The Girl of the Golden West, David Belasco [read with me txt] 📗

to clap both Trinidad and Sonora playfully on the back. "Yes, ask the boys about 'er, they'll tell you!" And so saying she fled from the room, followed by the men she was poking fun at.

"Hold her letters, you understand?" instructed Ashby who, with the Sheriff, was alone now with The Pony Express.

"Yes, sir," he replied earnestly. A moment later there being no further orders forthcoming he hastily took his leave.

Ashby now turned his attention to Rance.

"Sheriff," said he, "to-night I expect to see this Nina Micheltorena either here or at The Palmetto."

Rance never raised an eyebrow.

"You do?" he remarked a moment later with studied carelessness. "Well, the boys had better look to their watches. I met that lady once."

Ashby shot him a look of inquiry.

"She's looking to that five thousand reward for Ramerrez," he told him.

Rance's interest was growing by leaps and bounds though he continued to riffle the cards.

"What? She's after that?"

"Sure thing. She knows something . . ." And having delivered himself of this Ashby strode over to the opposite side of the room where his coat and hat were hanging upon an elk horn. While putting them on he came face to face with the Girl who, having merely glanced in at the dance-hall, was returning to take up her duties behind the bar. "Well, I'll have a look at that greaser up the road," he said, addressing her, and then went on half-jocularly, half-seriously: "He may have his eye on the find in that stocking."

"You be darned!" was the Girl's parting shot at him as he went out into the night.

There was a long and impressive pause in which, apparently, the Sheriff was making up his mind to speak of matters scarcely incident to the situation that had gone before; while fully conscious that she was to be asked to give him an answer--she whose answer had been given many times--the Girl stood at the bar in an attitude of amused expectancy, and fussing with things there. At length, Rance, glancing shyly over his shoulder to make sure that they were alone, became all at once grave and his voice fell soft and almost caressingly.

"Say, Girl!"

The young woman addressed stole a look at him from under her lashes, all the while smiling a wise, little smile to herself, but not a word did she vouchsafe in reply.

Again Rance called to her over his shoulder:

"I say, Girl!"

The Girl took up a glass and began to polish it. At last she deigned to favour him with "Hm?" which, apparently, he did not hear, for again a silence fell upon them. Finally, unable to bear the suspense any longer, the Sheriff threw down his cards on the table, and facing her he said:

"Say, Girl, will you marry me?"

"Nope," returned the Girl with a saucy toss of the head.

Rance rose and strode over to the bar. Looking fixedly at her with his steely grey eyes he demanded the reason.

"'Cause you got a wife in Noo Orleans--or so the mountain breezes say," was her ready answer.

Rance gave no sign of having heard her. Throwing away the cigar he was smoking he asked in the most nonchalant manner:

"Give me some of them cigars--my kind."

Reaching for a box behind her the Girl placed it before him.

"Them's your kind, Jack."

From an inside pocket of his broadcloth coat Rance took out an elaborate cigar-case, filled it slowly, leaving out one cigar which he placed between his lips. When he had this one going satisfactorily he rested both elbows on the edge of the bar, and said bluntly:

"I'm stuck on you."

The Girl's lips parted a little mockingly.

"Thank you."

Rance puffed away for a moment or two in silence, and then with sudden determination he went on:

"I'm going to marry you."

"Think so?" questioned the Girl, drawing herself up proudly. And while Rance proceeded to relight his cigar, it having gone out, she plumped both elbows on the bar and looked him straight in the eye, and announced: "They ain't a man here goin' to marry me."

The scene had precisely the appearance of a struggle between two powerful wills. How long they would have remained with elbows almost touching and looking into each other's eyes it is difficult to determine; but an interruption came in the person of the barkeeper, who darted in, calling: "One good cigar!"

Instantly the Girl reached behind her for the box containing the choicest cigars, and handing one to Nick, she said:

"Here's your poison--three bits. Why look at 'em," she went on in the next breath to Rance; "there's Handsome with two wives I know of somewhere East. And--" She broke off short and ended with: "Nick, who's that cigar for?"

"Tommy," he told her.

"Here, give that back!" she cried quickly putting out her hand for it. "Tommy don't know a good cigar when he's smokin' it." And so saying she put the choice cigar back in its place among its fellows and handed him one from another box with the remark: "Same price, Nick."

Nick chuckled and went out.

"An' look at Trin with a widow in Sacramento. An' you--" The Girl broke off short and laughed in his face. "Oh, not one o' you travellin' under your own name!"

"One whisky!" ordered Nick, coming into the room with a rush. Without a word the Girl took down a bottle and poured it out for him while he stood quietly looking on, grinning from ear to ear. For Rance's weakness was known to him as it was to every other man in Manzaneta County, and he believed that the Sheriff had taken advantage of his absence to press his hopeless suit.

