Lin McLean - Owen Wister (read after TXT) 📗

while Jode grew quieter and colder under the certainty of victory. It was after twelve o’clock when the people came from church, and no change or sign was to be seen. Jode told us, with a chill smile, that he had visited his instruments and found no new indications. Fifteen minutes after that the sky was brown. Sudden, padded, dropsical clouds were born in the blue above our heads. They blackened, and a smart shower, the first in two months, wet us all, and ceased. The sun blazed out, and the sky came blue again, like those rapid, unconvincing weather changes of the drama.

Amazement at what I saw happening in the heavens took me from things on earth, and I was unaware of the universal fit that now seized upon Cheyenne until I heard the high cry of Jode at my ear. His usual punctilious bearing had forsaken him, and he shouted alike to stranger and acquaintance: “It is no half-inch, sir! Don’t you tell me”’ And the crowd would swallow him, but you could mark his vociferous course as he went proclaiming to the world. “A failure, sir! The fellow’s an impostor, as I well knew. It’s no half-inch!” Which was true.

“What have you got to say to that?” we asked Hilbrun, swarming around him.

“If you’ll just keep cool,” said he—“it’s only the first instalment. In about two hours and a half I’ll give you the rest.”

Soon after four the dropsical clouds materialized once again above open-mouthed Cheyenne. No school let out for an unexpected holiday, no herd of stampeded range cattle, conducts itself more miscellaneously. Gray, respectable men, with daughters married, leaped over fences and sprang back, prominent legislators hopped howling up and down door-steps, women waved handkerchiefs from windows and porches, the chattering Jode flew from anemometer to rain-gauge, and old Judge Burrage apostrophized Providence in his front yard, with the postmaster’s label still pinned to his back. Nobody minded the sluicing downpour—this second instalment was much more of a thing than the first—and Hilbrun alone kept a calm exterior—the face of the man who lifts a heavy dumb-bell and throws an impressive glance at the audience. Assistant Lusk was by no means thus proof against success I saw him put a bottle back in his pocket, his face already disintegrated with a tipsy leer. Judge Burrage, perceiving the rain-maker, came out of his gate and proceeded toward him, extending the hand of congratulation. “Mr. Hilbrun,” said he, “I am Judge Burrage—the Honorable T. Coleman Burrage—and I will say that I am most favorably impressed with your shower.”

“His shower!” yelped Jode, flourishing measurements.

“Why, yu’ don’t claim it’s yourn, do yu’?” said Lin McLean, grinning.

“I tell you it’s no half-inch yet, gentlemen,” said Jode, ignoring the facetious puncher.

“You’re mistaken,” said Hilbrun, sharply.

“It’s a plumb big show, half-inch or no half-inch,” said Lin.

“If he’s short he don’t get his money,” said some ignoble subscriber

“Yes, he will,” said the Governor,“or I’m a short. He’s earned it.”

“You bet ”’ said Lin. “Fair and square. If they’re goin’ back on yu’, doctor, I’ll chip—Shucks!” Lin’s hand fell from the empty pocket; he remembered his wad in the stake-holder’s hands, and that he now possessed possibly two dollars in silver, all told. “I can’t chip in, doctor,” he said. “That hobo over there has won my cash, an’ he’s filling up on the prospect right now. I don’t care! It’s the biggest show I’ve ever saw. You’re a dandy, Mr. Hilbrun! Whoop!” And Lin clapped the rain-maker on the shoulder, exulting. He had been too well entertained to care what he had in his pocket, and his wife had not yet occurred to him.

They were disputing about the rainfall, which had been slightly under half an inch in a few spots, but over it in many others; and while we stood talking in the renewed sunlight, more telegrams were brought to Jode, saying that there was no moisture anywhere, and simultaneously with these, riders dashed into town with the news that twelve miles out the rain had flattened the grain crop. We had more of such reports from as far as thirty miles, and beyond that there had not been a drop or a cloud. It staggered one’s reason; the brain was numb with surprise.

“Well, gentlemen,” said the rain-maker, “I’m packed up, and my train’ll be along soon—would have been along by this, only it’s late. What’s the word as to my three hundred and fifty dollars?”

Even still there were objections expressed. He had not entirely performed his side of the contract.

“I think different, gentlemen,” said he. “But I’ll unpack and let that train go. I can’t have the law on you, I suppose. But if you don’t pay me” (the rain-maker put his hands in his pockets and leaned against the fence) “I’ll flood your town.”

In earthquakes and eruptions people end by expecting anything; and in the total eclipse that was now over all Cheyenne’s ordinary standards and precedents the bewildered community saw in this threat nothing more unusual than if he had said twice two made four. The purse was handed over.

“I’m obliged,” said Hilbrun, simply.

“If I had foreseen, gentlemen,” said Jode, too deeply grieved now to feel anger, “that I would even be indirectly associated with your losing your money through this—this absurd occurrence, I would have declined to help you. It becomes my duty,” he continued, turning coldly to the inebriated Lusk, “to hand this to you, sir.” And the assistant lurchingly stuffed his stakes away.

“It’s worth it,” said Lin. “He’s welcome to my cash.”

“What’s that you say, Lin McLean?” It was the biscuit-shooter, and she surged to the front.

“I’m broke. He’s got it. That’s all,” said Lin, briefly.

“Broke! You!” She glared at her athletic young lord, and she uttered a preliminary howl.

At that long-lost cry Lusk turned his silly face. “It’s my darling Kate,” he said. “Why, Kate!”

