lumbered down to them and took possession as Hopalong and his newly found friend started for the town.
They entered the “Miner’s Rest” and Hopalong fixed the room in his mind with one swift glance. Three men—and they looked like the crowd he had stopped before—were playing poker at a table near the window. Hopalong leaned with his back to the bar and talked, with the players always in sight.
Soon the door opened and a bewhiskered, heavy-set man tramped in, and walking up to Hopalong, looked him over.
“Huh,” he sneered, “Yu are th’ gent with th’ festive guns that plugged Dan, ain’t yu?”
Hopalong looked at him in the eyes and quietly replied:
“An’ who th’ deuce are yu?”
The stranger’s eyes blazed and his face wrinkled with rage as he aggressively shoved his jaw close to Hopalong’s face.
“Yu runt, I’m a better man than yu even if yu do wear hair pants,” referring to Hopalong’s chaps. “Yu cow-wrastlers make me tired, an’ I’m goin’ to show yu that this town is too good for you. Yu can say it right now that yu are a ornery, game-leg—”
Hopalong smashed his insulter squarely between the eyes with all the power of his sinewy body behind the blow, knocking him in a heap under the table. Then he quickly glanced at the card players and saw a hostile movement. His gun was out in a flash and he covered the trio as he walked up to them. Never in all his life had he felt such a desire to kill. His eyes were diamond points of accumulated fury, and those whom he faced quailed before him.
“Yu scum! Draw, please draw! Pull yore guns an’ gimme my chance! Three to one, an’ I’ll lay my guns here,” he said, placing them on the bar and removing his hands. “‘Nearer My God to Thee’ is purty appropriate fer yu just now! Yu seem to be a-scared of yore own guns. Git down on yore dirty knees an’ say good an’ loud that yu eats dirt! Shout out that yu are too currish to live with decent men,” he said, even-toned and distinct, his voice vibrant with passion as he took up his Colts. “Get down!” he repeated, shoving the weapons forward and pulling back the hammers.
The trio glanced at each other, and all three dropped to their knees and repeated in venomous hatred the words Hopalong said for them.
“Now git! An’ if I sees yu when I leaves I’ll send yu after yore friend. I’ll shoot on sight now. Git!” He escorted them to the door and kicked the last one out.
His miner friend still leaned against the bar and looked his approval.
“Well done, youngster! But yu wants to look out—that man,” pointing to the now groping victim of Hopalong’s blow, “is th’ marshal of this town. He or his pals will get yu if yu don’t watch th’ corners.”
Hopalong walked over to the marshal, jerked him to his feet and slammed him against the bar. Then he tore the cheap badge from its place and threw it on the floor. Reaching down, he drew the marshal’s revolver from its holster and shoved it in its owner’s hand.
“Yore th’ marshal of this place an’ it’s too good for me, but yore gain’ to pick up that tin lie,” pointing at the badge, “an’ yore goin’ to do it right now. Then yore gain’ to get kicked out of that door, an’ if yu stops runnin’ while I can see yu I’ll fill yu so full of holes yu’ll catch cold. Yore a sumptious marshal, yu are! Yore th’ snortingest ki-yi that ever stuck its tail atween its laigs, yu are. Yu pop-eyed wall flower, yu wants to peep to yoreself or some papoose’ll slide yu over th’ Divide so fast yu won’t have time to grease yore pants. Pick up that license-tag an’ let me see you perculate so lively that yore back’ll look like a ten-cent piece in five seconds. Flit!”
The marshal, dazed and bewildered, stooped and fumbled for the badge. Then he stood up and glanced at the gun in his hand and at the eager man before him. He slid the weapon in his belt and drew his hand across his fast-closing eyes. Cursing streaks of profanity, he staggered to the door and landed in a heap in the street from the force of Hopalong’s kick. Struggling to his feet, he ran unsteadily down the block and disappeared around a corner.
The bartender, cool and unperturbed, pushed out three glasses on his treat: “I’ve seen yu afore, up in Cheyenne—‘member? How’s yore friend Red?” He asked as he filled the glasses with the best the house afforded.
“Well, shore ‘nuff! Glad to see yu, Jimmy! What yu doin’ away off here?” Asked Hopalong, beginning to feel at home.
“Oh, jest filterin’ round like. I’m awful glad to see yu—this yere wart of a town needs siftin’ out. It was only last week I was wishin’ one of yore bunch ‘ud show up—that ornament yu jest buffaloed shore raised th’ devil in here, an’ I wished I had somebody to prospect his anatomy for a lead mine. But he’s got a tough gang circulating with him. Ever hear of Dutch Shannon or Blinky Neary? They’s with him.”
“Dutch Shannon? Nope,” he replied.
“Bad eggs, an’ not a-carin’ how they gits square. Th’ feller yu’ salted yesterday was a bosom friend of th’ marshal’s, an’ he passed in his chips last night.”
“So?”
“Yep. Bought a bottle of ready-made nerve an’ went to his own funeral. Aristotle Smith was lookin’ fer him up in Cheyenne last year. Aristotle said he’d give a century fer five minutes’ palaver with him, but he shied th’ town an’ didn’t come back. Yu know Aristotle, don’t yu? He’s th’ geezer that made fame up to Poison Knob three years ago. He used to go to town ridin’ astride a log on th’ lumber flume. Made four miles in six minutes with th’ promise of a ruction when he stopped. Once when he was loaded he tried to ride back th’ same way he came, an’ th’ first thing he knowed he was three miles farther from his supper an’ a-slippin’ down that valley like he wanted to go somewhere. He swum out at Potter’s Dam an’ it took him a day to walk back. But he didn’t make that play again, because he was frequently sober, an’ when he wasn’t he’d only stand off an’ swear at th’ slide.”
“That’s Aristotle, all hunk. He’s th’ chap that used to play checkers with Deacon Rawlins. They used empty an’ loaded shells for men, an’ when they got a king they’d lay one on its side. Sometimes they’d jar th’ board an’ they’d all be kings an’ then they’d have a cussin’ match,” replied Hopalong, once more restored to good humor.
“Why,” responded Jimmy, “he counted his wealth over twice by mistake an’ shore raised a howl when he went to blow it—thought he’s been robbed, an’ laid behind th’ houses fer a week lookin’ fer th’ feller that done it.”
“I’ve heard of that cuss—he shore was th’ limit. What become of him?” Asked the miner.
“He ambled up to Laramie an’ stuck his head in th’ window of that joint by th’ plaza an’ hollered ‘Fire,’ an’ they did. He was shore a good feller, all th’ same,” answered the bartender. Hopalong laughed and started for the door. Turning around he looked at his miner friend and asked: “Comin’ along? I’m goin’ back now.”
“Nope. Reckon I’ll hit th’ tiger a whirl. I’ll stop in when I passes.”
“All right. So long,” replied Hopalong, slipping out of the door and watching for trouble. There was no opposition shown him, and he arrived at his claim to find Jake in a heated argument with another of the gang.
“Here he comes now,” he said as Hopalong walked up. “Tell him what yu said to me.”
“I said yu made a mistake,” said the other, turning to the cowboy in a half apologetic manner.
“An’ what else?” Insisted Jake.
“Why, ain’t that all?” Asked the claim-jumper’s friend in feigned surprise, wishing that he had kept quiet.
“Well I reckons it is if yu can’t back up yore words,” responded Jake in open contempt.
Hopalong