CHAPTER XVIII
THE MILLIONAIRES
Pinkey was not one to keep his left hand from knowing what his righthand is doing, so the report had been widely circulated that "a bunch ofmillionaires" were to be the first guests at the new Lolabama DudeRanch. In consequence of which, aside from the fact that the horses ranacross a sidewalk and knocked over a widow's picket-fence, the advent ofPinkey and Wallie in Prouty caused no little excitement, since it wasdeduced that the party would arrive on the afternoon train.
If to look at one millionaire is a pleasure and a privilege for folk whoare kept scratching to make ends meet, the citizens of Prouty might wellbe excused for leaving their occupations and turning out _en masse_ tosee a "bunch." The desire to know how a person might look who couldwrite his check in six or more figures, and get it cashed, explained theappearance of the male contingent on the station platform waiting forthe train to come in, while the expectation of a view of the lateststyles accounted for their wives.
"Among those present," as the phrase goes, was Mr. Tucker. Although Mr.Tucker had not been in a position to make any open accusations relativeto the disappearance of his cache, the cordial relations between Wallieand Pinkey and himself had been seriously disturbed. So much so, infact, that they might have tripped over him in the street withoutbringing the faintest look of recognition to his eyes.
Mr. Tucker, however, was too much of a diplomat to harbour a grudgeagainst persons on a familiar footing with nearly a dozen millionaires.Therefore, when the combined efforts of Wallie and Pinkey on the boxstopped the coach reasonably close to the station platform, Mr. Tuckerstepped out briskly and volunteered to stand at the leaders' heads.
"Do you suppose we'll have much trouble when the train pulls in?" Wallieasked in an undertone.
"I don't look fer it," said Pinkey. "They might snort a little, andjump, when the engine comes, but they'll git used to it. Thattwenty-mile drive this mornin' took off the wire-aidge some."
Pinkey's premises seemed to be correct, for the four stood with hangingheads and sleepy-eyed while everyone watched the horizon for the smokewhich would herald the coming of the train.
"Your y-ears is full of sand and it looks like you woulda shaved or hadyour whiskers drove in and clinched." Pinkey eyed Wallie critically asthey waited together on the seat.
"Looks as if you would have had your teeth fixed," Wallie retorted."It's been nearly a year since that horse kicked them out."
"What would I go wastin' money like that for?" Pinkey demanded."They're front ones--I don't need 'em to eat."
"You'd look better," Wallie argued.
"What do I care how I look! I aim to do what's right by these dudes:I'll saddle fer 'em, and I'll answer questions, and show 'em the sights,but I don't need teeth to do that."
Pinkey was obstinate on some points, so Wallie knew it was useless topersist; nevertheless, the absence of so many of his friend's teethtroubled him more than a little, for the effect was startling when hesmiled, and Pinkey was no matinee idol at his best.
"There she comes!"
As one, the spectators on the platform stretched their necks to catchthe first glimpse of the train bearing its precious cargo ofmillionaires.
Wallie felt suddenly nervous and wished he had taken more pains todress, as he visualized the prosperous-looking, well-groomed folk of TheColonial Hotel.
As the mixed train backed up to the station from the Y, it was seen thatthe party was on the back platform of the one passenger coach, ready toget off. The engine stopped so suddenly that the cars bumped and theparty on the rear platform were thrown violently into each other's arms.
The expression on old Mr. Penrose's face was so fiendish as Mrs. C. D.Budlong toppled backward and stood on his bunion that Wallie forgot thegraceful speech of welcome he had framed. Mr. Penrose had travelled allthe way in one felt slipper and now, as the lady inadvertently groundher heel into the tender spot, Mr. Penrose looked as he felt--murderous.
"Get off my foot!" he shouted.
Mrs. Budlong obeyed by stepping on his other foot.
Mr. Appel, who had lurched over the railing, observed sarcastically:
"They ought to put that engineer on a stock train."
The party did not immediately recognize Wallie in his Western clothes,but when they did they waved grimy hands at him and cried delightedly:
"Here we are, Wallie!"
