CHAPTER XXXIX
NEWS FROM BUFFALO JIM
Rub-a-dub-dub, Three men in a tub, The butcher, the baker, The candlestick maker; They all jumped out of a holler pertater. Rub-a-dub-dub.
"Do you call them your prayers?" asked Lafe sternly. "I done told you toget to bed more'n a hour ago, son. I swan I can't figure what your ma'sthinking of. Now, drag it."
The boy turned a confident grin on his sire and continued his marchthrough the house, rub-a-dub-dubbing to the best that was in him. He wasattired lightly in a chemise, and was accordingly able to give anunhampered illustration of how the candlestick maker and the othertradesmen emerged from the spud. Hetty had gone to prepare his bed;returning, she made a dive for the fugitive and bore him, struggling, tohis unwelcome nest. There she was obliged to growl over him in imitationof a big old bear, before Lafe, Jr., became reconciled.
Johnson listened with scant patience to their further discourse insidethe bedroom.
"That ain't the way to learn the boy his prayers," he interrupted."Bless _Mister_ Shortredge. Mister! That's a fine way for a li'l fellerto pray, ain't it? Call him Jim or Buf'lo, Hetty. Call him Jim orBuf'lo. I reckon the Almighty don't know Jim as Mister."
"I guess the Almighty ain't such a close friend of his, anyhow, seeingas he's a friend of yours," retorted Mrs. Johnson.
Lafe revolved this in his mind. By the time he had hit upon an aptrejoinder, opportunity for its use had fled; but he made a mental notethereof, resolved to steer the talk around some day to the same theme.
Early next morning Jeff Hardin came up the trail, with a letter forJohnson. Letters are rare arrivals in that region and a certainformality attaches to their receipt. This one Lafe accepted with seemingunconcern, and having looked long at the handwriting and turned it overand over, he called his wife. To her Lafe opined that Buffalo must havewritten to him. Meanwhile Jeff loitered near, flicking the reins on hishorse's back, intent on catching anything of interest that might cropup.
"He wouldn't never take a prize, Buf'lo wouldn't," said Lafe critically,"but this looks a bit shaky, even for him."
"Well, let's open it," Hetty suggested.
It took her husband at least ten minutes to scan the brief page,although famous for the ease with which he read and spelled; but thiswas due to the fact that Shortredge despised punctuation and had broadtheories of capitals, into which the sense of the subject-matter did notenter at all. So there existed always a confusion as to where hissentences began and where they left off. But Johnson finished at last,and then he turned to Hetty with a hopeless air.
"Well, if that wouldn't knock you deader'n a rat. Here he owes mefifty-seven dollars already, and he's been owing it for nigh on amillion years," he said, "yet he wants--"
He broke off, perceiving that Jeff lingered. "Won't you get down andvisit, Jeff?" he asked.
"No-oo, I wouldn't choose to, thanks, Lafe," said Jeff; "I got to drift.Did you say he owed you fifty-seven, Lafe? Well, adios, you two. Takecare of yourself, Mrs. Johnson. Come on, boy, and I'll give you a rideas far as the spring."
Hardin continued his journey toward Badger, and told them there how JimShortredge had applied to Lafe Johnson for a loan of two hundreddollars, although he had been owing him close to a thousand for sevenyears.
"Well, what're you going to do about it?" said Hetty, when the courierhad departed.
"Do about it? Forget it--that's what I'm going to do."
"We couldn't have him here with little Lafe round," Hetty went onreflectively. "It wouldn't be safe. No, we couldn't. Could we?"
"Well, I should reckon not. I should rather reckon not. Where'd we puthim?"
Lafe was highly indignant for the remainder of the forenoon. What sortof an idiot did Buffalo take him to be, anyhow? It was all very well fora man to use his friend's money and time as his own so long as both weresingle, but when a man married, his family had first claim. If Jim couldnot get that through his head without having it pounded in, Lafe wassorry, but he would have to make it clear, notwithstanding. Send himfifty dollars--had Hetty ever in her life heard anything to equal that?Here was a feller who could easily earn seventy-five dollars a month--athick, stout man--and just because he was a trifle sick, he had to sendoff to borrow and to ask if he could visit. It was weak-kneed, Lafecalled it. He had really never suspected this propensity in Shortredge.
"Many's the time I've helped him out," he said, reverting to the subjectafter dinner, "and what do I get? A man owes it to a friend before hegets married, Hetty. Afterwards, he--"
"He what?"
"Well, he ain't got any friends," said her husband.
His irritation continued throughout the afternoon and he brusquelyrefused to take his son up in front when he rode away to Horne'sheadquarters. It was growing dark when he returned and the cattle weredrifting up the Canon to water. Johnson noticed each cow and calf with ashrewd eye, and determined to spread more salt in the morning. His soncame galloping to meet him, and Lafe swung the boy to the fork of thesaddle. He was still moody, however, and his wife observed that he didnot eat with his customary appetite. Finally he pushed the plate fromhim.
