EVIDENTLY NOT

by W. C. Tuttle

Author of “Local Option in Loco Land,” “Pirates from Piperock,” etc.

“Anyway, I don’t believe it, ‘Magpie’,” says I, and that starts an argument.

It don’t take much for me and that long-complected cow-trailer to start an argument. All that one of us has got to do is to say, “I don’t think so,” and the stuff is all off, ’cause the other one does think so and he’s right there when it comes to telling why.

Magpie Simpkins pulls his bronc across the trail and proceeds to make a cigaret while he ponders on the proper procedure to make me disagree with myself.

We’re in a strange land, me and Magpie. We’ve been away over in the Buffalo Basin country, where some misguided hombre said there was gold. It had been told to us thusly—

“They say there is gold in the Buffalo Basin.”

Just “they” was the only authority, which don’t give you nobody in particular to kill off for lying, but me and Magpie are willing to hold up our right hands and swear, to the best of our ability, that “they” lied.

Punching a pack-train of burros is slow going, so we traded our long-eared rolling-stock for a couple of broncs and saddles, and here we are cutting across the State, aiming to hit Yaller Rock County eventually.

“You’re wrong, Ike,” says Magpie after his smoke is going good. “Circumstantial evidence is as good or as bad as any other kind. If it wasn’t for circumstantial evidence we wouldn’t need a penitentiary—especially out here, where mostly every man who is arrested is guilty of something. Maybe he ain’t guilty of what he’s charged with, Ike, but he’s plenty guilty of something just as bad. It ain’t noways possible for every crime to have a witness and you can’t acquit a feller just because he sneaked up on his criminal occupation in the dark when everybody was in bed.”

“Just the same, I don’t believe in it,” says I. “I don’t believe in putting a feller behind the bars just because he can’t prove he’s innocent. Sometimes, Magpie, things figure out so a feller just can’t prove things, and he ought to have the benefit of the doubt.”

“Feller men should be circumspect,” says Magpie wise-like.

I don’t know what he means and I’m danged sure he don’t.

“Each and every man’s life should be a open book for all to read. No man should ever be placed in a position where he can’t explain the what and whyfor of every little minute of his life. Skulduggery and deception pilgrim hand in hand.”

“Well,” says I, “you brings in words that astounds me, and I can’t say much in reply to things I don’t savvy, but down deep into me heart, liver and lights, Magpie, I know you’re crazy, but——”

“There ain’t no ‘buts’, Ike. If every man lived free and open——”

Zing!

Magpie’s saddle-horn is just plain steel, never having been covered with leather, and that bullet skipped off that bare knob and sings sweet-like off into the brush. Then cometh the pop of the rifle. Me and Magpie sets there and looks at that saddle-horn.

“Somebody shooting at coyotes,” opines Magpie. “Wild bullet.”

“I don’t think so,” says I. “I think that somebody——”

“Now, Ike, it ain’t reasonable to suppose that anybody——”

Splut!

A slug cuts right past my hip and tears a sizable hole in the cantle of my saddle. I falls right off that bronc and sets down in the brush, and Magpie follers me.

“There goes your old argument,” says I. “I was right.”

“Not necessarily, Ike. There might ’a’ been two coyotes.”

Can you beat that? Even when another bullet seeps into the mesquite he ain’t convinced. Me and him are heeled with six-guns, but they ain’t much use against rifles.

“You argues in favor of circumstantial evidence, Magpie, and when said evidence presents itself you deny it.”

“Yeah? How about you, Ike? You don’t believe it, but you hops on to a chance to use it at the slightest opportunity.”

“I ain’t hopping on to nothing! I don’t need to be shot at more than twice before I gets a hunch that I’m excess meat in this vale of tears.”

“Pshaw! You’re finicky, Ike. Maybe them bullets wasn’t noways——”

“Just lay them guns on the earth and reach for a cloud,” says a soft voice, and we stops our argument.

There’s four of ’em, and every way we looks we’re staring down the muzzle of a rifle. One of them fellers is wearing a star, but she ain’t the star of hope for us. He hands out a pair of handcuffs and they seems to fit us fine. Then they makes us get on to our broncs and leads us away.

“We’ll sneak into town from the far side,” says the sheriff. “We sure got to go easy-like, boys, ’cause they’re watching for us.”

“We thought you was shooting at coyotes,” says Magpie.

“You’re a danged good guesser, feller,” says the sheriff, and that’s all that was said.

It was enough. They takes us off our broncs out behind a barn and then they eases us behind fences and sheds until they slams us into a ’dobe jail.

“Nobody seen us,” grins the sheriff, “and it’s a danged good thing, ’cause if the bunch knowed we had ’em in here they’d paw this here jail all to pieces.”

“Not wishing to be inquisitive,” says Magpie, “but I’d admire to know why you puts us in here?”

“Reckon you need telling?” asks the sheriff mean-like.

“Feller kinda likes to know,” admits Magpie.

“Well, being as you two has likely committed so many crimes that you has to find out which one you’re jailed for, I’ll tell you that you’re in jail for robbing the Greasewood bank and shooting the cashier. Sabe? Now you better lay low until we can take you to War Bonnet, ’cause this here jail won’t stand no rough use. The sentiment runs to necktie parties, ’cause that cashier was popular.”

“Ain’t you afraid they’ll get out, Zeb?” asks one of them. “Maybe some of us better stay and look out for ’em.”

“Nope. We don’t want nobody to suspicion they’re here. Sabe? We’ll all ride away again and show up here after dark without no prisoners. They’ll have the road to War Bonnet watched, but as soon as they hear we didn’t have no luck, they’ll come in.” And then he turns to us. “You fellers ain’t got a chance in the world if you do get out. You’d just about—— Say, I got a scheme. Take off your clothes.”

