The Duke Of Chimney Butte

  CHAPTER XVIII

  THE RIVALRY OF COOKS

  Taterleg said that he would go to Glendora that night with Lambert, whenthe latter announced he was going down to order cars for the firstshipment of cattle.

  "I've been layin' off to go quite a while," Taterleg said, "but thatscrape you run into kind of held me around nights. You know, that fellerhe put a letter in the post office for me, servin' notice I was to keepaway from that girl. I guess he thinks he's got me buffaloed and on therun."

  "Which one of them sent you a letter?"

  "Jedlick, dern him. I'm goin' down there from now on every chance I getand set up to that girl like a Dutch uncle."

  "What do you suppose Jedlick intends to do to you?"

  "I don't care what he aims to do. If he makes a break at me, I'll layhim on a board, if they can find one in the Bad Lands long enough tohold him."

  "He's got a bad eye, a regular mule eye. You'd better step easy aroundhim and not stir him up too quick."

  Lambert had no faith in the valor of Jedlick at all, but Taterleg wouldfight, as he very well knew. But he doubted whether there was any greatchance of the two coming together with Alta Wood on the watch betweenthem. She'd pat one and she'd rub the other, soothing them and drawingthem off until they forgot their wrath. Still, he did not want Taterlegto be running any chance at all of making trouble.

  "You'd better let me take your gun," he suggested as they approached thehotel.

  "I can take care of it," Taterleg returned, a bit hurt by thesuggestion, lofty and distant in his declaration.

  "No harm intended, old feller. I just didn't want you to go pepperin'old Jedlick over a girl that's as fickle as you say Alta Wood is."

  "I ain't a-goin' to pull a gun on no man till he gives me a good reason,Duke, but if he _gives_ me the reason, I want to be heeled. I guess Iwas a little hard on Alta that time, because I was a little sore. She'snot so foolish fickle as some."

  "When she's trying to hold three men in line at once it looks to me shemust be playin' two of 'em for suckers. But go to it, go to it, oldfeller; don't let me scare you off."

  "I never had but one little fallin' out with Alta, and that was the timeI was sore. She wanted me to cut off my mustache, and I told her Iwouldn't do that for no girl that ever punched a piller."

  "What did she want you to do that for, do you reckon?"

  "Curiosity, Duke, plain curiosity. She worked old Jedlick that way, butshe couldn't throw me. Wanted to see how it'd change me, she said. Well,I know, without no experimentin'."

  "I don't know that it'd hurt you much to lose it, Taterleg."

  "Hurt me? I'd look like one of them flat Christmas toys they make out oftin without that mustache, Duke. I'd be so sharp in the face I'd whistlein the wind every time my horse went out of a walk. I'm a-goin' to wearthat mustache to my grave, and no woman that ever hung her stockin's outof the winder to dry's goin' to fool me into cuttin' it off."

  "You know when you're comfortable, old feller. Stick to it, if that'sthe way you feel about it."

  They hitched at the hotel rack. Taterleg said he'd go on to the depotwith Lambert.

  "I'm lookin' for a package of express goods I sent away to Chicago for,"he explained.

  The package was on hand, according to expectation. It proved to be afive-pound box of chewing gum, "All kinds and all flavors," Taterlegsaid.

  "You've got enough there to stick you to her so tight that even deathcan't part you," Lambert told him.

  Taterleg winked as he worked undoing the cords.

  "Only thing can beat it, Duke--money. Money can beat it, but a man's gotto have a lick or two of common sense to go with it, and some good lookson the side, if he picks off a girl as wise as Alta. When Jedlick wasweak enough to cut off his mustache, he killed his chance."

  "Is he in town tonight, do you reckon?"

  "I seen his horse in front of the saloon. Well, no girl can say I everwent and set down by her smellin' like a bunghole on a hot day. I don'ttravel that road. I'll go over there smellin' like a fruit-store, andI'll put that box in her hand and tell her to chaw till she goes tosleep, an then I'll pull her head over on my shoulder and pat thembangs. Hursh, oh, hursh!"

  It seemed that the effervescent fellow could not be wholly serious aboutanything. Lambert was not certain that he was serious in his attitudetoward Jedlick as he went away with his sweet-scented box under his arm.

  By the time Lambert had finished his arrangements for a special train tocarry the first heavy shipment of the Philbrook herd to market it waslong after dark. He was in the post office when he heard the shot that,he feared, opened hostilities between Taterleg and Jedlick. He hurriedout with the rest of the customers and went toward the hotel.

  There was some commotion on the hotel porch, which it was too dark tofollow, but he heard Alta scream, after which there came another shot.The bullet struck the side of the store, high above Lambert's head.