and scareder, and banging Hank's head harder and harder, some one grabs me from behind.
They was two of them, and one gets my collar and one gets the seat of my pants, and they drug me off'n him. Hank, he gets up, and then he sets down sudden on a horse block and wipes his face on his sleeve, which they was considerable blood come onto the sleeve.
I looks around to see who has had holt of me, and it is two men. One of them looks about seven feet tall, on account of a big plug hat and a long white linen duster, and has a beautiful red beard. In the road they is a big stout road wagon, with a canopy top over it, pulled by two hosses, and on the wagon box they is a strip of canvas. Which I couldn't read then what was wrote on the canvas, but I learnt later it said, in big print:
SIWASH INDIAN SAGRAW. NATURE'S UNIVERSAL MEDICINAL SPECIFIC. DISCOVERED BY DR. HARTLEY L. KIRBY AMONG THE ABORIGINES OF OREGON.
On account of being so busy, neither Hank nor me had hearn the wagon come along the road and stop. The big man in the plug hat, he says, or they was words to that effect, jest as serious:
“Why are you mauling the aged gent?”
“Well,” says I, “he needed it considerable.”
“But,” says he, still more solemn, “the good book says to honour thy father and thy mother.”
“Well,” I says, “mebby it does and mebby it don't. Butheain't my father, nohow. And he ain't been getting no more'n his come-uppings.”
“Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord,” the big man remarks, very serious. Hank, he riz up then, and he says:
“Mister, be you a preacher? 'Cause if you be, the sooner you have druv on, the better fur ye. I got a grudge agin all preachers.”
That feller, he jest looks Hank over ca'am and easy and slow before he answers, and he wrinkles up his face like he never seen anything like Hank before. Then he fetches a kind o' aggervating smile, and he says:
“Beneath a shady chestnut tree The village blacksmith stands. The smith, a pleasant soul is he With warts upon his hands—”
He stares at Hank hard and solemn and serious while he is saying that poetry at him. Hank fidgets and turns his eyes away. But the feller touches him on the breast with his finger, and makes him look at him.
“My honest friend,” says the feller, “I amnota preacher. Not right now, anyhow. No! My mission is spreading the glad tidings of good health. Look at me,” and he swells his chest up, and keeps a-holt of Hank's eyes with his'n. “You behold before you the discoverer, manufacturer, and proprietor of Siwash Indian Sagraw, nature's own remedy for Bright's Disease, rheumatism, liver and kidney trouble, catarrh, consumption, bronchitis, ring-worm, erysipelas, lung fever, typhoid, croup, dandruff, stomach trouble, dyspepsia—” And they was a lot more of 'em.
“Well,” says Hank, sort o' backing up as the big man come nearer and nearer to him, jest natcherally bully-ragging him with them eyes, “I got none of them there complaints.”
The doctor he kind o' snarls, and he brings his hand down hard on Hank's shoulder, and he says:
“There are more things betwixt Dan and Beersheba than was ever dreamt of in thy sagacity, Romeo!” Or they was words to that effect, fur that doctor was jest plumb full of Scripter quotations. And he sings out sudden, giving Hank a shove that nearly pushes him over: “Man alive!” he yells, “youdon't knowwhat disease you may have! Many's the strong man I've seen rejoicing in his strength at the dawn of day cut down like the grass in the field before sunset,” he says.
Hank, he's trying to look the other way, but that doctor won't let his eyes wiggle away from his'n. He says very sharp:
“Stick out your tongue!”
0061
Hank, he sticks her out.
The doctor, he takes some glasses out'n his pocket and puts 'em on, and he fetches a long look at her. Then he opens his mouth like he was going to say something, and shuts it agin like his feelings won't let him. He puts his arm across Hank's shoulder affectionate and sad, and then he turns his head away like they was some one dead in the fambly. Finally, he says:
“I thought so. I saw it. I saw it in your eyes when I first drove up. I hope,” he says, very mournful, “I haven't come too late!”
Hank, he turns pale. I was getting sorry fur Hank myself. I seen now why I licked him so easy. Any one could of told from that doctor's actions Hank was as good as a dead man already. But Hank, he makes a big effort, and he says:
“Shucks! I'm sixty-eight years old, doctor, and I hain't never had a sick day in my life.” But he was awful uneasy too.