“Our clothes?” asks Magpie foolish-like.

“Yeah. Hand ’em out to me. I reckon you won’t get loose none to speak about.”

What could we do? We undresses and gives them our clothes, and when they locks the outside door me and Magpie Simpkins are as bare as the day we came into this life of few years and full of trouble. Me and Magpie sets there and gawps at each other.

“Venice,” says Magpie. “How is all the little Milos?”

“Tolable, Godiva, tolable.”

We sets there and stares into space for a while.

“You ought to be satisfied with the evidence,” says I. “It ain’t noways possible for every crime to have a witness, and——”

“Pshaw, they ain’t got nothing to hold us on, Ike.”

“Nope. Me and you are foolish to stay here. Being a open book, so to speak, you ought to read ’em a few paragraphs, Magpie.”

“Sh-h-h-h!”

We hugs the wall of the cell and listens to some folks talking.

“Well, they ain’t caught ’em yet, that’s a cinch. The sheriff will just about ride seventeen broncs to death and catch nobody.”

“Uh-huh. Nobody seen ’em? Nobody got any idea where they went?”

“Nope. Old man Stivers walks into the bank and finds Abe Walters laying on the floor. Whole danged town was asleep, I reckon. Believe me, the law won’t deal with this case. Everybody liked Abe.”

Their voices fades away and me and Magpie sighs deep-like.

“I—I wish I had a cigaret,” says Magpie. “I’m going to kill that sheriff for taking my tobacco and papers.”

We sets there out of range of that window and watches night come along. As soon as it gets dark Magpie begins to vesticate around. The bottom of the one little window is about six feet from the floor and is guarded with four bars.

Magpie yanks the bunk under it and climbs up. Pretty soon he begins to laugh.

“No wonder that sheriff handicaps us, Ike. These bars are only stuck into the ’dobe mud.”

He yanks and grunts for a while and then hops down. “Liberty confronts us, Ike. Let’s be going.”

“Not me, Magpie. I may look well in the nude in a jail, but I sure ain’t going to mingle in no society like this. Do all the libertying you desire, old-timer, but excuse me. Good luck to you.”

“You mean you’re going to stick here and get hung?”

“I mean that I stays here; the hanging is a future consideration.”

Magpie spits on his hands and seems to consider the height of the window.

“Well, give me a boost then,” says I. “I ain’t as tall as you are.”

That blasted window was made for small men to escape out of—men who ain’t bow-legged. I lost skin off both sides of me when I squeezed through, and when I hit the earth I’m in a cactus patch. Magpie slides through and lit setting down.

“——!” he snorts. “Why didn’t you tell me about them cactus?”

“I didn’t think there was any left, Magpie, except what’s in me.”

We sneaked around a corner of the street and almost runs into a big building which is all lit up. We can hear somebody orating loud and clear.

“Sunday night, Ike!” grunts Magpie, “What luck!”

“Go to church if you want to, Magpie. I won’t.”

He mumbles something about fools, as he climbs over a fence, and I climbs over with him.

“What’s the main idea?” I asks as we lean up against a house.

“Ike, it’s reasonable to suppose that men live in houses, ain’t it? Ain’t it reasonable to suppose that they might have more clothes than they’ve got on? I’m going to get clothes.”

I’m no burglar. Neither is Magpie, for that matter, but nobody ever done a better job. The window was nailed down, so we smashed it out. Ever get into a strange house in the dark? Don’t do it! Take chances on the penitentiary and pack a lantern.

We opened the first door we felt—and stepped off into the cellar.

“Looking for preserved pants?” I asks, feeling for busted bones.

“Ike, you’d seem comical if I hadn’t hit my head on the spud-bin.”

Then we crawled back up-stairs and explored a while.

“This is the dangest mixed-up house I ever seen!” grunts Magpie, pawing around the knob of a door.

“Pete!” snaps a female voice. “Pete Bowers, you’re drunk again, ain’t you? Too drunk to talk, eh? Sunday night, too, of all nights! I’ve got a notion to take a club to you!”

“Yash’m,” mutters Magpie, backing into me.

“Don’t you ‘yash’m’ me! You undress and get into this bed or I’ll come out there and take you apart!”

We stands still for a whole minute and then hears her yawn.

“Ho-hum-m-m-m!” Then the bed squeaks as she gets up. “Well, I reckon I’ve got to undress you, you drunken pup!”

And she strikes a match!

Yes, we went some. Ever try running in a strange house in the dark? Any old time I feel like running again, I’ll pick a sixty-acre field in the middle of the day—and it won’t be even a cloudy day. I led the procession. Lucky for us I found a door, but unlucky for us it was the cellar door again.

When we got through pawing each other around the place, Magpie wrenched a rocking-chair off my neck and used it to bust out the little window. We don’t no more than get over the fence when we hears that gentle housewife’s voice again.

“Go ahead! Don’t mind me, Pete. Go way off where you’ve got plenty of room to stagger around. Ho-hum-m-m-m! That’s what alkyhol does to a he-human, I reckon.” And we hears her shut the window.

“Gosh!” gasps Magpie, unhooking a tin can off his toes. “I hates to be glad over a man’s misfortune, but I’m glad Pete drinks.”

“There’s circumstantial evidence for you, Magpie. Pete will likely come home sober and get —— whaled out of him for getting drunk and busting up the furniture.”

“As I said before, Ike, a man may not be guilty as charged, but he’s guilty of something just as bad. Pete must be guilty of drinking or she’d never mistake us for him. See how it works?”

“Maybe he don’t always bust up furniture, Magpie.”

“To that argument, Ike, I will say this: They’ve got so danged much furniture that she won’t never miss a few chairs or a sofy or two.”

“Let’s go back to the nice little jail, Magpie,” I suggests. “I ain’t worth a dang undressed. The shades of night may be drawn, but just the same my conscience bothers me. You can boost me in——”

“Yeah, like ——! Want to get lynched?”

