Ernest Haycox - Ernest Haycox - Ultimate Collection - Western Classics & Historical Novels

"You thought more of Denver than you thought of me!" cried Debbie. "You do now!"

"If you'd think straight," replied Steve, "you wouldn't say that. It's the same as sayin' a beefsteak tastes better than a rose smells. The things ain't the same."

She flung back her head. "We must fight this out, Steve! We must settle it! I'll be expecting you for supper tonight."

Steve sighed. "Debbie, it seems like yore askin' me to do things today I can't. I'll be in Sundown tonight."

Debbie looked away, stormy eyed. She bit her lips, moved restlessly. "I suppose I must wait, then. If it is ranch business it comes before me. At least I'm glad to know you've got business to keep you from running idle through the hills."

Steve said nothing, and Debbie challenged him swiftly. "It is ranch business, isn't it?"

He seemed to debate his answer. "I ain't in the habit of lyin'. No, it's not."

There was only one alternative in so far as Debbie was concerned. "Does it have anything to do with Denver—or Redmain?"

"Right now," said Steve, "I can't answer you, Debbie. Next time I come back I will."

"Then it does!" exclaimed Debbie. "You are going down there to mix up in Denver's quarrels again! Steve, I refuse to let you! The man's dead! Lou Redmain's done nothing to you! You've no business keeping up the fight. I refuse to let you, do you hear?"

Very slowly Steve answered: "I reckon you don't own the right to tell me whether I can go or stay, Debbie."

"Oh, don't I?" Debbie drew herself together. "Listen to me, Steve! If you don't come back here for supper you need never come back at all!"

A slow, brick-red mantle crawled up Steve's neck. "Mean that, Debbie?"

"You know I mean it! You be here!"

Steve startled her into stiff silence by the changed pitch of his talk. "You fool girl, I wish the Lord had given yuh enough sense to get in outa the rain. I've been pushed around, led around, shoved around by you and yore family until it's a wonder I still wear pants. Who ever told you a man could be cussed into shape? It's about time you learned your limits. I'm no Santy Claus, and I'm no Lord Fauntleroy. There's lots of things about me dead wrong, and I've got sense enough to know it. As regards them, you can have your say any day in the week. But when it's a question of how I conduct myself with men, how far I'm to ride, when I'm to draw out, what I'm to say, neither you nor any other woman that breathes has got the right of tellin' me a thing. I do my work, I'll take care of my own conscience without help. And I don't propose to be humbled in my own estimation or go around with Jim Coldfoot's whipped-dog air. You seem to want a dummy for a husband. Ain't you satisfied to be a woman without tryin' to be a man likewise? Who taught you how to treat a man, anyhow? Yuh been actin' like a nine-year-old girl who was afraid somebody was goin' to steal her dolly. Grow up and get some average common sense. You've sorta indicated durin' the last six months that 'most everything about me was haywire. All right, I admit it. I've had to do a man's work ever since I was ten years old, and Yellow Hill is no place to get the education of a scholar and a gentleman. As for Dave Denver, he's a better man than me any time, any place. And I owe him too blamed much to let the Lunt family interfere, which includes yore maw and paw, yore brothers and sisters, yore aunts and uncles and cousins, and all the rest of the tribe which has offered free advice on my conduct. If I'm the total loss yuh seem to think, I'll relieve you of the burden here and now. Don't expect me tonight or any other night. Ma'm, I'll bid you good-day."

He tipped his hat, turned, and spurred off. Nightingale joined him, and they galloped across the meadow. As the trees reached out to close them in Steve looked around; Debbie still stood by the gate, crying. Steve groaned, said, "Aw, hell!" and shot past the astonished Englishman.

They reached town near the middle of the afternoon, racking their horses in front of the hotel. Nightingale cocked his blue eyes on Steve for further information.

"I tell you," decided Steve. "You better bed down somewhere so not to draw too much attention. Nothin's booked to happen till after seven."

"Well enough," said the Englishman. "I shall get whatever newspapers are available and settle right yonder in the porch rocking chair for some leisurely reading. Give me the appropriate gesture when you are ready."

"Read?" grunted Steve, whose increasing nervous tension would not let him be still. "Imagine that!"

"Well, yes," murmured Nightingale, sauntering away. "People have been known to do it."

Steve rolled to the nearest building wall and leaned against it. Under the pretext of building a smoke he ran his glance from one end of the street to the other. Sundown seemed unduly empty until he caught partial sight of a crowd inside the courthouse. Promptly he strolled across and went in, his entry marked by a sharp gavel tap. The judge was speaking.

"...Thus with all the evidence before me, I am bound to render decision. Litigants will remember that while the broad and noble structure of the law incorporates and irradiates the sum of human wisdom and human error of the toiling centuries, it is not meet to say that it represents always infallible justice. The law is both an embodiment of common sense and arbitrary rule, without which confusion would reign sans end. The law is an increasingly crystallized thing, a thing of tangible substance, form, and shape. The forms of the law are, as it were, the ribs which hold in the essence of the social body, and if, perchance, some of that essence should trickle through those ribs and fall wasted to the receptive earth, we can only say that nothing conceived by mortal man is perfect, and nothing conceived by mortal man will ever cover the infinite vagaries of social experience and the multitudinous variations of human conduct. With that in mind this court made the attempt to bring plaintiff and defendant into harmony before trial. Failing, this action ensued, dragging its weary lucubrations over the diurnal face of the calendar."

The court paused and scratched its judicial nose.

Up from the packed and stricken silence wavered a faint cry.

"True, brother, true."

Sheriff Ortez leaned against Steve and whispered, "All this fer a six-dollar pony on the aidge of nervous breakdown. Nobuddy can say the judge ain't give 'em their money's worth."

"In re Wilgus versus Tuggs," stated the court, "concerning the identity and ownership of one male horse of problematical age, unknown antecedents, and endless branding, we find for the plaintiff. So entered."

Wilgus rose grinning from his seat and yelled. "I said it was my hoss all the time and I could of told you in the beginning! What's mine's mine, and I'll have it! Let that be a lesson to you, Tuggs!"

The gavel slammed down. "Five dollars for contempt of this court," said the judge.

Wilgus subsided, muttering. Fear Langdell rose. "Your honor, may I thank you for the just verdict? To my client this represents a sweeping corroboration of a principle. And now I should like to present the bill of costs, to be entered against the defendant for payment."

"You bet," mumbled Wilgus. "He lost. Let him pay."

"The clerk will read the bill of costs," said the court.

The clerk accepted the statement from Langdell, shifted his tobacco and read without emotion.

"'...Do swear the following items have been personally and beforehand paid by plaintiff, as follows:

"'To stable rent at Grover's two weeks—$ 15.00

To extra feed—37.75

To 45 bales hay, extra bedding on acc't feeble condition of animal in question—22.50

To carpenter work, knocking out stall for extra space, also on acc't feeble condition—12.50

To material, same—8.30