The doctor, he says to the feller with him: “Looey, bring me one of the sample size.”
Looey brung it, the doctor never taking his eyes off'n Hank. He handed it to Hank, and he says:
“A whiskey glass full three times a day, my friend, and there is a good chance for even you. I give it to you, without money and without price.”
“But what have I got?” asts Hank.
“You have spinal meningitis,” says the doctor, never batting an eye.
“Will this here cure me?” says Hank.
“It'll cureanything,” says the doctor.
Hank he says, “Shucks,” agin, but he took the bottle and pulled the cork out and smelt it, right thoughtful. And what them fellers had stopped at our place fur was to have the shoe of the nigh hoss's off hind foot nailed on, which it was most ready to drop off. Hank, he done it fur a regulation, dollar-size bottle and they druv on into the village.
Right after supper I goes down town. They was in front of Smith's Palace Hotel. They was jest starting up when I got there. Well, sir, that doctor was a sight. He didn't have his duster onto him, but his stove-pipe hat was, and one of them long Prince Alferd coats nearly to his knees, and shiny shoes, but his vest was cut out holler fur to show his biled shirt, and it was the pinkest shirt I ever see, and in the middle of that they was a diamond as big as Uncle Pat Hickey's wen, what was one of the town sights. No, sir; they never was a man with more genuine fashionableness sticking out all over him than Doctor Kirby. He jest fairly wallered in it.
I hadn't paid no pertic'ler attention to the other feller with him when they stopped at our place, excepting to notice he was kind of slim and blackhaired and funny complected. But I seen now I orter of looked closeter. Fur I'll be dad-binged if he weren't an Injun! There he set, under that there gasoline lamp the wagon was all lit up with, with moccasins on, and beads and shells all over him, and the gaudiest turkey tail of feathers rainbowing down from his head you ever see, and a blanket around him that was gaudier than the feathers. And he shined and rattled every time he moved.
That wagon was a hull opry house to itself. It was rolled out in front of Smith's Palace Hotel without the hosses. The front part was filled with bottles of medicine. The doctor, he begun business by taking out a long brass horn and tooting on it. They was about a dozen come, but they was mostly boys. Then him and the Injun picked up some banjoes and sung a comic song out loud and clear. And they was another dozen or so come. And they sung another song, and Pop Wilkins, he closed up the post-office and come over and the other two veterans of the Grand Army of the Republicans that always plays checkers in there nights come along with him. But it wasn't much of a crowd, and the doctor he looked sort o' worried. I had a good place, right near the hind wheel of the wagon where he rested his foot occasional, and I seen what he was thinking. So I says to him:
“Doctor Kirby, I guess the crowd is all gone to the circus agin to-night.” And all them fellers there seen I knowed him.
“I guess so, Rube,” he says to me. And they all laughed 'cause he called me Rube, and I felt kind of took down.
Then he lit in to tell about that Injun medicine. First off he told how he come to find out about it. It was the father of the Injun what was with him had showed him, he said. And it was in the days of his youthfulness, when he was wild, and a cowboy on the plains of Oregon. Well, one night he says, they was an awful fight on the plains of Oregon, wherever them is, and he got plugged full of bullet holes. And his hoss run away with him and he was carried off, and the hoss was going at a dead run, and the blood was running down onto the ground. And the wolves smelt the blood and took out after him, yipping and yowling something frightful to hear, and the hoss he kicked out behind and killed the head wolf and the others stopped to eat him up, and while they was eating him the hoss gained a quarter of a mile. But they et him up and they was gaining agin, fur the smell of human blood was on the plains of Oregon, he says, and the sight of his mother's face when she ast him never to be a cowboy come to him in the moonlight, and he knowed that somehow all would yet be well, and then he must of fainted and he knowed no more till he woke up in a tent on the plains of Oregon. And they was an old Injun bending over him and a beautiful Injun maiden was feeling of his pulse, and they says to him:
“Pale face, take hope, fur we will doctor you with Siwash Injun Sagraw, which is nature's own cure fur all diseases.”
