i have often quoted our leader as saying that mr. wallace was a man whom he could afford to trust, seeing that he had the handling of a thousand dollars or two of his money. in point of fact, he had more than that. he had two hundred thousand dollars of money in his hands that mr. chisholm’s signature was good for—not banknotes, for they were not as good then as they are now, but specie; and when a man put specie in the bank, he always wanted to get the same when he signed a check. the bank was not a great way off, and in a few minutes we were standing in the presence of the cashier.
“is mr. wallace in?” asked mr. chisholm, gazing over the heads of three or four men who had come there to do business.
“step right into his private office,” said the cashier. “he is waiting for you.”
[283]
the private office was a little room that opened off the rear of the bank, and when we filed in you couldn’t have gotten another man in edgeways. mr. wallace was engaged with some papers, but laid them all down when he heard our big boots clattering on the floor.
“hallo, chisholm!” said he. “well, you found ’em, didn’t you? are these men all remembered in the will? where’s the boy? sit down.”
“i don’t see much chance to sit down here,” said mr. chisholm, looking around. “but, if it suits you just as well, i won’t sit. most of these men are remembered in the will, and some of ’em aint. i brought ’em along with me so as to give me plenty of backing. this thing of probating wills aint what it’s cracked up to be.”
“why, what’s the matter?” asked mr. wallace.
“we found that little surrogate like you was telling me of, and he won’t let me have the will. said he would lock it up, and it would be safe.”
“that’s all right. supposing you should[284] die to-morrow and the will should fall into the hands of some dishonest person. where would you be? the will is there, and anybody can get a copy of it; but nobody can touch the will itself.”
“oh, ah! that’s the way the thing stands,” said mr. chisholm, and i thought he felt a little sheepish over the way he had acted in the surrogate’s office. “then i was wrong and he was right. but then,” he added, a bright idea striking him, “he made me sign it as guardeen. i had no business to do that.”
“how old is the boy? sixteen? well, of course he had to have somebody, and he thought you would do. where is the boy? i haven’t congratulated him yet.”
“here he is, right here,” said mr. chisholm, seizing bob by the arm and pushing him forward. “he is a pretty fellow to have a guardeen, is he not? he knows more about taking care of his money than i do.”
bob blushed like a school-girl when he was pushed out into view, but he returned the pressure of mr. wallace’s hand, and promptly[285] accepted the seat that was given to him. the president then went on to tell bob that he had nearly seven hundred thousand dollars’ worth of bonds and stocks, and about forty thousand dollars in specie; did he want some of it?
“yes, sir. i should like about ten thousand dollars.”
“all right. mr. chisholm, will you sign for that?”
“no, sir, i won’t,” said mr. chisholm, frightened at the amount. “you said you wouldn’t ask me how to spend your money.”
“bob can’t get it without you sign it,” said mr. wallace. “i will make out the check and you’ll sign it, of course. you are not going to kick, the first thing!”
mr. chisholm looked around to see what the rest of us thought about it, but none of us had anything to say. mr. wallace wrote out the check, and then motioned to mr. chisholm to take his chair and sign it; and our leader obeyed without a word of protest. mr. wallace then went out of his private office, and in a few moments returned with his arms[286] filled with bags containing bright new gold pieces.
“i’ll count them out for you if you want me to,” said he, “but then the whole sum is right here and the bags are sealed. what do you want of such an amount of money, any way? you can’t spend it out there on the ranch.”
“no, sir. but some of these men have been remembered in father’s will, and i want to pay them up.”
“oh!” said mr. wallace. “well, then, what’s the reason you can’t pay them right here? it will make a less load for you to carry.”
“now, mr. wallace, i have got something to say about that,” said mr. chisholm. “not one cent do you give the men so long as we are in the reach of bug-juice. i want them to go home with me as straight as when they came away.”
“all right. what shall we do with this money?”
mr. chisholm immediately stepped forward, and under his supervision the money was[287] equally distributed so that each had an equal weight to carry, but i noticed that lem and frank didn’t get any of it. they were the ones who were much too fond of “bug-juice.” they winked at me, but said nothing.
“now, mr. wallace, i am done with probating wills,” said mr. chisholm. “you made me sign as guardeen for a boy that is as well able to take care of his money as i am, and put my name to checks for which i am not at all responsible, and i don’t like your way of doing business.”
