Still Jim Part 36

Oscar hurried Pen and Jane up to the tent house with scant ceremony, then ran for the lower town. Mrs. Flynn and Sara were greatly surprised by the early return of the merrymakers. The four waited eagerly for news. Sara would not let any of the women stir from the tent, saying that it was unsafe until they knew what had happened. At midnight Oscar returned.

"They got poor old Dad. After he left the hall, he was going past a lighted tent in the lower town when he heard sounds of a fight. He went in and found two drunken Mexicans fighting over a flask of whiskey. He took the whiskey and told them to go to bed. He started out into the street and the two jumped him and started to stab him to death. He yelled and the sheriff and his boy was the only folks in all that town dared to go help him. The two hombres shot the sheriff in the arm before he located them and got away. They had finished poor old Dad, though.

Mr. Manning's got posses out and will start more at daylight. If you'll put Jane up for the night, Mrs. Flynn, I'll go back to the lower town.

You'd ought to see those committeemen. Three of them would have gone out with a posse, I'll bet, if they hadn't remembered their dignity in time!"

Jim had his hands full. By daylight the next morning there was every prospect of a wholesale battle between the Americans and the Mexicans.

The camp was at fever pitch with excitement. The two shifts not at work swarmed the streets of the lower camp, the Mexicans at the far end, the Americans at the upper end near Dad Robins' house, whence came the sound of an old woman's hard sobs. After a hurried breakfast at the lower mess, Jim joined this crowd. The men circled round him, all talking at once. Jim listened for a time, then he raised his arm for silence. "It was booze did it! Booze and nothing else! Am I right?"

Reluctant nods went around the crowd. "And yet," Jim went on, "there's hardly a white man in the camp who hasn't fought me on my ruling that liquor must not come within the government lines. You all know what booze means in a place like this. Those of you who were with me at Makon know what we suffered from it up there. I know you fellows, decent, kindly men now, in spite of your threats to lynch the hombres. But if you could get booze, you'd make this camp a h.e.l.l on earth right now. No better than a drunken Mexican is a drunken white. Am I right?"

Again reluctant nods and half-sheepish grins.

"Now, you fellows forget your lynching bee. Commons, Ralston, Schwartz, you make a committee to raise enough money to send Mrs. Robins and the boy back to New Hampshire with the body. Here is ten to start with. They must leave this noon. Tom Weeks, you make the funeral arrangements. I'll see that transportation is ready at noon. Bill Underwood, you get a posse of fifty men and quarantine this camp for booze."

A little laugh went through the crowd. Billy Underwood had been the chief malcontent under Jim's liquor ruling. Bill did not laugh. He began to pick his men with the manner of a general.

"One word more," said Jim. "You all know that the United States Reclamation Service is under the suspicion of the nation. They call you and me a bunch of grafters. It's up to you as much as it is to me to show today that we are men and not lawless hoboes."

A little murmur of applause swept through the crowd as Jim turned on his heel. He made his way into the Mexican end of the camp. There was noise here of talking and quarreling. Jim walked up to a tall Mexican who was in a way a padrone among the hombres.

"Garces," said Jim, "send the night shift to bed."

Garces eyed Jim through half-shut eyes. Jim did not move a muscle.

"Why?" asked the Mexican.

"Because I shall put them to bed unless they are gone in five minutes."

Jim pulled out his watch. In just four minutes, after a shouted order from Garces, the street was cleared of more than half the hombres.

"Now," said Jim, "except when the shifts change, you are to keep your people this side of the ditch," pointing to the line that separated the Mexican and American camps. "I have fifty men scouring the camp for whiskey. Anybody found with liquor will be arrested. If there is a particle of trouble over it in your camp, I'll let the Gringos loose.

Sabez?"

Garces shivered a little. "Yes, senor," he said.

Jim took a turn up and down the street on his horse, then started for the dam site. As he cantered up the road, Billy Underwood, mounted on a moth-eaten pony, saluted with dignity.

"Boss, that saloon keeper up the canyon has got a billion bottles of booze. Worst whiskey you ever smelled. He says he's laying for you and if you cross his doorstep, he'll shoot you up."

Jim looked at Bill meditatively. "Bill, I'm going to call his bluff!"

"Us fellows in my posse'll shoot his place up if you say the word,"

cried Bill eagerly.

"No, that won't do," replied Jim. "But I have an idea that he's a four-flusher. Keep your eye on 'Mexico City,' Bill. I am afraid of trouble, though I've got Garces buffaloed so far."

Jim turned his horse and cantered back through Mexico City along the narrow river trail to Cactus Canyon. Just off the government reserve was a tent with a sheet iron roof. The trail to the tent was well worn. Jim dropped the reins over the pony's head and walked into the tent. There was a rough bar across one end, behind which stood a quiet-faced man with a black mustache. Drinking at the bar were two white men whom Jim recognized as foremen.

"You two fellows are fired," drawled Jim. "Turn in your time and leave camp this afternoon."

The Big Boss is king on a project. The two men meekly set down their gla.s.ses and filed out of the tent. It was something to have been fired by the big boss himself.

"And who are you?" asked the saloonkeeper.

"Don't you recognize me, Murphy?" asked Jim, pleasantly. "I have the advantage of you there. My name is Manning."

The saloonkeeper made a long-armed reach for a gun that stood in the corner.

"One moment, please," said Jim. As he spoke he jumped over the bar, bearing the saloonkeeper down with him before the long-armed reach encompa.s.sed the gun. Jim removed Murphy's knife, then picked up the gun himself.

Murphy started for the door with a jump. "Break nothing!" he yelled.

"I'll have the law of New Mexico on you for this."

Murphy leaped directly into Bill Underwood's arms. "h.e.l.lo, sweetie,"

said Bill, holding Murphy close. "Thought I'd come up and see how you was making it, Boss."

"Nicely, thanks," said Jim. "I'll be finished as soon as he breaks up his stock."

"It'll be some punishment for me to watch a job like that," said Bill, "but I'm with you, Boss."

He shifted his gun conspicuously as he released Murphy. Bill owed the saloonkeeper something over six weeks' pay. The occasion had an unholy joy for him. Murphy looked Jim over, scratched his head and started to whistle nonchalantly. In ten minutes he had destroyed his stock in trade. When he had finished, he handed Jim the key of the tent with a profound bow.

"Now," said Jim, "drop a match on the floor."

When the flames were well caught Jim said, "See that he leaves camp, Bill." Then he mounted and rode away.

Murphy looked after him curiously. "Some man, ain't he?" he said to Bill.

"I'll eat out of his hand any time," replied Bill. "Get your pony, Murphy."

"I'll join your posse," suggested Murphy. "I bet I can ferret out more booze than any three of you."

"Nothing doing!" growled Bill. "Should think you would have better taste than to wanta do that."

Murphy shrugged his shoulders. "I want you to let me go up to that Greek fellow's place before I go," he said.

Bill stared but made no comment.

As Jim rode back through the lower town he stopped young Hartman, the government photographer.

"Hartman," he asked, "have the films for the movies come in yet?"

"Came in yesterday, Mr. Manning."

"Good work! Hartman, will you give us a show this evening?"

"The hall's in pretty rough shape but if you want it----"

"I want it to keep things quiet, Hartman, till we find those hombres and get them in jail at Cabillo."