They done it. And he got well. It had been a secret among them there Injuns fur thousands and thousands of years. Any Injun that give away the secret was killed and rubbed off the rolls of the tribe and buried in disgrace upon the plains of Oregon. And the doctor was made a blood brother of the chief, and learnt the secret of that medicine. Finally he got the chief to see as it wasn't Christian to hold back that there medicine from the world no longer, and the chief, his heart was softened, and he says to go.
“Go, my brother,” he says, “and give to the pale faces the medicine that has been kept secret fur thousands and thousands of years among the Siwash Injuns on the plains of Oregon.”
And he went. It wasn't that he wanted to make no money out of that there medicine. He could of made all the money he wanted being a doctor in the reg'lar way. But what he wanted was to spread the glad tidings of good health all over this fair land of ourn, he says.
Well, sir, he was a talker, that there doctor was, and he knowed more religious sayings and poetry along with it, than any feller I ever hearn. He goes on and he tells how awful sick people can manage to get and never know it, and no one else never suspicion it, and live along fur years and years that-a-way, and all the time in danger of death. He says it makes him weep when he sees them poor diluted fools going around and thinking they is well men, talking and laughing and marrying and giving in to marriage right on the edge of the grave. He sees dozens of 'em in every town he comes to. But they can't fool him, he says. He can tell at a glance who's got Bright's Disease in their kidneys and who ain't. His own father, he says, was deathly sick fur years and years and never knowed it, and the knowledge come on him sudden like, and he died. That was before Siwash Injun Sagraw was ever found out about. Doctor Kirby broke down and cried right there in the wagon when he thought of how his father might of been saved if he was only alive now that that medicine was put up into bottle form, six fur a five-dollar bill so long as he was in town, and after that two dollars fur each bottle at the drug store.
He unrolled a big chart and the Injun helt it by that there gasoline lamp, so all could see, turning the pages now and then. It was a map of a man's inside organs and digestive ornaments and things. They was red and blue, like each organ's own disease had turned it, and some of 'em was yaller. And they was a long string of diseases printed in black hanging down from each organ's picture. I never knowed before they was so many diseases nor yet so many things to have 'em in.
Well, I was feeling purty good when that show started. But the doc, he kep' looking right at me every now and then when he talked, and I couldn't keep my eyes off'n him.
“Does your heart beat fast when you exercise?” he asts the crowd. “Is your tongue coated after meals? Do your eyes leak when your nose is stopped up? Do you perspire under your arm pits? Do you ever have a ringing in your ears? Does your stomach hurt you after meals? Does your back ever ache? Do you ever have pains in your legs? Do your eyes blur when you look at the sun? Are your teeth coated? Does your hair come out when you comb it? Is your breath short when you walk up stairs? Do your feet swell in warm weather? Are there white spots on your finger nails? Do you draw your breath part of the time through one nostril and part of the time through the other? Do you ever have nightmare? Did your nose bleed easily when you were growing up? Does your skin fester when scratched? Are your eyes gummy in the mornings? Then,” he says, “if you have any or all of these symptoms, your blood is bad, and your liver is wasting away.”
Well, sir, I seen I was in a bad way, fur at one time or another I had had most of them there signs and warnings, and hadn't heeded 'em, and I had some of 'em yet. I begun to feel kind o' sick, and looking at them organs and diseases didn't help me none, either. The doctor, he lit out on another string of symptoms, and I had them, too. Seems to me I had purty nigh everything but fits. Kidney complaint and consumption both had a holt on me. It was about a even bet which would get me first. I kind o' got to wondering which. I figgered from what he said that I'd had consumption thelongestwhile, but my kind of kidney trouble was an awful SLY kind, and it was lible to jump in without no warning a-tall and jest natcherally wipe me outquick. So I sort o' bet on the kidney trouble. But I seen I was a goner, and I forgive Hank all his orneriness, fur a feller don't want to die holding grudges.
Taking it the hull way through, that was about the best medicine show I ever seen. But they didn't sell much. All the people what had any money was to the circus agin that night. So they sung some more songs and closed early and went into the hotel.
Well, the next morning I'm feeling considerable better, and think mebby I'm going to live after all. I got up earlier'n Hank did, and slipped out without him seeing me, and didn't go nigh the shop a-tall. Fur now I've licked Hank oncet I figger he won't rest till he has wiped that disgrace out, and he won't care a dern what he picks up to do it with, nuther.