Wallie made no reply to this self-evident fact and, indeed, he couldnot, for he was too aghast at the shabby appearance of his wealthyfriends to think of any that was appropriate. They looked as if they hadransacked their attics for clothes in which to make the trip.
The best Wallie could immediately manage was a limp handshake and asickly grin as the coal baron and street-railway magnate, Mr. HenryAppel, stepped off in a suit of which he had undoubtedly been defraudinghis janitor for some years.
Mrs. J. Harry Stott was handed down in a pink silk creation, through thelace insertion of which one could see the cinders that had settled inthe fat crease of her neck. While Mrs. Stott recognized itsinappropriateness, she had decided to give it a final wear and save afresh gown.
Upon her heels was Mr. Stott, in clothes which bore mute testimony tothe fact that he led a sedentary life. Mr. Stott was a "jiner" forbusiness purposes and he was wearing all his lodge pins in theexpectation of obtaining special privileges from brother members whiletravelling.
C. D. Budlong wore a "blazer" and a pair of mountain boots that hadinvolved him in a quarrel with a Pullman conductor, who had called him avandal for snagging a plush seat with the hob-nails. At his wife'srequest, Mr. Budlong was bringing a canvas telescope filled with avariety of tinned fruits. It was so heavy that it sagged from the handleas he bore it in front of him with both hands, so no one was deceived byhis heroic efforts to carry it jauntily and make it appear that he didnot notice the weight.
The only stranger in the party was Mrs. Henry Appel's maiden aunt--MissLizzie Philbrick--sixty or thereabouts. "Aunt Lizzie" was a refugee fromthe City of Mexico, and had left that troublesome country in such apanic that she had brought little besides a bundle of the reports of aHumane Society with which she had been identified, and an onyx apple, towhich it was assumed there was much sentiment attached, since sherefused to trust it to the baggage car, and was carrying it in her hand.
"Aunt Lizzie" looked as if she had been cast for a period play--earlyGeneral Grant, perhaps--as she descended wearing a beaded silk mantleand a bonnet with strings.
"Be careful, Aunt Lizzie! Look where you step!"
The chorus of warnings was due to the fact that Aunt Lizzie already hadfallen fourteen times in transit, a tack-head seeming sufficient to tripher up, and now, quite as though they had shouted the reverse, AuntLizzie stumbled and dropped the onyx apple upon old Mr. Penrose'sfelt-shod foot.
This was too much. Mr. Penrose shouted furiously:
"I wish you'd lose that damned thing!"
When it came to altered looks, Wallie had no monopoly on surprise. TheHappy Family found it difficult to reconcile this rather tough-lookingyoung man with the nice, neat boy who had blown them kisses from themotor bus.
"Now, what sort of a conveyance have you provided?" inquired Mr. Stott,who had taken the initiative in such matters during the trip.
Wallie pointed proudly to the stage-coach with Pinkey on the box and Mr.Tucker standing faithfully at the leaders' heads.
Everybody exclaimed in delight and lost no time in greeting Pinkey,whose response was cordial but brief. To Wallie he said, out of thecorner of his mouth:
"Load 'em on. The roan is gittin' a hump in his back."
"We have twenty-five miles to make," Wallie hinted.
"Our luggage? How about that?" inquired Mr. Stott.
"It will follow." Wallie opened the stage-coach door as a further hint.
"I want to get some snap-shots of the town," said Mr. Penrose, who hadhis camera and a pair of field-glasses slung over his shoulder.
"What an exp
erience this will be to write home!" gushed Miss Gaskett."Let's stop at the office and mail post-cards."
Pinkey leaned over the side and winked at Wallie, who urged uneasily:
"We must start. Twenty-five miles is a good distance to make beforedark."
"Switzerland has nothing to surpass this view!" declared Mr. Stott, whohad never been in Switzerland.
Everyone took a leisurely survey of the mountains.
"And the air is very like that of the Scotch moors." No one ever wouldhave suspected from his positive tone that Mr. Stott never had been inScotland, either.
"I am sorry to insist," said Wallie in response to another significantlook from Pinkey, "but we really will have to hurry."
Thus urged, they proceeded to clamber in, except Miss Gertie Eyester,who was patting the roan on the nose.
"Dear 'ittie horsey!"