“Well, I’d at least be dying with my pants on. Somebody is going to kill us pretty soon anyway.”

“Keep your nerve, Ike. Nerves will win.”

“Nerve ain’t no good when you ain’t got no pants. I’d fight a buzz-saw when I’m dressed, Magpie, but this Adam and Eve business saps my nervous system until she don’t register a spark. Where are we headed for now?”

“After something to give you courage, dang you! I’m tired of hearing you kick. Dang the man who throws loose cans around! How in thunder do you miss ’em, Ike?”

“Walking in your footsteps, Magpie. Your feet are so darn big that I has a clear trail.”

I followed him over another fence and to the side of another house. This time the window was loose, and we slides inside. For fear of another cellar door we crawls this time. Magpie finds a bureau with matches on it, so we pulls down the shade and lights a lamp. There didn’t seem to be a soul in the house. Magpie rustled into a closet and comes out with a suit of clothes. He didn’t tell me it was the only suit in the place; he just holds her up and asks me if I’ll wear it.

“Not me,” says I, “I’d never make a good preacher, ’cause I’m so bow-legged that the devil could get behind me without going around.”

That suit was made for a short hombre who wears a forty-eight coat. Magpie has plenty of room in a thirty-eight and has the longest legs in Montana. He got into that layout and then stands out in the middle of the room while I lays on the bed and sobs like a baby. Honest to grandma, I never seen anything like him! He’s got one of them flat-topped black hats, a collar that hooks in the back and that long loose black coat and them pants that hit him between the knee and the ankle. He made the shoes fit by cutting holes for his big toes.

He looks at me pious-like and says—“Brother, ain’t you going to cover up your shame?”

I wipes the tears out of my eyes and hunts for something to wear. I sure went through everything, but all I can find in man’s clothes is a pair of them elastic-topped shoes with the rubber wore out. Magpie sets down in a chair and watches me hunt.

“Dang your hide, help me, can’t you?” I yelps. “I’ve got to have something to wear, ain’t I?”

“Yes,” says he, “I’d opine you have, and it looks like skirts.”

“Like ——! How would I look in skirts? Not for me!”

“Ike, that church will soon be out and then we’ll have to fight our way loose. You—get—into—them—skirts! Sabe!”

“Well, dang you, Magpie, give me help!”

“I don’t know a thing about ’em, Ike.”

“You can button me up, can’t you?” I yelled. “Don’t act so uppish! Do I put on the straight-jacket first or don’t I?”

“You’ll make a —— of a looking woman, Ike. Your whiskers are two inches long.”

“They are,” says I, cinching myself into the thing, “but I’d rather be a bearded lady than a nude corpse. I’ll find something to put over my face until I get killed or find a razor.”

I gets into everything that seemed to have an entrance and buttons, while Magpie sets there and cries on his own bosom. My dress was white, with pink flowers on it, and the sleeves only comes to my elbows.

I found a pair of green stockings and managed to squeeze my feet into that pair of elastic-topped shoes. Then I got a hat. Man, that was some war bonnet. It’s got some red roses on it and right up the front rears the wing of a dove. It sets fine on the back of my head. Then I found some stuff to drape over my face.

Magpie digs into the bureau and finds two six-guns. He hangs one in the tail of his coat while I shoves the other into the bosom of my dress.

“Now, suppose somebody sees us going away, Magpie,” says I. “Don’t you reckon they’ll wonder where we’re going?”

“More than likely. We may have to shoot our way loose, Ike. Reckon we’ll take them two empty valises over there, so she’ll look like we was going some place. They’re empty but locked, so we’ll just take ’em along to make the play good.”

Now I don’t want you folks to think that me and Magpie didn’t have no morals. There is some things you have to do, but that ain’t no reason why you can’t square it later on.

We shut the window and went to the front door.

“We’ll walk right out like we owned the shanty,” says Magpie, but just as he reached for the knob somebody knocked. I reached for my bosom, but Magpie just turned the knob and opened the door.

“Ah, Reverend—” says a soft voice and I sees two men on the steps, and they’ve got their hats in their hands.

“Reverend, we-all is from War Bonnet. Sabe? War Bonnet has delegated us to come up here and offer to double any ante that Greasewood has made you-all. We comes to hire you out at your own salary. Is you receptive?”

“There’s more sinners in War Bonnet than ever dared to hive up here,” squeaks the other feller. “You’d have a hyiu place to show off. War Bonnet is going to have a preacher or bust a cinch.”

“We brings a wagon,” states the first feller, “and we can take you-all right with us and haul down your effects later on.”

“The raven fed Elijah,” gasps Magpie. “Lead us to that wagon.”

“Name’s Pearce,” says the soft speaker; “called ‘Peaceful’ ’cause I ain’t. This feller is knowed as ‘Happy,’ ’cause he never was. Last name’s Harmon. Come on, folks.”

We rode out of town in the wagon, Magpie and Peaceful in the front seat and me and Happy in the back. It was some road, believe me. Peaceful missed most of the rocks with the front wheels, but the rear wheels didn’t seem to interest him none to speak about. Sudden-like we lifts high on one side, the same of which seems to unbalance me, and then we slams the other side into a rock, and the preacher’s wife grabbed for the seat and got her hands full of grass.

I sets there in the dark, with my feet tangled in my skirt, and tries to get that bonnet off my nose.

“Lawdee!” I hears Peaceful grunt. “Reverend, you-all’s wife is overboard!”

“She sure is!” I yelps through my hat. “You —— fool, you couldn’t herd a cow down a lane!”

All is still for a moment and then Peaceful says:

“I’m plumb glad, Reverend, that you-all’s wife ain’t one of them there ‘holier than thou’ sort of females. She sure speaks up.”

