The Sunset Trail

  CHAPTER XV

  HOW MR. HICKOK WENT INTO CHEYENNE

  Mr. Masterson had sent for him, and within two days after his arrivalMr. Hickok was established in the best society of Cheyenne. This, whenone reflects upon the particular exclusiveness of Cheyenne's firstcircles, should talk loudly in Mr. Hickok's favor. It was something ofwhich any gentleman might be proud. Not a saloon denied him credit; thathotel which he honoured with his custom was as his home; his word wasgood for a dozen stacks of blues at any faro table in the camp. Andthis, mind you, in days when Cheyenne's confidence came forward slowly,and the Cheyenne hand was not outstretched to every paltry individualwho got off the stage.

  Two weeks prior to these exaltations, Mr. Hickok, then of Kansas City,might have been seen walking in that part of Main Street known as BattleRow. For one of his optimism, Mr. Hickok's mood showed blue and dull.One could tell this by the brooding eye, and the droop which investedhis moustache with a mournfulness not properly its own. Moreover, therewas further evidence to prove the low spirits of Mr. Hickok. His hair,long as the hair of a woman, which in lighter moments fell in a blondcataract about his broad shoulders, was knotted away beneath his hat.

  The world does not praise long hair in the case of any man. But Mr.Hickok had much in his defence. He had let his hair grow long in yearswhen the transaction of his business hopes and fears gave him much to dowith Indians. The American savage possesses theories that yield neitherto evidence nor argument. He believes that every paleface who cuts shorthis hair does so in craven denial of a scalp to what enemy may risevictorious over him. Such cowards he contemns. On the guileless otherhand, he holds that the long-haired man is a warrior bold, flauntingdefiance with every toss of his mane. That long-haired one may rob andcheat and swindle and cuff and kick your savage; the latter will neithermurmur nor lift hand against him. For is not he who robs and cheats andswindles and cuffs and kicks a chief? And is not his flowing hair afranchise so to do? There lurks a dividend in hair for any who trafficswith your savage. Wherefore, in an hour of aboriginal commerce Mr.Hickok encouraged a hirsute luxuriance in the name of trade. Later, hecontinued it for the sake of habit and old days.

  What should it be to prey upon the sensibilities of Mr. Hickok? KansasCity was in that hour a town of mud and dust and hill and hollow thatquenched all happiness and drove the male inhabitants to drink. Was itthat to bear him down? No; if it were environment, Mr. Hickok would havemade his escape to regions where the sun was shining.

  Not to run the trail too far, Mr. Hickok was ruminating the loss of hisfinal dollar, which had fled across a faro layout in the Marble Hall. Ashe strolled dejectedly in Battle Row, he couldn't have told where hisnext week's board was coming from, not counting his next week's drinks.It was the dismal present, promising a dismal future, which exhaledthose mists to take the curl from Mr. Hickok's moustache and teach hishair to hide beneath his hat. Short-haired men may be penniless andstill command respect; a long-haired man without a dollar is a creaturelaughed at.

  Having nothing to engage him but his gloom, Mr. Hickok glanced upwardand across the street where, over the fourth-story windows, anOdd-Fellows sign was bolted. The sign was painted black upon white. That"O" which stood as the initial of "Odd," showed wood colour inside theblack.

  It was years before when, to please a bevy of tender tourists, and bypermission of Mr. Speers, then Chief of Police, Mr. Hickok emptied hissix-shooters into the centre of that "O." It was a finished piece ofshooting; the tourists told of it about their clubs when safe in theEast again. The "O," where the original white had been splintered intowood colour by those dozen bullets it had stopped, showed plain asprint. Mr. Hickok sighed as he considered his handiwork.

  Mr. Hickok did not sigh because of any former accuracy with pistols; buthe recalled how on that fine occasion, in contrast to presentbankruptcy, he harboured fourteen hundred dollars in his clothes. He hadbeaten the bank at Old Number Three, and was rich and gay inconsequence.

  "I think I shoot better when I've got a roll."