"'Ittie horse eats human flesh, you'd better not git too close," saidPinkey.
Miss Eyester looked admiringly at Pinkey in his red shirt and declaredwith an arch glance:
"You're so droll, Mr. Fripp!"
Since Mr. Fripp thought something of the sort himself he did notcontradict her, but told himself that she was "not so bad--for a dude."
"I hope the horses are perfectly safe, because my heart isn't good, andwhen I'm frightened it goes bad and my lips get just as _b-l-u-e_!"
"They look all right now," said Pinkey, after giving them his carefulattention.
Miss Eyester observed wistfully:
"I hope I will get well and strong out here."
"If you'd go out in a cow-camp fer a couple of months it would do you aworld of good," Pinkey advised her. "You'd fatten up."
Mr. Budlong, who had gotten in the coach, got out again to inquire ofPinkey if he was sure the horses were perfectly gentle.
"I'd trust my own step-mother behind 'em anywhere."
Mr. Budlong, who had had a step-mother, intimated that that was notconvincing proof, and returned to the coach declaring that he had nofears for himself, but his wife was nervous.
To show his contempt of danger, Mr. Stott said: "Poof!"
Wallie, having closed the door, climbed up beside Pinkey, who unlockedthe brake.
"I always feel helpless shut inside a vehicle," declared Mr. Budlong.
Mr. Stott again said recklessly: "Poof!"
Just as he said "poof!", the leaders rose on their hind legs. Mr.Tucker, who rose with them, clung valiantly to their bits and dangledthere. One of the wheel horses laid down and the other tried to climbover the back of the leader in front of him, while the bystandersscattered.
"There seems to be some kind of a ruckus," Mr. Appel remarked as hestood up and leaned out the window.
Before he had time to report, however, two side wheels went over theedge of the station platform, tipping the coach to an angle which sentall the passengers on the upper side into the laps of those on thelower.
Aunt Lizzie pitched headlong and with such force that when she struckMr. Stott on the mouth with her onyx apple she cut his lip.
"You'll kill somebody with that yet!" Mr. Stott glared at the keepsake.
Aunt Lizzie scrambled back into her seat and looked composedly at thedrop of blood he offered in evidence, on the corner of his handkerchief.
Mr. Appel, who undoubtedly would have gone on through the window whenthe coach lurched had it not been for his wife's presence of mind inclutching him by the coat, demanded in an angry voice--instead ofshowing the gratitude she had reason to expect:
"Whatch you doin'? Tearin' the clothes off'n m'back? Wisht you'd leaveme be!"
It had been years since Mr. Appel had spoken to his wife like that. Mrs.Appel opened her reticule, took out a handkerchief and held it to hereyes.
In the meantime the side wheels had dropped off the station platform andthe coach had righted itself, but in spite of all that Pinkey and Walliecould do the leaders swung sharply to the left and dragged the wheelhorses after them down the railroad track.
When the wheels struck the ties, Miss Mattie Gaskett bounded into theair as if she had been sitting upon a steel coil that had suddenly beenreleased. She was wearing a tall-crowned hat of a style that had notbeen in vogue for some years and as she struck the roof it crackled andwent shut like an accordeon, so that it was of an altogether differentshape when she dropped back to the seat.
"Oh, my!" she exclaimed, blinking in a dazed fashion as she felt of herhat.
Old Mr. Penrose, who had elongated his naturally long neck preparatoryto looking out the window, also struck the roof and with such force thathis neck was bent like the elbow in a stove-pipe when he came down. Hesaid such a bad word that Aunt Lizzie Philbrick exclaimed: "Oh, howdread-ful!" and asked him to remember where he was.
Mr. Penrose replied that he did not care where he was--that if her neckhad been driven into her shoulders a foot she would say something, too.
Mrs. J. Harry Stott and Mr. Budlong, who had bumped heads so hard thatthe thud was heard, were eyeing each other in an unfriendly fashion asthey felt of their foreheads, waiting for the lump.
Mr. Stott, who was still patting his lip with his handkerchief,declared:
"Such roads as these retard the development of a county."
"Undoubtedly," agreed Mr. Appel, getting up out of the aisle. "They area disgrace!"