“Emily,” says Magpie choking-like, “get back on the wagon.”

“All right, Mose,” says I, and just as I climbs in several fellers rides up and seems to surround us.

“Who are you?” asks a voice.

“Hello, ‘Baldy’,” says Happy. “Who wants to know?”

“Hello, Happy. Who’s with you?”

“My Uncle Mose, Aunt Emily and Peaceful Pearce.”

“Howdy, Peaceful,” says another. “This is Pete Myers.”

“I recognizes you, Pete. Who you-all expecting?”

“Nobody much. Evenin’, folks,” and they rides away.

We jolts along for a spell and then Happy says:

“Ma’am, every time I hear of anybody by the name of Mose I think of bulrushes. Does you connect your husband with that Bible story?”

“Partly,” says I, “the first part. He’s never rushed.”

“You-all got a cold, ma’am?” asks Peaceful. “Voice sounds thick. Ever put anything around your neck?”

“Just took something off,” says I. “Didn’t do me any good.”

“Rocking-chair ain’t much benefit,” says Magpie.

“Never heard of using one,” says Peaceful. “How does you go about it?”

“Hang it on your neck in the dark.”

“One of them there charm cures, eh?” asks Happy. “Might benefit.”

“Never has,” says Magpie, “but there’s a first time for everything.”

Then we drove into War Bonnet.

War Bonnet is just about the same size as Paradise. If you don’t know what size Paradise is, you ain’t got nothing on anybody else, ’cause there ain’t never been a census taken. Once in a while they totals up the casualties for the year and holds sort of a memorial, but the exact amount of survivors fluctuates.

War Bonnet strikes me as being a danged bad place to have your gun stick. I envies a picture I seen once. It was called “The Cow Girl.” I never seen a cow girl in my whole life, but this picture shows her with a belt around her waist and a big Colt hanging in the holster.

My gun is down inside my bosom so far that I can’t seem to get it loose, and that danged hammer is digging into me until I feels that I’m going to be a heap tattooed around the waistline.

Peaceful herds them broncs up to the door of a house. I reckon that news travels fast, ’cause Peaceful says to a woman who comes to the door—

“Ma, we got ’em.”

And it ain’t more than a minute until the front yard is full of female folks.

“Get out, Emily, and remember you’re the spouse of a sky-pilot,” whispers Magpie.

Happy helped me out—or rather yanked me out. I asks him if he’s married, and he whispers—

“Not now. Why?”

I didn’t get a chance to tell him, ’cause just then Magpie hops off the front wheel without thinking of that heavy six-gun in the tail of his coat. It caught inside the wagon-box as he dropped, and then she flips high and handsome and comes down on his head. Magpie sinks to his knees and Peaceful and Happy bows their heads and takes off their hats. They never seen him get hit.

Pretty soon Magpie staggers to his feet and says some words under his breath that you’ll likely find in the Bible, but not all in one sentence, and the herd surrounds us.

One old girl got her arms around my neck and I has a —— of a time to keep her from rooting into my whiskers.

“Glory be!” she gurgles. “Oh, we need a minister so bad.”

“That’s the kind you’ve got,” says I, and then I gets near enough to Magpie to kick him on the ankle.

“Razor!” I hisses in his ear. “I ain’t no bearded lady!”

“Brethren,” says Magpie, “canst any one loan me the lend of a razor? We comes away sudden-like, and my wife is so danged particular that she won’t let me be seen in public without a shave.”

Razors? Say, a barber would starve to death in a community like that.

“You-all hives up in my house tonight,” says Peaceful, herding us inside, and War Bonnet’s best citizens follers us in. Them women seems to consider me a heap and it makes me nervous.

“I’d admire to go somewhere and fix up a little,” says I. “I fell out of that danged dead-ax wagon, and I has a feeling that I sat on a cactus.”

“Haw! Haw—” begins somebody, but shuts right up.

“Right this way,” says Peaceful, and he lets me and Magpie into a bedroom. Magpie has a lump the size of an egg on top of his head where that gun hit him. Both of my green stockings has come down and are under my shoes, and that fall seems to have unbuttoned my dress until that straight-jacket sticks out through the back. Magpie looks me over and seems to choke with emotion.

“Ike, you’re the wildest-looking wife I ever had.”

Just then somebody knocks on the door.

“Parson, what denomination does you represent?”

Magpie looks at me foolish-like and then back at the door.

“Round church—circular sect.”

“Oh,” says the feller. “I hoped you was a Baptist.”

“New on me, Magpie,” says I. “Round church?”

“Uh-huh. Paw said it was the best kind, ’cause the devil can’t corner you, Ike.”

As far back as I can remember, Ike Harper’s face has been partly obscured with hair, but for once he gets a clean view of it.

My golden hair ain’t hanging down my back, but I’ve got enough to bluff with. Magpie shaved my arms to the elbow and smoothed his own face a little. He also cinched up my dress and I managed to pin them green stockings so they won’t trip me.

“Now,” says I, “as soon as they gets into bed we’ll make our sneak.”

“Uh-huh. Just as soon as we can, Ike. Hang on to your nerve and don’t cuss. We’ve got to locate some broncs. Remember you’re a lady, Ike. More than that, old-timer, you’re the wife of a preacher. Let’s face the music.”

That parlor is sure filled with folks. Peaceful seems to be sort of a leader. He comes up to Magpie and says:

“Reverend, I’m dawg-gone sorry, but I ain’t never heard your name. I wants to introduce you-all to the folks.”

“My name?” Magpie looks around foolish-like. “Thought you knowed it. I’m the Reverend Moses—er—Meek. This female person is Emily. Being married to me makes her Meek, too.”

We shakes hands all around and then a tall, lanky female says to me:

“Seems like your face is familiar, dearie. What was your maiden name?”