  Thus murmured Mr. Hickok, as he meditated upon the strangeness ofthings. Mr. Hickok might have extended his surmise. A man does allthings better when he has a roll.

  The currents of life had been flowing swiftly for Mr. Hickok. Two yearsbefore he was marshal of Hays, and had shot his way into the popularconfidence. In an evil hour a trio of soldiers came over from the Fort,led by one Lanigan, and took drunken umbrage at Mr. Hickok's hair. Thisrudeness touched Mr. Hickok tenderly, and in checking it he snuffed outthose three as gallery Frenchmen snuff candles at ten paces. Since therearose carpers to say that Mr. Hickok went too far in these homicides, helaid down his trust and journeyed to Abilene.

  Mr. Hickok was welcomed with spread arms by Abilene. Its marshal hadjust been gathered home through the efforts of a cowboy with a geniusfor firearms. Abilene offered the vacant place to Mr. Hickok, and toencourage acceptance, showed him where it hanged the cowboy. Mr. Hickokaccepted, drew on the public fisc for the price of five hundred roundsof ammunition, and entered upon his responsibilities.

  Mr. Hickok reigned as marshal eight months, and kept Abilene like achurch. Then he put a bullet through Mr. Coit, whose pleasure it hadbeen to go upon tri-weekly sprees and leave everything all over theworks. Again, as on that day in Hays, there came narrowists to flingreproach upon Mr. Hickok. They said the affair might have beensufficiently managed by wrecking a six-shooter upon Mr. Coit's head; thedead gentleman had yielded to such treatment on former occasions. As itwas, the intemperate haste of Mr. Hickok had eliminated one who spentmoney with both hands. The taking off of Mr. Coit might conduce toAbilene's peace; it was none the less a blow to Abilene's prosperity.Mr. Hickok, made heartsore by mean strictures, and weary with complaintswhich found sordid footing in a lust for gain, gave up his marshalshipof Abilene, as he had given up the post in Hays, and wandered east insearch of whiter fortune.

  About the time he shook the Abilene dust from his moccasins, there cameto Mr. Hickok's hand a proposal from Mr. Cody to join him in theproduction of a drama. It was to be a drama descriptive of an ArcadianWest--one wherein stages were robbed, maidens rescued, Indians put todeath. Mr. Hickok in real life had long been familiar with everyfraction of the stage business; the lines he could learn in a night. Mr.Cody was confident that Mr. Hickok would take instant part in that dramawithout rehearsal. If Mr. Hickok accepted, the financial side was to becoloured to meet his taste. His social life, so Mr. Cody explained,should be one of splendour and Eastern luxury.

  Mr. Hickok, pausing only to break himself at faro-bank, took up theproffer of Mr. Cody. He journeyed to New York, and found thatthorough-going scout sojourning at the Brevoort House.

  "Where's your trunk?" asked Mr. Cody.

  "Haven't any," returned Mr. Hickok, whose trunk had been left to keep aboarding-house in countenance. "But I've brought my guns." This last,hopefully.

  "That's right," observed Mr. Cody, whom nothing was ever known to daunt."While a gentleman may be without a change of linen, he should never lethis wardrobe sink so low as to leave him without a change of guns."

  Mr. Hickok was not a permanency in the theatres. His was a seriousnature, and there were many matters behind the footlights to irk thesoul of him. For one stifling outrage he was allowed nothing lethalwherewith to feed his six-shooters. Blanks by the hundreds he mighthave; but no bullets.

  Now this, in a blind sort of way, told upon Mr. Hickok as somethingirreligious. A Colt's-45 was not a joke; its mechanism had not beenconnived in any spirit of facetiousness. It was hardware for life anddeath; it owned a mission, and to make of it a bauble and a tinsel thingsmote upon Mr. Hickok like sacrilege.

  And then, to shoot over the heads of folk shook one's faith. It was asthough one mocked the heavens! In good truth, Mr. Hickok never did thislast. It was his wont to empty his weapons, right and left, at theshrinking legs of Indian-seeming supers. The practice was not lacking inelements of certain excellence. The powder burned the supers, andbrought yells which
were genuine from those adjuncts of the theatre. Inthat way was the public gratified, and the integrity of the stageupheld.

