Part 10 (1/2)

”Then somebody's lied to you, fer I filed on this ground and I ain't abandoned it.”

”You've never done any work on it, and Mr. Tucker has my filing fees and application so I cannot see that there is any argument about it.”

Wallie was very polite and conciliatory.

”You'll find that filin' is one thing and holdin' is another in this man's country.” Quite deliberately he scuffled up another cloud of cinders.

”I will appreciate it,” said Wallie, sharply, ”if you won't kick ashes in my gravy!”

”And I will appreciate it,” Boise Bill mocked him, ”if you'll git your junk together and move off my land in about twenty minutes.”

”I refuse to be intimidated,” said Wallie, paling. ”I shall begin a contest suit if necessary.”

”I allus fight first and contest afterward.” Boise Bill lifted his huge foot and kicked over first the pan of ham and then the gravy. Wallie stood for a second staring at the tragedy. Then his nerves jumped and he shook in a pa.s.sion which seemed to blind and choke him.

Boise Bill had drawn his six-shooter and Wallie was looking into the barrel of it. His homestead, his life, was in jeopardy, but this seemed nothing at all compared to the fact that the ruffian, with deliberate malice, had kicked over his supper!

”Have I got to try a chunk o' lead on you?” Boise Bill snarled at him.

For answer Wallie stooped swiftly and gripped the long handle of the frying-pan. He swung it with all his strength as he would have swung a tennis racket. Knocking the six-shooter from Boise Bill's hand he jumped across the fire at him. Scarcely conscious of what he was doing in the frenzy of rage that consumed him, Wallie whipped his little pearl-handled pistol from his breeches pocket and as Boise Bill opened his mouth in an exclamation of astonishment, Wallie shoved it down his throat, yelling shrilly that if he moved an eye-lash he would pull the trigger!

This was the amazing sight that stopped Pinkey in his tracks as effectively as a bullet.

Wallie heard his step and asked plaintively but without turning:

”What'll I do with him?”

”As you are, until I pull his fangs.”

Pinkey threw the sh.e.l.ls from Boise Bill's rifle and removed the cartridges from his six-shooter. Handing the latter back to him he said laconically:

”Drift! And don't you take the beef-herd gait, neither.”

The malevolent look Boise Bill sent over his shoulder was wasted on Wallie who was picking out of the ashes and dusting the ham for which he had stood ready to shed his blood.

CHAPTER VIII

NEIGHBOURS

The modest herring had been the foundation of the great Canby fortune.

Small and unpretentious, the herring had swum in the icy waters of the Maine coast until transformed into a French sardine by Canby, Sr. It had brought wealth and renown to the shrewd old Yankee, who was alleged to have smelled of herring even in his coffin, but the Canby family were not given to boasting of the source of their income to strangers, and by the time Canby, Jr., was graduated from Harvard they were fairly well deodorized.

In the East many things had conspired to make the young Canby the misanthrope and recluse he had come to be in Wyoming, where he was fully aided and abetted in his desire for seclusion by his neighbours, who disliked him so thoroughly that they went out of their way to avoid speaking to him.

Having been graduated without distinction, he concentrated his efforts upon an attempt to become one of a New England coterie that politely but firmly refused to do more than admit his existence.

In pursuance of his ambition he built a castle-like residence and specialized in orchids and roses, purchased a yacht, became an exhibitor at the Horse Show. Society praised his roses, but their admiration did not extend to Canby; he went on solitary cruises, in his floating palace and the Horse Show, which had proved an open sesame to others, in his case was a failure.