Part 23 (1/2)

”Yesterday a couple of women that Ma don't even know stopped out in front of the house and giggled at everything Pa said, and one of 'em said: 'Oh, you naughty man!' When Pa came into the house, Ma asked him what he was saying to those strange women that made 'em call him a naughty man, and Pa looked awful worried and wouldn't tell her. He said it wasn't his fault if women acted like fools. He's all swelled-up, Pa is. Wears his best clothes every day and has taken to smoking cigarettes instead of a pipe when he's outside the house. Ma was counting up the other day just to see how much the cigarettes cost her, and--But that wasn't what I started to tell you. I--”

”I seen him walkin' down Cutler Street day before yesterday with a woman,” said Alf Reesling. ”Fat sort of a woman with a pink hat on.”

”That's Mrs. Banks. She--”

”Never mind about Mrs. Banks,” interrupted the Marshal. ”Confine yourself to the evidence in this case, an' nothing else.”

”Well, as I was saying, Pa was peaceful and quiet, cracking nuts on the flatiron. He got hold of a tough hickor'-nut, and it wouldn't crack very easy. So he had to hit it as hard as he could. Somehow he missed it, and smack went the hammer right on his thumb. My goodness! You'd ought to have heard him yell. He hopped up and began dancing around the kitchen, sucking his thumb and trying to swear with his mouth full. Ma says,--this is all she said,--Ma says: 'Did you hit your finger, Lucius?' Pa let fly the hammer. It didn't miss her head a foot. Then he fired the flatiron at her feet. Ma screamed and started to run to'ards the back stairs. Pa knocked over the kitchen table trying to head her off. She stumbled and fell down on her hands and knees. Then while he was looking for something to beat her brains out with, she got up and run into the pantry and locked the door.

”Juliet was squealing her head off. Pa picked up the hammer and started to'ard her. Juliet made a break for the stairs, and Pa let go with the hammer. He missed her, but he knocked a big hole in the ceiling. Then he grabbed the tea-kettle off the stove and threw it at the cat. He got some of the boiling water on his legs, I guess, because he grabbed 'em in his hands and yelled like an Indian. He swore he'd kill everybody in the house. So I beat it. He was hunting for the flatiron and the hammer, and I was outside before he noticed me. I grabbed this old red tablecloth as I went out and put it around me. When I saw a light in your store, Mr. Lamson, I knowed Mr. Crow would be here, so up I came.

Now, what are you going to do about it, Mr. Crow?”

The Marshal pondered. ”You say your Ma's safely locked in the pantry?”

”She was--unless he busted the door down.”

”And Julie is up in the attic?”

”Yes, and she's probably dead by this time. There ain't any lock on the attic door.”

”Well, seems to me they're perfectly safe till morning. Julie could jump out of the attic window if the worst come to the worst. The thing that's worryin' me is you. Where are you going to sleep tonight, Elfie?”

”Right here in Mr. Lamson's rocking-chair,” said the girl promptly.

”I'll take her up to my house,” said Alf Reesling. ”She can crawl in with my daughter Queenie.”

”That's out of the question,” said Harry Squires, arising and looking around for his overcoat. ”We will need you, Alf. The Marshal is going to organize a posse and go up to Power-house Gully and capture Vicious Lucius dead or alive, before he's half an hour older.”

”What's that?” demanded the Marshal, startled.

”You heard what I said. Get into your overcoats and goloshes, gentlemen.

The Marshal instructs me to say that we will be leaving here in five minutes.”

”Well, I'll be dog-goned!” oozed from Marshal Crow's lips. He was staring quite hopelessly at Harry Squires.

”Isn't that a fact, Mr. Crow?” inquired Harry, fixing him with a most disconcerting look.

Anderson indulged in a short fit of coughing. ”Yes,” he said, after recovering himself, ”it _is_ a fact, but I'd like to know how you got onto it.”

”I am a mental telegrapher, Mr. Crow,” said the reporter, carefully placing a hat upon Mr. Reesling's head. ”There's your hat, Alf. Now be sure and pick out a good coat.”

The Marshal's posse eventually resolved itself into a party of two--Anderson Crow and Harry Squires. Elmer K. Pratt remembered that his youngest child had the croup, and he couldn't leave her; Situate M.

Jones complained of a sudden and violent attack of lumbago; Newt Spratt loudly demanded the flaxseed his wife had asked him to bring home so that she could make a poultice for a terrible toothache she was enjoying that evening; Alf Reesling refused to desert poor little Elfie; and two other gentlemen succeeded in sneaking out the back way while the Marshal's view was obstructed by the aforesaid slackers. Storekeeper Lamson had a perfectly sound excuse. He was a pacifist. However, he was willing to lend his revolver to the Marshal and a pair of bra.s.s ”knucks”

to Harry Squires.

Approaching Power-house Gully, the two adventurers observed shadowy forms moving about in the darkness at the foot of the slope. They paused.

”Mostly women, I should say,” remarked the Marshal.

”Probably hoping that Lucius is a widower by this time,” said the reporter.