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

fearful lest he should think her wanting in hospitality, she proposed: "Try a cigar, Mr. Johnson?"

"Thank you," he said, rising, and following her to the bar.

"Best in the house--my compliments."

"You're very kind," said Johnson, taking the candle that she had lighted for him; then, when his cigar was going, and in a voice that was intended for her alone, he went on: "So you remember me?"

"If you remember me," returned the Girl, likewise in a low tone.

"What the devil are they talking about anyway?" muttered Rance to himself as he stole a glance at them over his shoulder, though he kept on shuffling the cards.

"I met you on the road to Monterey," said Johnson with a smile.

"Yes, comin' an' goin'," smiled back the Girl. "You passed me a bunch o' wild syringa over the wheel; you also asked me to go a-berryin'--" and here she paused long enough to glance up at him coquettishly before adding: "But I didn't see it, Mr. Johnson."

"I noticed that," observed Johnson, laughing.

"An' when you went away you said--" The Girl broke off abruptly and replaced the candle on the bar; then with a shy, embarrassed look on her face she ended with: "Oh, I dunno."

"Yes, you do, yes, you do," maintained Johnson. "I said I'll think of you all the time--well, I've thought of you ever since."

There was a moment of embarrassment. Then:

"Somehow I kind o' tho't you might drop in," she said with averted eyes. "But as you didn't--" She paused and summoned to her face a look which she believed would adequately reflect a knowledge of the proprieties. "O' course," she tittered out, "it wa'n't my place to remember you--first."

"But I didn't know where you lived--you never told me, you know," contended the road agent, which contention so satisfied the Girl--for she remembered only too well that she had not told him--that she determined to show him further evidences of her regard.

Say, I got a special bottle here--best in the house. Will you . . .?"

"Why--"

The girl did not wait for him to finish his sentence, but quickly placed a bottle and glass before him.

"My compliments," she whispered, smiling.

"You're very kind--thanks," returned the road agent, and proceeded to pour out a drink.

Meanwhile, little of what was taking place had been lost on Jack Rance. As the whispered conversation continued, he grew more and more jealous, and at the moment that Johnson was on the point of putting the glass to his lips, Rance, rising quickly, went over to him and deliberately knocked the glass out of his hand.

With a crash it fell to the floor.

"Look here, Mr. Johnson, your ways are offensive to me!" he cried; "damned offensive! My name is Rance--Jack Rance. Your business here--your business?" And without waiting for the other's reply he called out huskily: "Boys! Boys! Come in here!"

At this sudden and unexpected summons in the Sheriff's well-known voice there was a rush from the dance-hall; in an instant the good-natured, roistering crowd, nosing a fight, crowded to the bar, where the two men stood glaring at each other in suppressed excitement.

"Boys," declared the Sheriff, his eye never leaving Johnson's face, "there's a man here who won't explain his business. He won't tell--"

"Won't he?" cut in Sonora, blusteringly. "Well, we'll see--we'll make 'im!"

There was a howl of execration from the bar. It moved the Girl to instant action. Quick as thought she turned and strode to where the cries were the most menacing--towards the boys who knew her best and ever obeyed her unquestioningly.

"Wait a minute!" she cried, holding up her hand authoritatively. "I know the gent!"

The men exchanged incredulous glances; from all sides came the explosive cries:

"What's that? You know him?"

"Yes," she affirmed dramatically; and turning now to Rance with a swift change of manner, she confessed: "I didn't tell you--but I know 'im."

The Sheriff started as if struck.

"The Sacramento shrimp by all that is holy!" he muttered between his teeth as the truth slowly dawned upon him.

"Yes, boys, this is Mr. Johnson o' Sacramento," announced the Girl with a simple and unconscious dignity that did not fail to impress all present. "I vouch to Cloudy for Mr. Johnson!"

Consternation!

And then the situation vaguely dawning upon them there ensued an outburst of cheering compared to which the previous howl of execration was silence.

Johnson smiled pleasantly at the Girl in acknowledgment of her confirmation of him, then shot a half-curious, half-amused look at the crowd surrounding him and regarding him with a new interest. Apparently what he saw was to his liking, for his manner was most friendly when bowing politely, he said:

"How are you, boys?"

At once the miners returned his salutation in true western fashion: every man in the place, save Rance, taking off his hat and sweeping it before him in an arc as they cried out in chorus:

"Hello, Johnson!"

"Boys, Rance ain't a-runnin' The Polka yet!" observed Sonora with a mocking smile on his lips, and gloating over the opportunity to give the Sheriff a dig.

The men shouted their approval of this jibe. Indeed, they might have gone just a little too far with their badgering of the Sheriff, considering the mood that he was in; so, perhaps, it was fortunate that Nick should break in upon them at this time with:

"Gents, the boys from The Ridge invites you to dance with them."

No great amount of enthusiasm was evinced at this. Nevertheless, it was a distinct declaration of peace; and, taking advantage of it, Johnson advanced toward the Girl, bowed low, and asked with elaborate formality:

"May I have the honour of a waltz?"