“Lily Langtry,” says I, thinking real quick and saying the first name what comes to me.

“Lily? I thought your husband called you Emily?”

“Lily was my maiden name,” says I. “I’ve been married more than once.”

“More than once?”

“Yeah. First time it was a Piegan squaw. Her name was Dawn——”

“I beg your pardon!” she gasps. “How could you——”

“Sh-h-h-h-h!” I hisses. “I was a Mormon.”

“Oh!” says she and nods her head.

Maybe she understood, but I didn’t. I makes up my mind to keep still after this.

Then Mrs. Peaceful skids up to me.

“My dear Mrs. Meek, is there anything I can do for you? Anything you would like to have?”

“Have you got the makings of a cigaret? Mine was in my pants—”

I sees Happy turn his head and stare at me and I bites my tongue.

Mrs. Peaceful is staring into my face and I says:

“For my husband. He’s timid about smoking in company.”

“Oh!” says she. “Certainly. How much?”

“Enough for about thirty cigarets,” says I, and just then I hears Magpie’s voice:

“Wine is verily a mocker, brethren. I shall devote my time in stamping out the evils of wine, women and—er—cigarets. Them little paper rolls, innocent as they may look, are the torch of the devil.”

“How many did you say, Mrs. Meek?” she asks.

“Ma’am, you can use your own judgment. I ain’t afraid of the devil.”

This may sound foolish to some folks, but anybody who smokes them “torches of the devil” will appreciate my feelings. I ain’t had a smoke since that misguided posse shot a hole in the cantle of my saddle, and right now I’m receptive to lynching if I can just have one little chance at a cigaret before they yank the rope.

I’m in a trance, thinking about a nice little smoke, when I hears Mrs. Peaceful saying to Magpie:

“Reverend Meek, can you spare your wife for one night? The fact is we’re a little shy on sleeping accommodations. We only have two beds. My sister is with us, so you will have to sleep with my husband. Mrs. Jackson has kindly offered to take Mrs. Meek home with her for tonight.”

That long, lanky female speaks up.

“Yes indeed, it will be a pleasure for me to entertain Mrs. Meek.”

“Only for one night, of course,” says Mrs. Peaceful, “Tomorrow we will fix you up in permanent quarters. You won’t mind, will you, dearie?” says she to me, but I can’t speak.

Gosh a’mighty, there is questions that Solomon couldn’t answer.

“What’s the matter, Reverend? Don’t you feel well?”

I looks over at Magpie. I can see him sort of get tight all over, and his Adam’s apple ducks up and down his throat one hundred and fifty ducks per minute.

“Can I bring you-all a drink?” asks Peaceful.

“Ug-ug-ug—” gasps Magpie. “Uh-huh-uh-uh-huh. About four-fingers in a washtub.”

Me and Magpie stares at each other until Peaceful brings him a dipper of water, and then the darn fool stood right there and washed his face. Never took his eyes off me all the time. Just splashed the water on his face, like he was in a trance, and all this time I’m digging into the bosom of my dress, trying to get that blamed six-gun loose from a bunch of lace. I’m keyed up to kill without regrets.

“Do—do you-all have attacks like that very often?” asks Peaceful.

“No,” says Magpie weak-like, leaning against the wall, “not very—thank Gawd!”

“Amen!” says Mrs. Jackson. “Flesh is weak.”

“You’re danged right,” I whispers. “And she’s getting weaker.”

“Well,” says Mrs. Jackson, “we might as well say good night. I know Mrs. Meek must be tired.”

I know we shook hands. I was just about as happy over it as a feller would be who was shaking hands with a jury that had convicted him of murder in the first degree. I stumbles around that room, shaking hands like a darn fool, and then I hears Mrs. Peaceful saying—

“Kiss your wife good night, Reverend.”

Most of ’em giggles like a lot of locoed loons and Magpie staggers over to me. He didn’t kiss me, but they didn’t know it.

He hooks on to me like a grizzly bear and hisses in my ear:

“Think of something! Dang your hide, think fast!”

“Good night, Moses,” says I. “Take care of yourself.”

Then my knees got so weak that I tripped in my skirt and fell off the front porch.

I hears everybody expressing sympathy and crowding around me in the dark, but I got to my feet.

“Gracious!” exclaims one of them females. “Did you hurt yourself?”

“Skinned one leg all to thunder!” I snaps and walks out of there with Mrs. Jackson trailing me.

Think? My gosh, I thought of everything in the past and a lot of things in the future. She led me to her house, and shoved me inside. I guess she had furniture—I don’t know.

“Will we have a prayer before we retire?” she asks.

My brain seems to have got so hard that I can’t shake it, so I reckon I nods. I looks all around and then I says—

“You got two beds?”

“No, just one.”

“Good night!” says I. “This won’t work a-tall. I can’t sleep a wink with a stranger. I’ve either got to hive up with my—uh—husband or sleep alone.”

“Pshaw!” says she. “Now, ain’t that too bad? I don’t see what we are going to do.”

Then I gets a inspiration.

“Why not have Mrs. Peaceful’s sister sleep with you?”

“Well! Of course she can! You sure can figure out things, Mrs. Meek.”

“Uh-huh. A preacher’s wife has to.”

“I suppose so. How long have you been with Mr. Meek?”

“Off and on for twelve years.”

“Off and on?” she gasps.

“Yes’m. Two years ago me and ‘Dirty Shirt’ Jones——”

Then I remembers that I’m a lady.

“Yes, yes!” says she. “Tell me about it!”

“Tomorrow. She’s a long, long tale, ma’am.”

“Uh-huh, I suppose even ministers’ wives have their troubles.”

“You know it,” says I. “A dang sight more than you think.”

The Pearce family was surprized to see us back, but when we explains things they sees my point of view and agrees to it.