They was a crick about a hundred yards from our house, in the woods, and I went over there and laid down and watched it run by. I laid awful still, thinking I wisht I was away from that town. Purty soon a squirrel comes down and sets on a log and watches me. I throwed an acorn at him, and he scooted up a tree quicker'n scatt. And then I wisht I hadn't scared him away, fur it looked like he knowed I was in trouble. Purty soon I takes a swim, and comes out and lays there some more, spitting into the water and thinking what shall I do now, and watching birds and things moving around, and ants working harder'n ever I would agin unless I got better pray fur it, and these here tumble bugs kicking their loads along hind end to.
After a while it is getting along toward noon, and I'm feeling hungry. But I don't want to have no more trouble with Hank, and I jest lays there. I hearn two men coming through the underbrush. I riz up on my elbow to look, and one of them was Doctor Kirby and the other was Looey, only Looey wasn't an Injun this morning.
They sets down on the roots of a big tree a little ways off, with their backs toward me, and they ain't seen me. So nacherally I listened to what they was jawing about. They was both kind o' mad at the hull world, and at our town in pertic'ler, and some at each other, too. The doctor, he says:
“I haven't had such rotten luck since I played the bloodhound in a Tom Show—Were you ever an 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' artist, Looey?—and a justice of the peace over in Iowa fined me five dollars for being on the street without a muzzle. Said it was a city ordinance. Talk about the gentle Rube being an easy mark! If these country towns don't get the wandering minstrel's money one way they will another!”
“It's your own fault,” says Looey, kind o' sour.
“I can't see it,” says Doctor Kirby. “How did I know that all these apple-knockers had been filled up with Sykes's Magic Remedy only two weeks ago? I may have been a spiritualistic medium in my time now and then,” he says, “and a mind reader, too, but I'm no prophet.”
“I ain't talking about the business, Doc, and you know it,” says Looey. “We'd be all right and have our horses and wagon now if you'd only stuck to business and not got us into that poker game. Talk about suckers! Doc, for a man that has skinned as many of 'em as you have, you're the worst sucker yourself I ever saw.”
The doctor, he cusses the poker game and country towns and medicine shows and the hull creation and says he is so disgusted with life he guesses he'll go and be a preacher or a bearded lady in a sideshow. But Looey, he don't cheer up none. He says:
“All right, Doc, but it's no use talking. You cantalkall right. We all know that. The question is how are we going to get our horses and wagon away from these Rubes?”
I listens some more, and I seen them fellers was really into bad trouble. Doctor Kirby, he had got into a poker game at Smith's Palace Hotel the night before, right after the show. He had won from Jake Smith, which run it, and from the others. But shucks! it never made no difference what you won in that crowd. They had done Doctor Kirby and Looey like they always done a drummer or a stranger that come along to that town and was fool enough to play poker with them. They wasn't a chancet fur an outsider. If the drummer lost, they would take his money and that would be all they was to it. But if the drummer got to winning good, some one would slip out'n the hotel and tell Si Emery, which was the city marshal. And Si would get Ralph Scott, that worked fur Jake Smith in his livery stable, and pin a star onto Ralph, too. And they would be arrested fur gambling, only them that lived in our town would get away. Which Si and Ralph was always scared every time they done it. Then the drummer, or whoever it was, would be took to the calaboose, and spend all night there.
0077
In the morning they would be took before Squire Matthews, that was justice of the peace. They would be fined a big fine, and he would get all the drummer had won and all he had brung to town with him besides. Squire Matthews and Jake Smith and Windy Goodell and Mart Watson, which the two last was lawyers, was always playing that there game on drummers that was fool enough to play poker. Hank, he says he bet they divided it up afterward, though it was supposed them fines went to the town. Well, they played a purty closte game of poker in our little town. It was jest like the doctor says to Looey:
“By George,” he says, “it is a well-nigh perfect thing. If you lose you lose, and if you win you lose.”