The next thing that I knew Ogden and I were grappling with Lin McLean; for everything had happened at once. The bride had swooped upon her first wedded love and burst into tears on the man’s neck, which Lin was trying to break in consequence. We do not always recognize our benefactors at sight. They all came to the ground, and we hauled the second husband off. The lady and Lusk remained in a heap, he foolish, tearful, and affectionate; she turned furiously at bay, his guardian angel, indifferent to the onlooking crowd, and hurling righteous defiance at Lin. “Don’t yus dare lay yer finger on my husband, you sagebrush bigamist!” is what the marvelous female said.

“Bigamist?” repeated Lin, dazed at this charge. “I ain’t,” he said to Ogden and me. “I never did. I’ve never married any of ‘em before her.”

“Little good that’ll do yus, Lin McLean! Me and him was man and wife before ever I come acrosst yus.”

“You and him?” murmured the puncher.

“Her and me,” whimpered Lusk. “Sidney.” He sat up with a limp, confiding stare at everybody.

“Sidney who?” said Lin.

“No, no,” corrected Lusk, crossly—“Sidney, Nebraska.”

The stakes at this point fell from his pocket which he did not notice. But the bride had them in safe-keeping at once.

“Who are yu’, anyway—when yu’ ain’t drunk?” demanded Lin.

“He’s as good a man as you, and better,” snorted the guardian angel. “Give him a pistol, and he’ll make you hard to find.”

“Well, you listen to me, Sidney Nebraska—” Lin began.

“No, no,” corrected Lusk once more, as a distant whistle blew—“Jim.”

“Goodbye, gentlemen,” said the rain-maker. “That’s the west-bound. I’m perfectly satisfied with my experiment here, and I’m off to repeat it at Salt Lake City.”

“You are?” shouted Lin McLean. “Him and Jim’s going to work it again! For goodness’ sake, somebody lend me twenty-five dollars!”

At this there was an instantaneous rush. Ten minutes later, in front of the ticket-windows there was a line of citizens buying tickets for Salt Lake as if it had been Madame Bernhardt. Some rock had been smitten, and ready money had flowed forth. The Governor saw us off, sad that his duties should detain him. But Jode went!

“Betting is the fool’s argument, gentlemen,” said he to Ogden, McLean, and me, “and it’s a weary time since I have had the pleasure.”

“Which way are yu’ bettin’?” Lin asked.

“With my principles, sir,” answered the little signal-service officer.

“I expect I ain’t got any,” said the puncher. “It’s Jim I’m backin’ this time.”

“See here,” said I; “I want to talk to you.” We went into another car, and I did.

“And so yu’ knowed about Lusk when we was on them board walks?” the puncher said.

“Do you mean I ought to have—”

“Shucks! no. Yu’ couldn’t. Nobody couldn’t. It’s a queer world, all the same. Yu’ have good friends, and all that.” He looked out of the window.” Laramie already!” he commented, and got out and walked by himself on the platform until we had started again. “Yu’ have good friends,” he pursued, settling himself so his long legs were stretched and comfortable, “and they tell yu’ things, and you tell them things. And when it don’t make no particular matter one way or the other, yu’ give ‘em your honest opinion and talk straight to ‘em, and they’ll come to you the same way. So that when yu’re ridin’ the range alone sometimes, and thinkin’ a lot o’ things over on top maybe of some dog-goned hill, you’ll say to yourself about some fellow yu’ know mighty well, ‘There’s a man is a good friend of mine.’ And yu’ mean it. And it’s so. Yet when matters is serious, as onced in a while they’re bound to get, and yu’re in a plumb hole, where is the man then—your good friend? Why, he’s where yu’ want him to be. Standin’ off, keepin’ his mouth shut, and lettin’ yu’ find your own trail out. If he tried to show it to yu’, yu’d likely hit him. But shucks! Circumstances have showed me the trail this time, you bet!” And the puncher’s face, which had been sombre, grew lively, and he laid a friendly hand on my knee.

“The trail’s pretty simple,” said I.

“You bet! But it’s sure a queer world. Tell yu’,” said Lin, with the air of having made a discovery, “when a man gets down to bed-rock affairs in this life he’s got to do his travellin’ alone, same as he does his dyin’. I expect even married men has thoughts and hopes they don’t tell their wives.”

“Never was married,” said I.

“Well—no more was I. Let’s go to bed.” And Lin shook my hand, and gave me a singular, rather melancholy smile.

At Salt Lake City, which Ogden was glad to include in his Western holiday, we found both Mormon and Gentile ready to give us odds against rain—only I noticed that those of the true faith were less free. Indeed; the Mormon, the Quaker, and most sects of an isolated doctrine have a nice prudence in money. During our brief stay we visited the sights: floating in the lake, listening to pins drop in the gallery of the Tabernacle, seeing frescos of saints in robes speaking from heaven to Joseph Smith in the Sunday clothes of a modern farm-hand, and in the street we heard at a distance a strenuous domestic talk between the new— or perhaps I should say the original— husband and wife.

“She’s corralled Sidney’s cash!” said the delighted Lin. “He can’t bet nothing on this shower “

And then, after all, this time—it didn’t rain!

Stripped of money both ways, Cheyenne, having most fortunately purchased a return ticket, sought its home. The perplexed rain-maker went somewhere else, without his assistant. Lusk’s exulting wife, having the money, retained him with her.

“Good luck to yu’, Sidney!” said