  But the supers objected, and refused to go on with Mr. Hickok. Theymight love the drama, but not to that extent. It was the rock on whichthey split. Mr. Hickok would not aim high, and the burned ones wouldtake no part in the presentation unless he did. The situation becamestrained. As a finale, after bitter words had been spoken, Mr. Hickokquit the mimic world and returned to a life that, while it numbered itsdrawbacks, might make the boast that it was real. It was then he came toKansas City, there to experience ebbing, flowing nights at farobank,with that final ebb adverted to, which left him dollar-stranded asdescribed.

  This chronicle deserted Mr. Hickok in Battle Row, thinking on thestrangeness of things. Having sufficiently surveyed his bullet work ofanother day, as set forth by the Odd Fellows' emblem, Mr. Hickok wasabout to resume his walk when a telegraph boy rushed up. His rush over,the urchin gazed upon Mr. Hickok with the utmost satisfaction for thespace of thirty seconds. Then he took a message from his book.

  "Be you Mr. Hickok?"

  "Yes, my child," replied Mr. Hickok blandly.

  "Mr. Wild Bill Hickok?" Mr. Hickok frowned; he distasted the ferociousprefix.

  It had been granted Mr. Hickok by romanticists with a bent to befantastic, and was a step in titles the more strange, perhaps, since Mr.Hickok was not baptised "William," but "James." But "Wild Bill" theymade it, and "Wild Bill" it remained; albeit in submission to Mr.Hickok's wishes--he once made them plain by shooting a glass of whiskeyfrom the hand of one who had called him "Wild Bill," to that gentleman'sdisturbance and a loss to him of one drink--he was never so named exceptbehind his back. When folk referred to him, they called him "Wild Bill";when they addressed him they did so as "Mr. Hickok." Now, when the worldand Mr. Hickok understood each other on this touchy point, every sign offriction ceased. The compromise won ready adoption, and everybody wassatisfied since everybody went not without his partial way.

  Mr. Hickok tore open the message, while the boy admired him to thehilts. The message was a long one, by which Mr. Hickok deduced it to beimportant. Mr. Hickok was not over-quick with written English; he hadbeen called in the theatres a "slow study." To expedite affairs he wentat once to the signature. This was intelligent enough. As a rule, onecould give you every word of any eight-page letter he receives by merelyglancing at the signature. That rule will prove particularly true whenthe signature is a lady's. However, this time the rule failed.

  Mr. Hickok, while he knew the name, was driven to wade through thecommunication before he could come by even a glint of its purport. Thishe did slowly and painfully, feeling his way from word to word as thoughfording a strange and turbid stream. At last, when he made it out, Mr.Hickok's face came brightly forth of the shadows like the sun frombehind a cloud. Evidently the news was good. Mr. Hickok glanced again atthe name. It was the name of Mr. Masterson, whose life he had oncesaved.

  Lest you gather unjustly some red and violent picture of Mr. Hickok, asone to whom the slaughter of his kind was as the air he breathed, itshould be shown that he had saved many lives. The record of this truthwould gratify Mr. Hickok were he here to read, for he often rememberedit in his conversation.

  "If I've took life," Mr. Hickok would remark, "I've frequent saved life.Likewise, I've saved a heap more than I've took. A count of noses wouldshow that the world's ahead by me. Foot up the figgers, an' you'll seeI've got lives comin' to me right now."

  What Mr. Masterson said was this: He had staked out a claim in theDeadwood district; the assay showed it full of yellow promise. Mr.Hickok was to be a part owner; likewise, he must meet Mr. Masterson inCheyenne. Incidentally, the latter had notified the American National tocash Mr. Hickok's draft for two hundred dollars, so that poverty, shouldsuch have him in its coils--which it did--might not deter him fromproceeding to Cheyenne.