Well, the doctor, he had started out winning the night before. And Si Emery and Ralph Scott had arrested them. And that morning, while I had been laying by the crick and the rest of the town was seeing the fun, they had been took afore Squire Matthews and fined one hundred and twenty-five dollars apiece. The doctor, he tells Squire Matthews it is an outrage, and it ain't legal if tried in a bigger court, and they ain't that much money in the world so fur as he knows, and he won't pay it. But, the squire, he says the time has come to teach them travelling fakirs as is always running around the country with shows and electric belts and things that they got to stop dreening that town of hard-earned money, and he has decided to make an example of 'em. The only two lawyers in town is Windy and Mart, which has been in the poker game theirselves, the same as always. The doctor says the hull thing is a put-up job, and he can't get the money, and he wouldn't if he could, and he'll lay in that town calaboose and rot the rest of his life and eat the town poor before he'll stand it. And the squire says he'll jest take their hosses and wagon fur c'latteral till they make up the rest of the two hundred and fifty dollars. And the hosses and wagon was now in the livery stable next to Smith's Palace Hotel, which Jake run that too.
Well, I thinks to myself, itisa dern shame, and I felt sorry fur them two fellers. Fur our town was jest as good as stealing that property. And I felt kind o' shamed of belonging to such a town, too. And I thinks to myself, I'd like to help 'em out of that scrape. And then I seen how I could do it, and not get took up fur it, neither. So, without thinking, all of a sudden I jumps up and says:
“Say, Doctor Kirby, I got a scheme!”
They jumps up too, and they looks at me startled. Then the doctor kind o' laughs and says:
“Why, it's the young blacksmith!”
Looey, he says, looking at me hard and suspicious:
“What kind of a scheme are you talking about?”
“Why,” says I, “to get that outfit of yourn.”
“You've been listening to us,” says Looey. Looey was one of them quiet-looking fellers that never laughed much nor talked much. Looey, he never made fun of nobody, which the doctor was always doing, and I wouldn't of cared to make fun of Looey much, either.
“Yes,” I says, “I been laying here fur quite a spell, and quite natcheral I listened to you, as any one else would of done. And mebby I can get that team and wagon of yourn without it costing you a cent.”
Well, they didn't know what to say. They asts me how, but I says to leave it all to me. “Walk right along down this here crick,” I says, “till you get to where it comes out'n the woods and runs acrost the road in under an iron bridge. That's about a half a mile east. Jest after the road crosses the bridge it forks. Take the right fork and walk another half a mile and you'll see a little yaller-painted schoolhouse setting lonesome on a sand hill. They ain't no school in it now. You wait there fur me,” I says, “fur a couple of hours. After that if I ain't there you'll know I can't make it. But I think I'll make it.”
They looks at each other and they looks at me, and then they go off a little piece and talk low, and then the doctor says to me:
“Rube,” he says, “I don't know how you can work anything on us that hasn't been worked already. We've got nothing more we can lose. You go to it, Rube.” And they started off.
So I went over town. Jake Smith was setting on the piazza in front of his hotel, chawing and spitting tobacco, with his feet agin the railing like he always done, and one of his eyes squinched up and his hat over the other one.
“Jake,” I says, “where's that there doctor?”
Jake, he spit careful afore he answered, and he pulled his long, scraggly moustache careful, and he squinched his eyes at me. Jake was a careful man in everything he done.
“I dunno, Danny,” he says. “Why?”
“Well,” I says, “Hank sent me over to get that wagon and them hosses of theirn and finish that job.”
“That there wagon,” says Jake, “is in my barn, with Si Emery watching her, and she has got to stay there till the law lets her loose.” I figgered to myself Jake could use that team and wagon in his business, and was going to buy her cheap offn the town, what share of her he didn't figger he owned already.
“Why, Jake,” I says, “I hope they ain't been no trouble of no kind that has drug the law into your barn!”
“Well, Danny,” he says, “theyhasbeen a little trouble. But it's about over, now, I guess. And that there outfit belongs to the town now.”
“You don't say so!” says I, surprised-like. “When I seen them men last night it looked to me like they was too fine dressed to be honest.”
“I don't think they be, Danny,” says Jake, confidential. “In my opinion they is mighty bad customers. But they has got on the wrong side of the law now, and I guess they won't stay around here much longer.”
“Well,” says I, “Hank will be glad.”
“Fur what?” asts Jake.