Flabbergasted and awed to silence by what they termed Johnson's "style," Happy and Handsome stood staring helplessly at one another; at length Happy broke out with:

"Say, Handsome, ain't he got a purty action? An' ornamental sort o' cuss, ain't he? But say, kind o' presumin' like, ain't it, for a fellow breathin' the obscurity o' The Crossin' to learn gents like us how to ketch the ladies pronto?"

"Which same," allowed Handsome, "shorely's a most painful, not to say humiliatin' state o' things." And then to the Girl he whispered: "It's up to you--make a holy show of 'im."

The Girl laughed.

"Me waltz? Me?" she cried, answering Johnson at last. "Oh, I can't waltz but I can polky."

Once more Johnson bent his tall figure to the ground, and said:

"Then may I have the pleasure of the next polka?"

By this time Sonora had recovered from his astonishment. After giving vent to a grunt expressive of his contempt, he blurted out:

"That fellow's too flip!"

But the idea had taken hold of the Girl, though she temporised shyly:

"Oh, I dunno! Makes me feel kind o' foolish, you know, kind o' retirin' like a elk in summer."

Johnson smiled in spite of himself.

"Elks are retiring," was his comment as he again advanced and offered his arm in an impressive and ceremonious manner.

"Well, I don't like everybody's hand on the back o' my waist," said the Girl, running her hands up and down her dress skirt. "But, somehow--" She stopped, and fixing her eyes recklessly on Rance, made a movement as if about to accept; but another look at Johnson's proffered arm so embarrassed her that she sent a look of appeal to the rough fellows, who stood watching her with grinning faces.

"Oh, Lord, must I?" she asked; then, hanging back no longer, she suddenly flung herself into his arms with the cry: "Oh, come along!"

Promptly Johnson put his arm around the Girl's waist, and breaking into a polka he swung her off to the dance-hall where their appearance was greeted with a succession of wild whoops from the men there, as well as from the hilarious boys, who had rushed pell-mell after them.

Left to himself and in a rage Rance began to pace the floor.

"Cleaned out--cleaned out for fair by a high-toned, fine-haired dog named Johnson! Well, I'll be--" The sentence was never finished, his attention being caught and held by something which Nick was carrying in from the dance-hall.

"What's that?" he demanded brusquely.

Nick's eyes were twinkling when he answered:

"Johnson's saddle."

Rance could control himself no longer; with a sweep of his long arm he knocked the saddle out of the other's hand, saying:

"Nick, I've a great notion to walk out of this door and never step my foot in here again."

Nick did not answer at once. While he did not especially care for Rance he did not propose to let his patronage, which was not inconsiderable, go elsewhere without making an effort to hold it. Therefore, he thought a moment before picking up the saddle and placing it in the corner of the room.

"Aw, what you givin' us, Rance! She's only a-kiddin' 'im," at last he said consolingly.

The Sheriff was about to question this when a loud cry from outside arrested him.

"What's that?" he asked with his eyes upon the door.

"Why that's--that's Ashby's voice," the barkeeper informed him; and going to the door, followed by Rance, as well as the men who, on hearing the cry, had rushed in from the dance-hall, he opened it, and they heard again the voice that they all recognised now as that of the Wells Fargo Agent.

"Come on!" he was saying gruffly.

"What the deuce is up?" inquired Trinidad simultaneously with the Deputy's cry of "Bring him in!" And almost instantly the Deputy, followed by Ashby and others, entered, dragging along with him the unfortunate Jose Castro. The rough handling that he had received had not improved his appearance. His clothing, half Mexican, the rest of odds and ends, had been torn in several places. He looked oily, greasy and unwashed, while the eyes that looked around in affright had lost none of their habitual trickiness and sullenness.

And precisely as Castro appeared wholly different than when last seen in the company of his master, so, too, was Ashby metamorphosed. His hat was on the back of his head; his coat looked as if he had been engaged in some kind of a struggle; his hair was ruffled and long locks straggled down over his forehead; while his face wore a brutal, savage, pitiless, nasty look.

By this time all the regular habitues of the saloon had come in and were crowding around the greaser with scowling, angry faces.

"The greaser on the trail!" gurgled Ashby in his glass, having left his prisoner for a moment to fortify himself with a drink of whisky.

Whereupon, the Sheriff advanced and, with rough hands, jerked the prisoner's head brutally.

"Here you," he said, "give us a look at your face."

But the Sheriff had never seen him before. And in obedience to his commands to "Tie him up!" the Deputy and Billy Jackrabbit took a lariat from the wall and proceeded to bind their prisoner fast. When this was done Ashby called to Nick to serve him another drink, adding:

"Come on, boys!"

Instantly there was an exclamatory lining up at the bar, only Sonora, apparently, seeming disinclined to accept, which Ashby was quick to note. Turning to him quickly, he inquired:

"Say, my friend, don't you drink?"

But no insult had been intended