"Here you be!" sang out the Girl, and passed the glass over to him.

"He wants it with water," returned Nick, with a snicker.

With a contemptuous gesture the Girl put the bottle back on the shelf.

"No--no you don't; no fancy drinks here!" she objected.

"But he says he won't take it without water," protested Nick, though there was a twinkle in his eye. "He's a fellow that's jest rode in from The Crossin', so he says."

The Girl folded her arms and declared in a tone of finality:

"He'll take it straight or git."

"But he won't git," contended Nick chuckling. There was an ominous silence. Such behaviour was without a parallel in the annals of Cloudy. For much less than this, as the little barkeeper very well knew, many a man had been disciplined by the Girl. So, with his eyes fixed upon her face, he was already revelling in the situation by way of anticipation, and rejoicing in the coming requital for his own rebuff when the stranger had declined to leave as ordered. It was merely a question of his waiting for the words which would, as he put it, "take the fellow down a peg." They were soon forthcoming.

"You jest send 'im to me," commanded the Girl. "I'll curl his hair for him!"

Nick's face showed that the message was to his liking. It was evident, also, that he meant to lose no time in delivering it. A moment after he disappeared, Rance, who had been toying with a twenty dollar gold piece which he took from his pocket, turned to the Girl and said with great earnestness:

"Girl, I'll give you a thousand dollars on the spot for a kiss," which offer met with no response other than a nervous little laugh and the words:

"Some men invite bein' played."

The gambler shrugged his shoulders.

"Well, what are men made for?" said he, flinging the gold piece down on the bar in payment for the cigar.

"That's true," placidly commented the Girl, making the change.

Rance tried another tack.

"You can't keep on running this place alone; it's getting too big for you; too much money circulating through The Polka. You need a man behind you." All this was said in short, jerky sentences; moreover, when she placed his change in front of him he pushed it back almost angrily.

"Come now, marry me," again he pleaded.

"Nope."

"My wife won't know it."

"Nope."

"Now, see here, there's just one--"

"Nope--take it straight, Jack, nope . . ." interrupted the Girl. She had made up her mind that he had gone far enough; and firmly grabbing his hand she slipped his change into it.

Without a word the Sheriff dropped the coins into the cuspidor. The Girl saw the action and her eyes flashed with anger. The next moment, however, she looked up at him and said more gently than any time yet:

"No, Jack, I can't marry you. Ah, come along--start your game again--go on, Jack." And so saying she came out from behind the bar and went over to the faro table with: "Whoop la! Mula! Go! Good Lord, look at that faro table!"

But Rance was on the verge of losing control of himself. There was passion in his steely grey eyes when he advanced towards her, but although the Girl saw the look she did not flinch, and met it in a clear, straight glance.

"Look here, Jack Rance," she said, "let's have it out right now. I run The Polka 'cause I like it. My father taught me the business an', well, don't you worry 'bout me--I can look after m'self. I carry my little wepping"--and with that she touched significantly the little pocket of her dress. "I'm independent, I'm happy, The Polka's payin', an' it's bully!" she wound up, laughing. Then, with one of her quick changes of mood, she turned upon him angrily and demanded: "Say, what the devil do you mean by proposin' to me with a wife in Noo Orleans? Now, this is a respectable saloon, an' I don't want no more of it."

A look of gloom came into Rance's eyes.

"I didn't say anything--" he began.

"Push me that Queen," interrupted the Girl, sharply, gathering up the cards at the faro table, and pointing to one that was just beyond her reach. But when Rance handed it to her and was moving silently away, she added: "Ah, no offence, Jack, but I got other idees o' married life from what you have."

"Aw, nonsense!" came from the Sheriff in a voice that was not free from irritation.

The Girl glanced up at him quickly. Her mind was not the abode of hardened convictions, but was tender to sentiment, and something in his manner at once softening her, she said:

"Nonsense? I dunno 'bout that. You see--" and her eyes took on a far away look--"I had a home once an' I ain't forgot it--a home up over our little saloon down in Soledad. I ain't forgot my father an' my mother an' what a happy kepple they were. Lord, how they loved each other--it was beautiful!"

Despite his seemingly callous exterior, there was a soft spot in the gambler's heart. Every word that the Girl uttered had its effect on him. Now his hands, which had been clenched, opened out and a new light came into his eyes. Suddenly, however, it was replaced by one of anger, for the door, at that moment, was hesitatingly pushed open, and The Sidney Duck stood with his hand on the knob, snivelling:

"Oh, Miss, I--"

The Girl fairly flew over to him.