“Well,” says I, “because he got his pay in advance fur that job and now he don't have to finish it. They come along to our place about sundown yesterday, and we nailed a shoe on one hoss. They was a couple of other hoofs needed fixing, and the tire on one of the hind wheels was beginning to rattle loose.”
I had noticed that loose tire when I was standing by the hind wheel the night before, and it come in handy now. So I goes on:
“Hank, he allowed he'd fix the hull thing fur six bottles of that Injun medicine. Elmira has been ailing lately, and he wanted it fur her. So they handed Hank out six bottles then and there.”
“Huh!” says Jake. “So the job is all paid fur, is it?”
“Yes,” says I, “and I was expecting to do it myself. But now I guess I'll go fishing instead. They ain't no other job in the shop.”
“I'll be dinged if you've got time to fish,” says Jake. “I'm expecting mebby to buy that rig off the town myself when the law lets loose of it. So if the fixing is paid fur, I want everything fixed.”
“Jake,” says I, kind of worried like, “I don't want to do it without that doctor says to go ahead.”
“They ain't his'n no longer,” says Jake.
“I dunno,” says I, “as you got any right to make me do it, Jake. It don't look to me like it's no harm to beat a couple of fellers like them out of their medicine. And Ididwant to go fishing this afternoon.”
But Jake was that careful and stingy he'd try to skin a hoss twicet if it died. He's bound to get that job done, now.
“Danny,” he says, “you gotto do that work. It ain'thonestnot to. What a young feller like you jest starting out into life wants to remember is to always be honest. Then,” says Jake, squinching up his eyes, “people trusts you and you get a good chancet to make money. Look at this here hotel and livery stable, Danny. Twenty years ago I didn't have no more'n you've got, Danny. But I always went by them mottoes—hard work and being honest. Yougottonail them shoes on, Danny, and fix that wheel.”
“Well, all right, Jake,” says I, “if you feel that way about it. Jest give me a chaw of tobacco and come around and help me hitch 'em up.”
Si Emery was there asleep on a pile of straw guarding that property. But Ralph Scott wasn't around. Si didn't wake up till we had hitched 'em up. He says he will ride around to the shop with me. But Jake says:
“It's all right, Si. I'll go over myself and fetch 'em back purty soon.” Which Si was wore out with being up so late the night before, and goes back to sleep agin right off.
Well, sir, they wasn't nothing went wrong. I drove slow through the village and past our shop. Hank come to the door of it as I went past. But I hit them hosses a lick, and they broke into a right smart trot. Elmira, she come onto the porch and I waved my hand at her. She put her hand up to her forehead to shut out the sun and jest stared. She didn't know I was waving her farewell. Hank, he yelled something at me, but I never hearn what. I licked them hosses into a gallop and went around the turn of the road. And that's the last I ever seen or hearn of Hank or Elmira or that there little town.
Islowed down when I got to the schoolhouse, and both them fellers piled in.
“I guess I better turn north fur about a mile and then turn west, Doctor Kirby,” I says, “so as to make a kind of a circle around that town.”
“Why, so, Rube?” he asts me.
“Well,” I says, “we left it going east, and they'll foller us east; so don't we want to be going west while they're follering east?”
Looey, he agreed with me. But he said it wouldn't be much use, fur we would likely be ketched up with and took back and hung or something, anyhow. Looey could get the lowest in his sperrits sometimes of any man I ever seen.
“Don't be afraid of that,” says the doctor. “They are not going to follow us.Theyknow they didn't get this property by due process of law.Theyaren't going to take the case into a county court where it will all come out about the way they robbed a couple of travelling men with a fake trial.”
“I guess you know more about the law'n I do,” I says. “I kind o' thought mebby we stole them hosses.”
“Well,” he says, “we got 'em, anyhow. And if they try to arrest us without a warrant there'll be the deuce to pay. But they aren't going to make any more trouble. I know these country crooks. They've got no stomach for trouble outside their own township.”
Which made me feel considerable better, fur I never been of the opinion that going agin the law done any one no good.
They looks around in that wagon, and all their stuff was there—Jake Smith and the squire having kep' it all together careful to make things seem more legal, I suppose—and the doctor was plumb tickled, and Looey felt as cheerful as he ever felt about anything. So the doctor says they has everything they needs but some ready money, and he'll get that sure, fur he never seen the time he couldn't.