“don’t you want some money yourself?”
“no, sir, not a red cent. the drought is over now——”
“this has been fearful weather, hasn’t it?” asked mr. wallace, anxious to get mr. chisholm off on his favorite topic.
“fearful! you follow the dead cattle that we left behind while on our trip to the west fork of trinity, and you can go straight to my house. we left a trifle of over three million dollars on the plains, and that’s a heap of money to come out of poor men’s pockets. i wish you good-day, sir.”
[288]
we all touched our hats to mr. wallace and went out of his private office, and i drew a long breath of relief. there had been no shooting done, and i was glad of it. i was hurrying ahead to get to mr. chisholm’s side, to ask him if that order in regard to “popping him over”—that is to say, henderson—was still in force, when i saw frank seize bob by the arm and pull him back. i stayed back with him, for i wanted to see how the thing was coming out. i fell in with tom mason right ahead of bob and elam, and lem and frank brought up the rear. this was the way in which we marched down, and mr. chisholm couldn’t raise any objections to it. after we had got fairly under way, i heard frank say to bob, in a scarcely audible whisper:
“say, you wouldn’t mind lending lem and me a twenty, would you?”
“i should be glad to, but the bag is sealed up,” replied bob.
“sh! don’t let mr. chisholm know it. you couldn’t get the seal off’n the bag, could you? lem and me is mighty thirsty.”
[289]
bob put his hand into his pocket, and i could hardly keep from laughing outright when i saw the contortions his face went through in order to get the seal off the bag. he worked as a boy never worked before, and at last i saw, by the expression on his countenance, that he had got the bag open. we were pretty near to the hotel when this happened. i heard the chinking of the pieces as bob drew his hand out and placed two twenty dollars in frank’s extended palm.
“boys, i will give you that to pay you for sticking by me,” said he. “now, be careful, and don’t take too much.”
“you’re right; we’ll stick by you,” said frank. “if you ever get in a scrape like this again, send us word. we’ll not take too much. we are afraid of mr. chisholm.”
they had got the money, and the next thing was to get the whiskey. mr. chisholm thought he was smart, and, no doubt, he was in some things; but he had to deal with men who were as smart as he was. when we got back to the hotel, frank and lem threw themselves into the chairs they had occupied before,[290] to keep a lookout for henderson; but mr. chisholm spoke a word or two to them, and they got up and went into the house.
“now, landlord, catch up,” said mr. chisholm. “can you get us an early supper? we want to be away from here in an hour.”
the landlord was all attention. he was in and out of the bar a good many times, but lem and frank never went near it. they had a good deal of time to spend in looking at the pictures; i saw a half a dozen men talking to them, and finally they came back to where we were, and sat down. i winked at lem, and he winked back at me, and so i knew he had got it; but how in the world he got it was a mystery to me. i did not see him put anything into his pocket; but, after we had eaten supper and were about an hour on our journey homeward, i saw the effects of it very perceptibly. it did not make lem and frank loud and boisterous, as they generally were when they were full, but “funny”—all except when mr. chisholm came back and scowled at them, and then they were as sober as judges. the next day, however, they were all right;[291] but when bob saw frank stoop down and fill his hat four times at a stream he was passing, and drink it empty each time, he said:
“i am sorry i gave you that money yesterday. you had by far too much.”
“i know it,” said frank. “but with stuff like this, one can drink all he wants to, and it won’t go to his head. but we had a good fill-up on account of your success, and there wasn’t any shooting done, as i was afraid there was going to be.”
“shooting! i should think not.”
“well, now, i was afraid there was going to be. when mr. chisholm was passing that little stream yesterday, and reached down and filled his hat, as you saw me doing, it was all i could do to keep lem from shooting that hat away from his mouth.”
“why, how far off was he?” enquired bob, who had never heard of such a thing as that.
“we were a hundred yards or so behind him.”
“why, the old villain! he might have missed the hat, and struck mr. chisholm through the face.”