"I declare that stew's no fit food for a man, Hetty. Can't we never havenothing else?"
"You've had stew twice in three weeks. That's what you've had," Hettyreturned, bridling. "What's got into you, anyhow? You're worse than abig ol' bear."
"Ugh-ugh-ugh-ugh!" her son growled, making a persistent effort to worryhis father's leg with his teeth. Lafe pried his offspring loose and sethim on his knee. The boy wrestled and thumped him, and gradually Lafesoftened under the play.
"I mind once, me and Buf'lo went for eleven days on jerky and tobacco;more tobacco than jerky," he said, considering his son with a smile."Nothing ever seemed to hurt us in them days, me and Buf'lo. Down in theBaccanochi, it was, where we went for some cattle. And of all the sorrysteers, you never seen the like, Hetty. Honest, they couldn't throw ashadow. But we got some beef there. I ain't never tasted beef like itsince--no, ma'am."
"Ho, haven't you?" Hetty sniffed.
His usual even spirits seemed to return during the after-supper smoke.He sat on the porch and listened to the cows lowing contentedly aroundthe tanks. Some animal went light-footed through the underbrush of theslope opposite, and Lafe, Jr., was morally certain it was a wildcat;but, then, he never failed to detect bears and wolves and mountain lionsin the least stirring of a twig. The dark deepened and a coyote yelpedagainst the Canon's walls. The baby announced his intention of catchingthe prowler on the morrow with a pinch of salt, and by the exercise ofcunning and stealth.
Hetty came out on the porch to fill the canteen and to warn little Lafethat bedtime was close upon him. The boy denied it vehemently.
"I mind once, when me and Buf'lo were sleeping at the ol' Palomino," herhusband told her; "just a night like to this it was, and a couple ofline riders come along with a deck of cards--"
"That's all you need to say," Hetty said. "You never did understand thegame."
Shortly afterward she took the child from his father and put him to bed,Lafe, Jr., howling that he was wide awake and nothing under heaven wouldmake him go. Yet he was asleep in a twinkling. His mother tiptoed out ofthe room. When she reached the porch, she gave vent to the long sigh atired woman will give when the day's work is done and she can relax, andshe began to rock in the wicker-chair. Her husband was walkingmeditatively near a tall cottonwood. He appeared to be pacing off theground.
"What're you doing?" she called.
"Nothing. Nothing much." But when she joined him, he coughed and lookedfoolish.
"Now," said Hetty, locking both arms about one of his and leaningagainst him, "tell me."
"Why," Lafe said, "I was just sort of studying how a tent would fit hereright snug. It's a slick place for a tent."
Hetty squeezed his arm and looked at him with eyes of perfectunderstanding.
"Do you want to see what I wrote to him?" she whispered.
"Who? Buf'lo? You wrote to Buf'lo? When did you write to Buf'lo? Well, Iswan."
It is best at this juncture to stare for signs of the marauding coyote,or to gaze fixedly at the evening star blazing in line with the chimney,because those two often chose to forget that they had been married fiveyears.
This is what Hetty showed Lafe, bending over his shoulder as he read itby the light of a lamp.
DEAR FRIEND:
My husband showed me your letter and I write to say we will be glad to have you come any time and stay with us as long as you like.
He has talked a whole lot about you and little Lafe always remembers you in his prayers. He don't like to say his prayers he's like his father. We have a nice home in the cannon and it will do you good it is so high up here.
Yours respectfully, MRS. JOHNSON.
P.S. My husband is writing to you, too.
Lafe took this letter and enclosed one of his own composition, togetherwith several very worn bills which he extracted from a can behind thekitchen clock. And just after daybreak he started for Badger to the endthat the letter might be carried to a railway town by the stage driver.While he was making some purchases of flour and groceries that Hetty haditemized on a piece of wrapping paper as an aid to memory, one of theloungers remarked to Johnson that he heard Buffalo Jim had had the nerveto try to borrow some money. It puzzled him how some people would beattheir way through the world.
"It does, does it?" Lafe answered, in a nutmeg-grater voice. "Well, itoughtn't to. Any time ol' Buf'lo wants anything, he knows where he canget it quick. Understand? Who done told you that? The man who told youthat was a liar. And if there's anybody here got something to get offhis mind about Buf'lo, now's the time. I'm a-listening."
Nobody had anything to get off his mind, it would seem. Having givenample opportunity, Johnson gathered up his parcels, tied them carefullyto various parts of the saddle, and departed for home. He did not regardthe incident in Badger of sufficient importance to communicate to hiswife.