  Nothing could have better dovetailed with the broken destinies of Mr.Hickok. Within thirty minutes he had drawn for those two hundreddollars. In forty he had sent three messages. The first was to Mr.Masterson, promising an appearance in Cheyenne. The others were ofgrimmer purpose, and went respectively to Abilene and Hays. These latterwere meant to clear the honour of Mr. Hickok.

  When Mr. Hickok went into the drama there broke out in Hays and Abilenea hubbub of cheap comment. There were folk of bilious fancy andunguarded lip who went saying that Mr. Hickok had fled to the footlightsfor safety. He had made enemies, as one who goes shooting up and down isprone to do; certain clots and coteries of these made Hays and Abilenetheir home camps. It was because he feared these foes, and shrunk fromthe consequences of their feuds, that he called himself an actor, andwent shouting and charging and shooting blank cartridges at imitationIndians throughout an anaemic East! Such childish employment kept Mr.Hickok beyond the range of his enemies, that was the reason of it; andthe reason was the reason of a dog. Thus spake Mr. Hickok's detractors;and none arose to deny, because Mr. Hickok's honour was his honour, andthe West does business by the aphorism, "Let every man kill his ownsnakes."

  Mr. Hickok had not gone in ignorance of these slanders; he had heardthem when as far away from Abilene and Hays as Boston Common. Now hewould refute them; he would give all who desired it an opportunity toburn condemnatory powder in his case. He would pass through Hays andAbilene on his slow way to Cheyenne. These hamlets should be notified.Those who objected to Mr. Hickok's past in any of its incidents mightcome down to the train and set forth their displeasure with theirpistols. With this fair thought, Mr. Hickok addressed respectively andas follows the editors of Abilene and Hays:

  "I shall go through your prairie dog village Tuesday. I wear my hairlong as usual." This last to intimate a scalp unconquered.

  The press is a great and peccant engine; and who has public interestmore at heart than your editor? Those of Abilene and Hays posted withall diligence the message of Mr. Hickok on their bulletin boards, addingthereunto the hour of the Hickok train, and then made preparations togive fullest details of the casualties.

  Mr. Hickok cleaned and oiled his guns. He looked forward carelessly toHays and Abilene. Experience had taught him that the odds were that nota warlike soul would interrupt his progress. Humanity talks fifty timeswhere once it shoots, and Mr. Hickok was not ignorant of the race in itsverbal ferocities. Indeed, being a philosopher, he explained them.

  "A man," observed Mr. Hickok, "nacherally does a heap more shootin' withhis mouth than with his gun. An' for two reasons, to wit:" Here Mr.Hickok would raise an impressive trigger finger. "He's a shorer, quickershot with his mouth; and it costs less for ammunition. A gent can loadand fire his mouth off fifty times with a ten-cent drink of licker,while cartridges, fifty in a box, are a dollar and four bits a box."

  Still, some vigorous person, whether at Abilene or Hays, might appear inthe path of Mr. Hickok on battle bent. Wherefore, as aforesaid, he oiledand loaded fully his Colt's-45s.

  "Because," said Mr. Hickok, "I wouldn't want to be caught four-flushin'if some gent did call my bluff."

  It will seem strange that Mr. Hickok stood willing thus to invitehostilities. The wonder of it might be explained. Mr. Hickok was, likemost folk who put in their lives upon the dreary, outstretched desertsof the West, a fatalist. He would live his days; until his time he wassafe from halter, knife and gun. Mr. Hickok had all unconsciously becomea fashion of white Cheyenne, and based existence on a fearlessness thatnever wavered, plus an indifference that never cared. He was what hewas; he would be what he would be. Men were merest arrows in the air,shot by some sightless archery of nature, one to have a higher and one alower flight, and each to come clattering back to earth and bury itselfin the grave. That was the religious thought of Mr. Hickok, or ratherMr. Hickok's religious instinct, for he never shaped it to an idea norpiled it up in words.

  There were scores to greet Mr. Hickok at Hays and Abilene, but none inhostile guise. While the train paused, Mr. Hickok came down from theplatform and stood with his back again
st the car. There he received hisfriends and searched the throng for enemies. He was careful, butinvincible, and his hair floated bravely as for a challenge.