[292]
“that was just what i was afraid he was going to do, although i have seen lem, when he was perfectly sober, put all his bullets into the same hole at that distance. but he is not a villain, by any means,” said frank earnestly. “it shows what a man will do when he gets too much old rye in him.”
i tell you i believed it, and i swore off on whiskey then and there. and i have kept my pledge from that day to this.
lem and frank being all right and having no henderson to look out for, we were longer going than we were coming, and it took us six days to overtake our cattle, which were being driven slowly toward their respective ranches. we went a little out of our way to enable bob to visit his father’s grave, and stood around with our hats in our hands while bob’s eyes, his face suffused with tears, gazed upon the scene he never was to see again. i supposed, of course, that bob, having been admitted by all hands to be the heir of that property, would be allowed to rest in peace; but i did not know henderson and coyote bill. they persecuted him from the word go, and it was[293] to end only with his leaving the country. the cattle were getting fat now, the full moon was close at hand, and the mexicans and indians were waking up. i heard the men talking about it as we rode along, and only wished i could be there to see some of it; but i tell you one raid by the comanches fairly took that all out of me.
on the evening of the sixth day after leaving austin we came up with the cowboys, who were camped in a belt of post-oaks, and long before we got up to them we found that they had discovered us. everyone wanted to know how bob had prospered, and when mr. chisholm told them he had been successful in spite of the surrogate’s efforts to cheat him out of it, you ought to have heard that belt of post-oaks resound with their cheers. now that he had time to think it over, mr. chisholm still regarded the efforts of the surrogate to keep the will as a fraud, notwithstanding what president wallace had told him.
“aint he just as likely to die as i am?” he demanded. “and can’t that henderson go there and get that will? i tell you i think it[294] would have been safer in my own hands than his. but i am done probating wills now. the next time anybody dies he can get somebody else.”
at last we arrived at our ranch and found everything there just as we had left it. the cowboys gazed in surprise at the result of tom’s search, for you will remember that he threw the things in the middle of the floor and had not had time to replace them. then tom showed them the stick he had used in unearthing the pocket-book and the very spot where he had dug it out. there weren’t ashes there enough to conceal it from anybody who had tried hard to find it. i could see that bob was very grateful to tom for what he had done, and consequently i was prepared for what he had to say to me afterward.
it was two weeks before we got our cattle all rounded out and driven off by themselves where we could take a look at them. there were not more than five thousand head, all the rest that mr. davenport had owned having been left on the prairie as a prey to the[295] wolves. he must have lost as many as ten thousand head, which amounted to a considerable sum. but i ought to say that, long before this happened, bob had brought all his cowboys together and paid them the money that had been left to them in his father’s will. it made less weight for him to carry, and, besides, he wanted it off his mind. i wish i could put it on paper, the scene he had with mr. chisholm, who positively refused to pay the money. it raised a roar of laughter, which made the old man so mad that it was all he could do to keep from pulling his pistol; but bob got around him at last, and finally he gave in.
“if it is as you say—that you want some disinterested party to pay them so that they won’t believe that they have been cheated—why, i will do it,” said he, seizing the nearest bag of gold and emptying it upon the table. “but you promised that there should be no foolishness about this. now, boys, watch me, and see that i don’t make any mistake. frank, you come first. i’ve got an all night’s job before me.”
[296]
but in an hour they were all paid, and not one of the men had a chance to tell mr. chisholm that he had made a mistake. they received it reverently, for their minds were with the man whose liberality had made so great a change in their fortunes. it was more money than they had ever had before in their lives.
shortly after that—the very next day it happened—bob said to me in a whisper that he wanted to see me when all the cowboys had gone to the round-up, so i stayed behind. elam had charge of the cooking now, for i had almost forgotten to say that the mexican had discharged himself when we drew near to the waters of the west fork of trinity. he heard that there was going to be a fight, and so took himself safe out of reach of it. but then we didn’t care for elam; he had been bob’s friend all the way through, and we were not afraid to trust him.
“say, carlos, i hardly know how to speak to you about this,” said bob, looking down at the floor. “you say tom mason’s friends are rich?”
[297]
“well, i know what you have on your mind, and i’ll tell you just what i think about it,” said i. “you know tom got into serious trouble where he lived, and he has somehow got it into his head that if he can go home with five thousand dollars, that trouble will never come up again. how much truth there is in it i don’t know.”
“i know all about his troubles, but he ought not to let them prey so heavily on his mind. now, how much has he got left?”
“i think if you give him three thousand dollars he will be all right.”
“that is what i think, too,” said elam. “he don’t belong in this country.”