Magpie stole the makings of cigarets from Happy Harmon, and we laid on that bed and smoked ourselves black in the face.

Every time Magpie looks at me he chokes. After he gets through having convulsions, we starts figuring out things.

“We’ve got to get away,” says Magpie. “Honest to gosh, Ike! There ain’t never been a preacher in War Bonnet, so Peaceful tells me. Greasewood manages to hire one and they crows over War Bonnet.”

“I suppose everybody what wants to get married has to go to Greasewood, and if they wants to hold a funeral they has to call on the same city for help, eh?”

“Help ——! War Bonnet hates Greasewood so bad that they’ve held off their marriages for seven months! Down at the undertakers is two corpses waiting for a preacher, and they’re figuring on holding revival services all the rest of the week.”

“Peaceful told you all that, Magpie?”

“Yeah. War Bonnet hankers for a preacher like a calf for its maw. Holy henhawks, look what I’m up against! I can’t preach!”

We smokes a while and then I says— “Magpie, did you ever read the Bible?” “Read it? Part of it, Ike. I’ve read the dictionary, too, as far as that goes, but I can’t repeat any of it. Darn this suit of clothes!”

“You ought to be proud of them clothes, Magpie. A darned old cow-thief like you ought to be glad to have folks mistake him for a preacher. Piety fits you like the diamonds on a rattlesnake.”

“Yah!” he snorts. “Maybe. More than I can say for you, ’cause you can’t be described in words, Ike. Them women looks you over, and I hears one of ’em say: ‘The poor thing! A woman like that couldn’t help being good.’ Haw! Haw! Haw! Woman, you sure got some figure! It won’t never do to let ’em see you in the daylight.”

“Aw, ——! Let’s get away, Magpie. The farther we are away from here in the morning the better it will be for us and for War Bonnet. Let’s leave our baggage here and sneak away.”

“We don’t want no useless impediment, that’s a cinch, Ike. Them valises are empty, I reckon.”

Magpie picks one of ’em up and shakes it.

“Something in it, Ike. I can hear it swish.”

He picks up a pair of shears off the dresser and rips a hole in the top. He stares inside for a while and then rips a hole in the top of the other one. Then he stumbles over to the bed and sets down.

“My ——!” he gasps. “I—I thought the mint was in Washington!”

“It sure is, Magpie.”

“Like——it is. It’s in them satchels!”

I sneaked over, like I was afraid they’d fly away, and peers inside. Then I digs in with both hands. Greenbacks! Everything from fives to twentys. They don’t weigh much, but—oh man! I dumps one of ’em on the bed and wealth spews all over the place.

Me and Magpie stares at each other for a while and then Magpie begins to grin.

“Well,” says I, “what’s so danged funny about it?”

“Don’t you see it, Ike?” Magpie smooths his mustache and looks wise as a old owl. “Don’t you see it? I ain’t the only fake preacher in the county. Haw! Haw! Haw! Murder will out, as they say.”

“Let her out then!” I snaps. “I want to laugh too.”

“Ike, that Greasewood preacher is the hombre what robbed the bank. Last person on earth to be suspected, don’t you see? He just puts it in his old valises and goes on preaching. Sabe? The son-of-a-gun!”

“Circumstantial evidence, Magpie.”

“Circumstantial ——! Nothing circumstantial about it, Ike. Where would a preacher get all that money?”

“If they catch us with it he’ll likely get a chance to pronounce ‘ashes to ashes and dust to dust’ over us,” says I. “What will we do with it?”

Just then somebody knocked on our door.

Magpie looks at that money, slips his gun loose, walks over to the door and opens it about an inch. It’s Peaceful.

“Reverend,” says he apologetic-like, “I sure hates to disturb you-all, but ‘Shirtpocket Bill’ has done got a slug inserted under his vest-pocket, and I reckon he’s needing a preacher mighty bad. Can’t you-all come up to the Golden Glow and ease him off? He can’t last very long and—Shirtpocket’s sort of religious—sort of.”

Magpie hesitates and looks back at me.

“Go ahead, Mose,” says I. “If you need help, send for me.”

“Dawg-gone good of you-all,” says Peaceful. “A woman’s hand might soothe him a heap. Don’t reckon that Shirtpocket ever had a decent woman speak to him. Be awful dawg-gone nice if you’d both come.”

“Just as soon as I can get my pants—skirt on,” says I. “Tell Shirtpocket Bill to wait for us.”

He shuts the door and Magpie hops on to me.

“Dang you, Ike, you’ll give us away yet! Why didn’t you tell him we were sick or something? Shirtpocket Bill’s demise don’t mean nothing to me.”

“Me neither, old-timer, but you got to play or get out of the pot. Cheer up, Moses Meek, he may die before we get there. This will give us a chance to see where some broncs are tied.”

We fixed up a little and walked out to where Peaceful waits for us.

“This sure will tickle Shirtpocket all to thunder,” says he.

“Reckon he’ll be sorry he didn’t get shot before.”

“Yes,” says I, “a long time before.”

We pilgrimed up-town and went into a place where there seemed to be plenty of life—lot of dance-hall females, et cettery, and they sure looked me over. Likely I’m the first decent woman they ever seen in the Golden Glow.

We walked up to the bar and Peaceful says to the bartender:

“I done brought a little Gospel aid for Shirtpocket. Has he passed out yet?”

The hooch-handler looks us over and nods.

“Uh-huh. About ten minutes ago. Said he was coming back.”

“Said he was coming back?” I asks.

“Yep. Jim Freeman, the hombre what shot him, is still here, and Shirtpocket said he was coming back to get him.”

“Haunt him?” asks Peaceful.

“Haunt him?” The bartender slides a bottle and glasses in front of us. “Haunt him? I don’t know—he didn’t say.”