  As the bell rang Mr. Hickok backed smilingly but watchfully aboard. Hehad no notion of exposing himself, and there might be someone about withthe required military talent to manage an attack in flank. But the peaceof those visits passed unbroken, and Mr. Hickok's honour was repaired.Mr. Hickok was not above a sedate joy concerning his healed honour, for,though he might not own a creed, he had a pride.

  Now that Hays and Abilene had gone astern with the things that had been,Mr. Hickok sat himself down to a contemplation of Cheyenne. This wouldbe his earliest visit. Nor had he in days gone by made the acquaintanceof any one who wrote Cheyenne as his home. Mr. Hickok decided on amodest entrance.

  "Which if thar's one thing that's always made me tired," observed Mr.Hickok, as he talked the subject over with himself, "it's a partyjumpin' into camp as though he owned the yearth an' had come to fenceit."

  Mr. Hickok planned an unobtrusive descent upon Cheyenne. He would appearwithout announcement. He would let Cheyenne uncover his merits one byone and learn his identity only when events should point the day andway. He would claim no privileges beyond the privileges of common men.

  Such was the amiable programme of Mr. Hickok, and he arrayed himself tobe in harmony therewith. The yellow mane that had flaunted at Hays andAbilene was imprisoned, as in Kansas City, beneath a small-rimmed softfelt hat, to the end that it enkindle rage in no man. Because thebrightness of the sun on the parched pampas hurt his eyes, worn as theywere with much scanning of midnight decks, Mr. Hickok donned darkgoggles. His coat was black and long--to cover his armament--and almost ofpulpit cut. To put a closing touch on a whole that spoke of lamb's-woolpeace, Mr. Hickok, limping with a shade of rheumatism, the harvest ofmany nights on rain-soaked prairies, carried a cane. This latter was aresplendent creature, having been the butt end of a rosewood billiardcue, and was as heavy as a Sioux war club. Thus appeared Mr. Hickok whenhe made his Cheyenne debut; and those who observed him halting up thestreet held him for some wandering evangelist, present with a purpose tohold services in the first hurdy-gurdy he caught off his foolish guard.

  Mr. Masterson was not in Cheyenne when Mr. Hickok arrived. There wasword waiting that he had gone to Deadwood, and would not return for aweek. Mr. Hickok, upon receiving this news, resolved for recreation.

  It was ten of the evening clock, and Mr. Hickok decided to creep abouton his billiard-cue, and take a friendly view of Cheyenne. It was wellto go abroad, with what decent speed he might, and acquire a high regardfor Cheyenne people; it would be a best method of teaching them toentertain a high regard for him.

  "But no trouble!" ruminated Mr. Hickok, with a shake of the head. Hewas, according to his custom, advising with himself. "No trouble! Thar'snothin' in it! Besides, the pitcher that goes often to the well getsbusted at last," and Mr. Hickok sighed sagaciously. Then, as one whoregisters a good resolve: "The next sport who gets a rise out o' me willhave to back me into a corner an' prove concloosive that he's out tokill. Then, of course, I'll be obleeged to take my usual measures."

  Such were the cogitations of Mr. Hickok, and all on the side of law andorder, when he turned into the Gold Room.

  "What'll you have, Sport?" asked the barkeeper.

  "Licker," said Mr. Hickok.

  The barkeeper tossed up glass and bottle in a manner of scorn. He hadcalled Mr. Hickok "Sport," not for compliment, but derision, and becauseMr. Hickok looked like an agriculturist who had gone astray.

  "Got a potato ranch some'ers?" remarked the barkeeper, and his toneswere the tones of sarcasm. "Or mebby is it hay?"

  Mr. Hickok made no reply as he paid the double price which the astutebar man charged him. He knew he was derided and he knew he was robbed;but full of peace he bore it in wordless humility. Musingly, he recalleda gallant past.

  "Now if that barkeep," he reflected, "knowed who I was, he'd simply hitthree or four high places and be miles away."

