Alec Lloyd, Cowpuncher Part 13

She didn't like that fer a cent. Wasn't nary one of 'em that suited her, and just when the chickens 'r the cholo gals needed her, here was a Briggs City galoot a-crossin' the yard.

"Sorry," she says to Macie, "but I'll have to give them gents they walkin'-papers. If I don't, I won't never git a lick done."

"Bully fer you!" Mace answers. "It'll be good riddance of bad rubbish. They're too gally." (Somethin' like that, anyhow.) "Learn 'em to act like they was civylised. But, say, Mrs. Bridger, you--you ain't a-goin' to give the rinky-d.i.n.k to the Sheriff?"

"Mister Bergin," answers the widda, "ain't bothered me none." (Mace was sh.o.r.e they was tears in her eyes.)

"Aw--_haw!_" I says, when the little gal tole me. _I_ savvied.

That same afternoon, whilst the widda was a-settin' on the shady side of the house, sewin' on carpet-rags, up come Sam Barnes. (It was Monday.)

"Mrs. Bridger," he begun, "I'm a-goin' to ast you to think over what I said to you last week. I don't want to be haidstrong, but I'd like to git a 'yas' outen you."

"Mister Barnes," she says. "I'm feard I cain't say yas. I ain't thinkin' of marryin'. But if I was, it'd be to a man that's--that's big, and tall, and has blue eyes." And she looked out at the sand-pile, and sighed.

"Wal," says Sam, "I reckon I don't fit specifications." And he hiked fer town.

He was plumb huffy when he tole me about it. "Fer a woman," he says, "that's got to look after herself, and has a kid on her hands to boot, she's got more airs'n a windmill."

Next!

That was Chub.

Now, Chub, he knowed a heap about handlin' a gun, and I reckon he'd pa.s.s as a liv'ry-stable keeper, but he didn't know much about _women_.

So, when he went down to ast the widda fer the second time, he put his foot in it by bein' kinda short t' little Willie.

"Say, kid," he says, "you locate over in that rockin'-chair yonder.

Young uns of you' age should be saw and not heerd."

Mrs. Bridger, she sit right up, and her eye-winkers just snapped.

"Mister Flannagan," she Says, "I'm feard you're wastin' you'

time a-callin' here. If ever I marry again, it's goin' t' be a man that's fond of childern."

Wal, ta-ta, Chub!

And, behind, there was the widda at the winda, all eyes fer that sand-pile.

We never knowed what she said to Dutchy's brother, August. But he come back to town lookin' madder'n a wet hen. "Huh!" he says, "I don't vant her _no_how. _She_ couldn't vork. She's pretty fer _nice,_ all right, but she's nichts fer stoudt."

When ole stingy Curry tried _his_ luck over, he took his lead from Chub's _ex_perience. Seems he put one arm 'round the kid, and then he said no man could kick about havin' to adopt Willie, and he knowed that with Mrs. Bridger it was "love me, love my dawg." Then he tacked on that the boy was a nice little feller, and likely didn't eat much.

"And long's I ain't a-goin' to marry you," says the widda, "why, just think--you won't have to feed Willie at all!"

But the next day we laughed on the other side of our face. I went down to Mrs. Bridger's, the sheriff trailin', (he balked half-way from the sand-pile to the door, this time, and sit down on a bucket t' play he was Willie's steam-injine), and I found that the little woman had been cryin' turrible.

"What's the matter?" I ast.

"Nothin'," she says.

"Yas, they is. Didn't you git a dun t'-day?"

"Wal," she answers, blushin', "I bought this place on tick.

But," (brave as the d.i.c.kens, she was) "I'll be able t' pay up all right--what with my chickens and the pig."

I talked with her a good bit. Then me and the sheriff started back to town. (Had to go slow at first; Bergin'd helt the ingineer on his knee till his foot was asleep.) On the way, I mentioned that dun.

"_Curry,_" says the sheriff. And he come nigh rippin' up the railroad tracks.

He made fer Curry's straight off. "What's the little balance due on that Starvation Gap property?" he begun.

"What makes you ast?" says Curry, battin' them sneaky little eyes of hisn.

"I'm _pre_pared t' settle it."

"But it happens I didn't sell to _you_. So, a-course, I cain't take you' money. Anyhow, I don't think the widda is worryin' much. She could git shet of that balance easy." And he moseyed off.

She could git shet of it by marryin' _him,_ y' savvy--the polecat!

The sheriff was boilin'. "Here, Cupid," he says, "is two hunderd.

Now, we'll go down to Mrs. Bridger's again, and you offer her as much as she wants."

"Offer it you'self."

"No, _you_ do it, Cupid,--please. But don't you tell her whose money it is."

"I won't. Here's where we git up The Ranchers' Loan Fund."

I coaxed Bergin as far as the front step _this_ time. Wasn't that fine?

But, say! Mrs. Bridger wouldn't touch a cent of that money, no ma'am.

"If I was to take it as a loan," she says, "I'd have interest to pay.

So I'd be worse off 'n I am now. And I couldn't take it in no other way. Thank y', just the same. And how's Miss Sewell t'-day?"

It wasn't no use fer me to tell her that The Ranchers' Loan Fund didn't want no interest. She was as set as Rogers's b.u.t.te.

During the next week 'r two, the sheriff and me dropped down to the widda's frequent. I'd talk to her--about chicken-raisin'

mostly--whilst Bergin 'd play with the kid. One day I got him to come _as far as the door!_ But I never got him no further. There he stuck, and 'd stand on the sill fer hours, lookin' out at Willie--like a great, big, scairt, helpless calf.

At first the widda talked to him, pleasant and encouragin'. But when he just said, "Yas, ma'am," and "No, ma'am," and nothin' else, she changed. I figger ('cause women is right funny) that her pride was some hurt. What if he _was_ bound up in the boy? Didn't he have no interest in _her?_ It hurt her all the worse, mebbe, 'cause I was there, and seen how he acted. 'Fore long she begun to git plumb outen patience with him. And one day, when he was standin' gazin' out, she flew up.

"George Bergin," she says, "a door is somethin' else 'cept a place to scratch you back on." And she shut it--him outside, plumb squshed!

Wal, we'd did our best--both Mace and me--and fell down. But right here is where somethin' better'n just good luck seemed to take a-holt of things. In the first place, _con_siderin' what come of it, it sh.o.r.e was fortu_nate_ that Pedro Garcia, one of them trashy section-gang cholos, was just a-pa.s.sin' the house as she done that. He heerd the slam. He seen the look on Bergin's face, too. And he fixed up what was the matter in that crazy haid of hisn.

In the second place, the very _next_ day, blamed if Curry didn't hunt Bergin up. "Sheriff," he begun, "I ain't been able to collect what's due me from Mrs. Bridger. She ain't doin' nothin' with the property, neither. So I call on you to put her off." And he helt out a paper.

_Put her off!_ Say! You oughta saw Bergin's face!

"Curry," he says, "in Oklahomaw, a dis-_po_ssess notice agin a widda ain't worth the ink it's drawed with."