“Whoa, Emily!” snorts Magpie and I stops that glass just short of my mouth. I puts it down, while they stares at me.

“Let the old girl have a shot if she wants it,” says somebody behind me, and then Peaceful says—

“My ——! I thought you was killed, Shirtpocket!”

That hombre has the crookedest face I ever seen. He’s got a gun on each hip and enough ammunition to exterminate the human race.

“Naw!” he grunts. “Slug hived up in a four-bit watch and knocked all the air out of me.”

“Meet Reverend Meek, Shirtpocket. The lady is his wife. They comes up here to ease your last moments.”

“My ——! They did? I’m going to have that busted watch set with diamonds and have it packed in a plush case. Ease my last moments? Well, well! I sure am eternally obliged—to the watch. Pleased to have metcha—alive and well.”

Just then we hears a racket near the door and I turns to see that Greasewood sheriff and his deputies coming straight for the bar. I kicks Magpie in the ankle and digs into my bosom for my gun. Peaceful sees ’em, too. He loosens his gun and walks right across the room to where a bunch of fellers are playing roulette. There ain’t a thing for me and Magpie to do but stand still.

“Shoot ’em in the neck, Ike!” hisses Magpie. “They might have watches in their pockets.”

That fool gun stuck again! I yanks the bosom of my dress up around my neck, but the gun won’t let loose, so I reaches over and picks the bottle off the bar.

The sheriff stares at me and Magpie and we stare right back at him.

“You-all better go back to Greasewood,” states Peaceful’s voice and the sheriff turns.

There is Peaceful and several others and they’ve all got their guns out. The sheriff stares around and just then I sees Shirtpocket Bill yank a gun with each hand. I glances at the door and there stands a hombre with a sawed-off shotgun in his hands.

“Stand back!” he yelps. “There ain’t four-bit timepieces enough in the town to stop all this lead!”

He yanks the gun to his shoulder just as Shirtpocket begins to heave lead from both guns. I dropped flat when Shirtpocket opened up, and just as I hits the floor I hears that shotgun roar twice and about all the illumination in the saloon gets busted.

Then I hopped to my feet. I knew where that sheriff stood when the lights went out, so I pops him over the head with that bottle of hooch. Then I grabs Magpie by the arm and starts for the door. Somehow I gets that gun loose this time. I feels that the upper part of my dress is up around my neck and the lower part is down around my feet, but this ain’t no time for modesty.

“Straight ahead!” I yelps. “Get your gun loose and help me cut a trail!”

“Whoo-ee!” I hears Peaceful yelp. “Try to take our preacher back, will you?”

Bing! Bang! Boom!

We plows straight for that door. Evidently we ain’t the only ones hunting for the open air, ’cause when we hits the crowd coming from the other side—blooey! They knocked me over backwards and I hit the keys of the piano with both elbows as I comes down. Magpie was behind me, and when we stops falling I’m setting on him with my feet over the piano stool.

The fighting has moved out into the street. One kerosene lamp hangs like a drunken bird on a perch and flickers like it was about all in. I blinks the stars out of my eyes and then a voice under me begins to sing, soft and low—

“It’s a long ways back to de-e-e-e-ear o-o-o-o-old mother’s knee-e-e.”

He held that last note until I turned over and peered into his face. Then I got up and staggered over in front of the bar. There is Magpie, setting with his back against the rail. He don’t even look at me, but his lips seem to move, and so I leans closer to hear:

“It’s—as—good—or—as—bad—as—any—other. If—it—wasn’t—as—for—circumstantial—evidence—we—wouldn’t——”

“Be here,” says I. “Wake up, you asinine arguifier!”

I yanks his feet around and he stares up at me foolish-like.

“Wh-where’s the sheriff?” he whispers.

“Over by the piano. I sat on him until he got sentimental.”

“Where’s Peaceful?”

“My gosh! Think I’m night-herding everybody?”

“I ain’t thinking, Emily. Somebody hit my thinker so hard—say, woman, you better get out of sight. You’re a walking scandal!”

I looks at myself and raises the ante. I’ve lost my skirt. Just then a card-table seems to get up and walk. It walks into a corner of the bar and out from under it comes Peaceful. He appears to have been hit several times. In fact, I’d say that he had been hit all of the time.

He steadies himself against the bar and stares at us—mostly at me. He shakes his head and looks around, but his eyes turn back to me. After while he nods solemn-like and says:

“Dead and in ——! I knowed I had it coming to me.”

From over by the piano comes a high-pitched voice singing—

“For I’m a po-o-o-o-or cowbo-o-o-o-oy and I know I’ve done wrong.”

“We all have,” nods Peaceful. “’Less we did we wouldn’t be here,” and he staggers out of the place.

I tears the top off that card-table and makes myself a nice green apron. Then me and Magpie walks outside and that Greasewood sheriff is right on our heels.

“What do you want, feller?” asks Magpie.

The sheriff sort of has trouble with his voice, but pretty soon he says—

“You two——”

That’s as far as he got. Magpie hit him so hard that his head hit the ground before his body did.

“I figure he’s the one what hit me,” says Magpie, sucking his knuckles. “Somebody hit me, and they can’t do it and get away with it, believe me!”

“They sure can’t,” says I. “I’d do the same, Magpie.”

And right in the middle of the street I stripped that sheriff clean and piled what was left of them female clothes upon his sleeping form. Any time they tell you that clothes don’t make the man—let ’em wear skirts for a while.

“What started it, anyway, Ike?” asks Magpie. “I don’t seem to sabe much.”

“More of your circumstantial evidence. Peaceful thought that the sheriff had been sent here to take their preacher away from War Bonnet, and the War Bonneters objected at the top of their voices.”

“Too bad, Ike. I hates deception in any form. Let’s find a couple of broncs. We’re going back and expose a fake preacher. Sabe?”