  Mr. Hickok inched towards a faro game which was hungering for victims.The faro game was at the far end of the Gold Room. Over and above ahandful of silver, Mr. Hickok had two 50-dollar bills, the remainingmoiety of those two hundred sent him by Mr. Masterson. Mr. Hickok was aborn speculator; in a moment he had been caught in the coils of thegame.

  While he had but the even hundred dollars, Mr. Hickok was no one toprolong an agony. He bet the half on the "high card." The turn came,"nine-trey;" Mr. Hickok's fifty were swept into the bank. Mr. Hickokwagered the other fifty on the "high card." The turn came,"deuce-eight."

  The dealer counted down twenty-five dollars.

  "How's that?" asked Mr. Hickok.

  "The limit's twenty-five," spake the dealer gruffly, and the grufflookout hoarsely echoed: "Limit's twenty-five!"

  "But you took fifty when I lost."

  "Fifty goes if you lose!" retorted the dealer, insolently, and thehoarse lookout with echoing insolence repeated: "It goes if you lose!"

  Then did Mr. Hickok rejoice because of a provident rheumatism thatfurnished him his billiard-cue. "Biff! bang!"

  Mr. Hickok tapped the dealer and then the lookout. They fell from theirperches like apples when one shakes November's bough. Having thuscleared a path for the feet of justice, Mr. Hickok reached across to thebankroll and helped himself to a bundle of money, which, to quote thescandalised barkeeper who beheld the rapine from afar, was, "big enoughto choke a cow." These riches Mr. Hickok pocketed in the name of right.

  Having repaired his money wrongs, as that portion of the Cheyenne publicthen and there present fell upon him, Mr. Hickok resumed hisbilliard-cue and went to work. Mr. Hickok did heroic deeds. He mowed aswath through the press! A dozen heads suffered! He fought his way tothe wall!

  "Now everybody fill his hand!" shouted Mr. Hickok, pulling his 8-inchsix-shooters.

  Mr. Hickok's goggles had fallen to the floor; his loosened locks wereflying like a war banner. Altogether, when thus backed against the wall,and behind a brace of Mr. Colt's best pistols, flowing hair, and eyesgray-fire, Mr. Hickok made a striking figure--one to live long inCheyenne memory! The public stood at gaze. Then some wise man yelled:

  "It's Wild Bill!"

  There was no dispute as to Mr. Hickok's identity. The public instantlyconceded it, and began going through doors and windows in blocks offive.

  Mr. Hickok, deserted, limped slowly towards the door. As he passed thebar, its once supercilious custodian, raised his head above its moistlevels, and asked in meekness:

  "Mr. Hickok, will you have a drink? It's on the house."

  It was the next afternoon; the Cheyenne marshal, accompanied by Mr.Bowlby, proprietor of the Gold Room, paid a courtly visit to Mr. Hickok.

  The marshal was aggrieved.

  "You ought not to come ambuscadin' into camp that a-way," heremonstrated, speaking of Mr. Hickok's bashful entrance into town. "Itmight have got a passel of Cheyenne people killed. It wan't right, Mr.Hickok. Only it's you, I'd say it sort o' bordered on the treacherous."

  "It ain't that I'm askin' it back, Mr. Hickok," observed Mr. Bowlby,diffidently, "but I want to check up my game. Sech bein' my motive,would you-all mind informin' me kindly how big a wad you got outen thatdrawer?"

  "Which I shore couldn't say," returned Mr. Hickok, languidly. "I ain'tcounted it none as yet." Then, in a way of friendly generosity: "Mr.Bowlby, I don't reckon how I oughter keep all that money; it's too much.I'd feel easier if you'd let me split it with you."

  "No 'bjections in the least," replied Mr. Bowlby, politely.

  "Which I should say as much!" exclaimed the marshal, in enthusiasticadmiration of Mr. Hickok's liberality. "Thar's an offer that's goodenough for a dog! An' now, gents," concluded the marshal, linking onearm into that of Mr. Hickok, and with Mr. Bowlby on the other; "let's godown to the Gold Room an' licker."