“But, Looey,” he says, “I'm done with country hotels from now on. They've got the last cent they ever will from me—at least in the summer time.”
“How you going to work it?” Looey asts him, like he hasn't no hopes it will work right.
“Camp out,” says the doctor. “I've been thinking it all over.” Then he turns to me. “Rube,” he says, “where are you going?”
“Well,” I says, “I ain't pinted nowhere in pertic'ler except away from that town we just left. Which my name ain't Rube, Doctor Kirby, but Danny.”
“Danny what?” asts he.
“Nothing,” says I, “jest Danny.”
“Well, then, Danny,” says he, “how would you like to be an Indian?”
“Medical?” asts I, “or real?”
“Like Looey,” says he.
I tells him being a medical Injun and mixed up with a show like his'n would suit me down to the ground, and asts him what is the main duties of one besides the blankets and the feathers.
“Well,” he says, “this camping-out scheme of mine will take a couple of Indians. Instead of paying hotel and feed bills we'll pitch our tent,” he says, “at the edge of town in each sweet Auburn of the plains. We'll save money and we'll be near the throbbing heart of nature. And an Indian camp in each place will be a good advertisement for the Sagraw. You can look after the horses and learn to do the cooking and that kind o' thing. And maybe after while,” he says, kind o' working himself up to where he thought it was going to be real nice, “maybe after while I will give you some insight into the hidden mysteries of selling Siwash Indian Sagraw.”
“Well,” says I, “I'd like to learn that.”
“Would you?” says he, kind o' laughing at himself and me too, and yet kind o' enthusiastic, “well, then, the first thing you have to do is learn how to sell corn salve. Any one that can sell corn salve can sell anything. There's a farmhouse right over there, and I'll give you your first lesson right now. Rummage around in that satchel there under the seat and get me a tin box and some corn salve labels.”
I found a lot of labels, and some boxes too. The labels was all different sizes, but barring that they all looked about the same to me. Whilst I was sizing them up he asts me agin was they any corn salve ones in there.
“What colour label is it, Doctor Kirby?” I asts him. Fur they was blue labels and white labels and pink labels.
He looks at me right queer. “Can't you read the labels?” he says, right sharp.
“Well,” I says, “I never been much of a reader when it comes to different kind of medicines.”
“Corn salve is spelled only one way,” says he.
“That's right,” I says, “and you'd think I orter be able to pick out a common, ordinary thing like corn salve right off, wouldn't you?”
“Danny,” he says, “you don't mean to tell me you can't read anything at all?”
“I never told you nothing of the kind.”
He picks out a label.
“If you can read so fast, what's that?” he asts.
She is a pink one. I thinks to myself; she either is corn salve or else she ain't corn salve. And it ain't natcheral he will pick corn salve, fur he would think I would say that first off. So I'm betting it ain't. I takes a chancet on it.
“That,” says I, “is mighty easy reading. That is Siwash Injun Sagraw.” I lost.
“It's corn salve,” he says. “And Great Scott! They call this the twentieth century!”
“I never called it that,” says I, sort o' mad-like. Fur I was feeling bad Doctor Kirby had found out I was such a ignoramus.
“Where ignorance is bliss,” says he, “it is folly to be wise. But all the same, I'm going to take your education in hand and make you drink of life's Peruvian springs.” Or some spring like that it was.
And the doctor, he done it. Looey said it wouldn't be no use learning to read. He'd done a lot of reading, he said, and it never helped him none. All he ever read showed him this feller Hamlet was right, he said, when he wrote Shakespeare's works, and they wasn't much use in anything, without you had a lot o' money. And they wasn't no chancet to get that with all these here trusts around gobbling up everything and stomping the poor man into the dirt, and they was lots of times he wisht he was a Injun sure enough, and not jest a medical one, fur then he'd be a free man and the bosses and the trusts and the railroads and the robber tariff couldn't touch him. And then he shut up, and didn't say nothing fur a hull hour, except oncet he laughed.
Fur Doctor Kirby, he says, winking at me: “Looey, here, is a nihilist.”
“Is he,” says I, “what's that?” And the doctor tells me about how they blow up dukes and czars and them foreign high-mucky-mucks with dynamite. Which is when Looey laughed.