We crosses the street and walks up the other side. Folks are beginning to drift back to the Golden Glow and we don’t want nobody to see us. Here and there we hears the pop of a gun, which shows that the spirit is still awake.

We finds a rack full of horses and we sneaks up to look ’em over. I eases up to one and feels of the saddle. Honest to grandma, I took right hold of the cantle, and my fingers sunk into that bullet hole. I digs into the sheriff’s pockets and finds a match. It’s my bronc, as sure as shooting, and the one next to it is Magpie’s.

“Glad I hit that danged sheriff, Ike,” says Magpie. “Didn’t take ’em long to appropriate our stuff, did it? Well, we ain’t stealing when we takes back our own property.”

“Now,” says I, “let’s go far and fast.”

“I don’t think we will. We’re going to get that money at Peaceful’s and we’re going to show up Greasewood’s minister. Sabe?”

“Aw, ——! What do we care, Magpie? Leave the money where it is.”

“We will not! I’m going to square myself by sending a preacher to the pen.”

“Well, let’s get into the bedroom window then. I won’t walk through the front door and explain things to Mrs. Peaceful—or Peaceful.”

We rode behind the house and tied our broncs and sneaked up to the window. Being in practise, we has no trouble getting in without making any noise. We didn’t no more than get inside when we hears voices in the parlor. We strains our ears.

“You-all brings queer news,” opines Peaceful’s voice. “Almighty queer! I sure am shocked a heap.”

“It’s the Gospel truth,” says another voice. “One of your citizens—Happy Harmon, I believe it was—bragged to one of my flock, or we would not have known it so soon.”

“Augusta,” whispers a voice right beside us, “are you awake?”

“Yes, sister. What is the matter?”

I hears Magpie stiffen beside me and gasp under his breath:

“The wrong room! My ——!”

Then somebody knocks on the door.

“Honey,” says Peaceful’s voice, “are you-all asleep?”

“No, dear. What is wrong?”

“Can you-all come out here?”

“Not unless we dress. Why?”

“Got some funny news to tell you. Can you-all cover up good so we can come in?”

Me and Magpie slides to the floor and under the bed just as the door opens.

“Reverend, this is my wife and her sister. Excuse ’em for being in bed.”

“Not at all. Not at all. Don’t mention it.”

“Honey,” says Peaceful, “them wasn’t preacher folks we had here. Dawg-gone ’em, they impostered upon us. Seems that the sheriff puts ’em in jail for robbing a bank and shooting the cashier. Sheriff took away their clothes, but they got away just the same and they burgled the Reverend’s home. They stole his clothes and his wife’s clothes, too, and——”

“She—she wasn’t a woman?” gasps Mrs. Peaceful. “She wasn’t?”

“Nope. She was a he.”

“My heavenly home! She was going to sleep—Oh, my!”

“Yes, they were low-down imposters,” says the preacher. “I came all the way down here to expose them. No doubt they had designs for some crooked work in War Bonnet. They are of low morals and a menace to society. It would give me great pleasure to lay my hands——”

“Ow-w-w-w-w!”

The sky-pilot was standing near the bed, so Magpie reaches out, grabs him by the feet and yanks him upside-down. I grabbed Peaceful. I only got one boot, but I sure yanked hard and I heard a rocking chair give up the ghost when he landed on it.

Then me and Magpie skids out from under that bed and stops at the door with a gun in each hand. The women ducks under the covers, while the preacher and Peaceful looks up at us like we was ghosts.

“Preacher,” pants Magpie, “you talk too much. Sabe? We’re here to get the evidence that will send you over the road.”

“O-over the r-r-road?” he gasps.

“Danged right!” snaps Magpie. “You’re the jasper what robbed the bank. In that other room is two valises with a lot of money in ’em, and they came from your bedroom. Sabe? Preacher ——! You ain’t no more preacher than I am!”

“Two valises with money in them?” he gasps, turning green.

“Yes, two valises with money in them!” mocks Magpie.

“Ah!” The preacher sets up and stares at us. “You—you took those valises? Give them back to me—please. That is the money we raised in Greasewood to build a church. We—we thought it would be safer there than in the bank, don’t you see?”

Me and Magpie looks at each other and then back at the two on the floor.

“It’s in the other room,” says Magpie in a far-away voice. “You’re much obliged to it.”

“Dud—don’t mention it,” says the preacher. “I—I never robbed any bank. The sheriff caught the real robbers early this evening and he came back to let you out, but you was gone. He brought your horses to War Bonnet. Said he was going to apologize and give them back to you, and——”

But me and Magpie walked out of the front door, got on our broncs and drifted toward a very pale north star. When we’re out of sight of War Bonnet, Magpie skids his bronc across the trail and rolls a cigaret. I finds the makings in the sheriff’s pockets. He didn’t have anything else in them. I sent ’em back to him later—along with his gun. We got our smokes to going.

“Feller men should be circumspect,” says I. “Each and every man should live like an open book. It ain’t noways possible for every crime to have a witness and you can’t acquit a man just because he sneaks up on his criminal occupation in the dark when everybody else is asleep.”

“Ike,” says Magpie soft-like, “I hate to argue, but I’ll say right here and now that you’re crazy if you even think so. Tell you why you’re wrong. Just because a feller can’t prove he’s innocent——”

And we went on our way rejoicing over another argument.

Transcriber’s Note

This story appeared in Adventure Magazine, February 18, 1920. It is believed to be in the public domain in the United States; copyright status may differ in other countries.

About This Book

This work is believed to be in the public domain in the United States. Copyright status in other countries may vary; readers outside the US should verify the status in their own jurisdiction.

Originally published by The Ridgway Company in Adventure Magazine, February 18, 1920

Prepared by volunteers at BookCove (bookcove.net).