“i know he don’t. he wants to get up the states, where quail and black squirrels are handy, and have some more fights with ‘our fellows.’ on the whole i think the scenes he passed through with those robbers are more exciting than the scenes he passed through here. if he can get a letter from his uncle, stating that those things have been forgotten, he’ll go back.”
“well, i shan’t stay in his way,” said bob.[298] “you think three thousand dollars are all he needs? i’ll see him this morning. if he wants more he can have it.”
“you wouldn’t have found your pocket-book if it hadn’t been for him,” said i. “he reminded me of a dog on a blind scent. he poked around till he found it.”
this was all that was necessary for bob to know, and during that day i saw him several times during the round-up talking with tom; but tom insisted that he didn’t want anything. about the time that night came, however, and the cowboys came in tired and hungry, bob tipped me a wink, and i followed him behind one of the wagons out of sight.
“i took him right where he lived,” whispered bob. “i told him he could go back to his uncle, who was all the time worrying about him, with more money than he had stolen, and he agreed to take time to think it over.”
“he took it, didn’t he?” i asked.
“yes, and it was all he needed. i shall be sorry to part with tom, but then home is the place for him.”
[299]
so it was settled that tom mason was to leave us as soon as he could get a letter to his uncle. we had always treated tom as one of the family, but somehow we got into the habit of treating him better than usual. but time went on and we didn’t see anybody who was going into austin to take a letter for him. meanwhile, we had bidden good-by to mr. chisholm and all his friends, and were fairly settled down to our business again. but there was one thing that was different from what it was during mr. davenport’s lifetime. lem and frank stayed about the ranch now entirely. bob hadn’t got over his experience with henderson and coyote bill; in fact, mr. chisholm was the one who recommended him to keep them always near him, and bob intended that, if they came to his house, he would give them as good as they sent.
things went on this way, we repeat, when one day that frank was busy with some story of his cowboy’s life, we heard a terrible clatter of horses’ hoofs approaching the house. frank and lem were on hand in an instant, and, with their revolvers in their[300] hands, went out to see what was the matter, but there was no sign of henderson or coyote bill in the men who drew up at the door. two of them were soldiers and the other a civilian, and their appearance indicated that they had been through something of a fight. one of the soldiers’ heads was all bloody, in spite of the handkerchief that had been bound around it, and the horse of the civilian seemed ready to drop from a wound in his side.
“what’s up? indians?” demanded frank.
“yes, and they’re most here,” returned the civilian. “can you give us a bite to eat and change our horses for us?”
“indians!” repeated bob. “come in and sit down. you can have all the horses you want. but indians!” he added with a shudder. “in all the eight years we have been in this part of the country we have never known them to come so far south before.”
“well, you will hear them coming now if you stay here,” said one of the soldiers. “you had better catch up and go with us.”
“why, how did you manage to get on to[301] them, anyway?” i asked, for like the rest i had been so overcome with astonishment that i could not say anything. “you look as though you have been in a hard fight.”
“you may safely say that, and the way they went about it satisfies me that there were some white men bossing the job,” said the soldier. “you see there were twenty-five of us detailed to act as guard to our paymaster, who had a lot of money—i don’t know how much—to pay off the men at fort worth. we were going safely along through a pass, within a day’s journey of the fort, when they jumped on us. i tell you i never saw bullets fly so thick before.”
“did they kill almost all the guard at one fire?” asked bob.
“they got about half of us, and where the rest are now i don’t know. some got through to the fort probably, and the rest of us, being cut off, had to save ourselves the best way we could.”
“lem, you and frank bring up a horse for each of us,” said bob suddenly. his face was pale, but i saw that he had his wits about[302] him. “you may turn the rest loose, for we have all got to go now. i wish those boys who were out with the stock had warning.”
“i’ll go and tell them,” said frank.
“no, you had better stay by me,” said bob. “if there are some white men bossing this, i think you will have all you can do. suppose coyote bill is among them?”
“by george! i believe you’re right,” said lem.
he jumped off the porch, and in company with frank went out to the corral to catch the horses that were to carry us safely out of reach of the comanches. bob had found a cloth and was tying up the soldier’s head; elam was skirmishing around the house trying to find something to eat; the other soldier was filling up on water, of which he had long been deprived; and the balance were busy gathering up their weapons. for myself, i was thinking over a certain proposition that had suddenly suggested itself to me. it was a dangerous thing, i knew; but i didn’t see who else was to do it.