"We are going _away_ from the mountains--I don't understand----"
Mr. Stott smiled reassuringly at Mrs. Budlong and told her that Wallieand Pinkey, of course, knew the road.
"I don't care," she insisted, stoutly, "I believe something's wrong. Weare going awfully fast, and if I thought it was as rough as this all theway I should prefer to walk."
"You must remember that you are now in the West, Mrs. Budlong," Mr.Stott replied in a kind but reproving tone, "and we cannot expect----"
Mrs. Budlong, who had just bitten her tongue, retorted sharply:
"We certainly could expect a more comfortable conveyance than this. If Ilive to get out I shall never step foot in it again."
"When we stop at the post-office," said Mr. Budlong in a tone ofdecision as he clung to the window frame, "I shall hire a machine and goout--the rest of you can do as you like."
If there was dissatisfaction inside the coach it was nothing at allcompared to the excitement on the box as the horses galloped down therailroad track. The leaders' mouths might have been bound in cast-ironfor all the attention they paid to the pull on their bits, althoughPinkey and Wallie were using their combined strength in their effortsto stop the runaways.
"Them dudes must be gittin' an awful churnin'," said Pinkey through hisclenched teeth.
"We'll be lucky if we are not ditched," Wallie panted as he braced hisfeet.
"Wouldn't that be some rank! Even if we 'rim a tire' we got to swing offthis track, for there's a culvert somewheres along here and----"
"Pink!"
Pinkey had no time to look, but he knew what the sharp exclamationmeant.
"Pull my gun out--lay it on the seat--I can stop 'em if I must."
Pinkey's face was white under its sunburn and his jaw was set.
"How far we got?"
"About a hundred yards," Wallie answered, breathing heavily.
"We'll give 'em one more try. My hands are playin' out. You pop it tothe roan when I say. Cut him wide open! If I can't turn him, I'll drophim. They'll pile up and stop. It's the only way."
Pinkey dug his heels into the foot-brace in front and took a tighterwrap of the lines around his hands. He could see the culvert ahead. Hisvoice was hoarse as he gave the word.
Wallie stood up and swung the long rawhide braided whip. At the sametime Pinkey put all his failing strength on one line. As the roan feltthe tremendous pull on his mouth and the whip-thongs stung his head andneck, he turned at a sharp angle, dragging his mate. The wheel horsesfollowed, and some of the stout oak spokes splintered in the wheels asthey jerked the coach over the rail.
The pallid pair exchanged a quick glance of unutterable re
lief. Thehorses were still running but their speed was slackening as Pinkey swungthem in a circle toward the town. Dragging the heavy coach oversagebrush hummocks and through sand had winded them so that they werealmost ready to quit when they turned down the main street.
"If we'd 'a' hit that culvert we mighta killed off half our dudes. Thatwoulda been what I call notorious hard luck," Pinkey had just observed,when Wallie commenced to whip the horses to a run once more.
"What you doin' that for?" He turned in astonishment.
"Let 'em go--I know what I'm about!"
"I think you're crazy, but I'll do what you say till I'm sure," Pinkeyanswered as Wallie continued to lay on the lash.
Imperative commands were coming from inside the coach as it tore throughthe main street.
"Let me out of this death-trap!" Old Mr. Penrose's bellow of rage washeard above the chorus of voices demanding that Pinkey stop.
But it was not until they were well on the road to the ranch, and Proutywas a speck, that the horses were permitted to slow down; then Pinkeyturned and looked at Wallie admiringly.
"You shore got a head on you, old pard! We wouldn't 'a' had a dude leftif we'd let 'em out while they was mad."
"It just occurred to me in time," said Wallie, complacently.
"You don't s'pose any of 'em'll slip out and run back?"
"No, I think we're all right if nothing more happens between here andthe ranch."
After a time Pinkey remarked:
"That lady with the bad heart--she must 'a' been scairt. I'll bet herlips were purple as a plum, don't you?"
But Wallie, who was far more interested in the probable fact that thecoach as a source of revenue could no longer be counted on than in thecolour of Miss Eyester's lips, mumbled that he didn't know.