I’d jest started on my steak when three big, rough-looking men come in. They give me a suspicious glance, but I paid ’em no heed and went on eating. So they sot down at the counter and ordered beans and coffee, and one of ’em said, “Have you swore out that warrant for old Joab Hudkins yet, Jabez?”
They all looked around at me on account of me strangling on my beer, and the oldest and meanest-looking one says, “I’m goin’ over to the sheriff ’s office soon’s we’ve et, Bill. This is the chance I been lookin’ fur.”
“Suits me,” says Bill with a oath. “Hey, Joe?”
“Shore,” says the third ’un. “But we better be keerful. Them Hudkinses and their kinfolks around here is bad enough, but the Bearfields, which lives out beyond the Pecos somewheres, is wuss yet.”
“I ain’t scairt of ’em,” says Jabez. “Ain’t us Watsons won all our feuds up to now? I don’t keer nothin’ about the hawgs, neither. But this here’s my chance to git even with old Esau Hawkins for that whuppin’ he give me over to the county seat fifteen year ago. I jest want to see his face when one of his kin goes to the pen for stealin’ hawgs! . . . What was that?”
It was me, tying a knot in my steak fork in my struggle to control myself, but by a supreme effort I helt my peace.
“Well,” says Bill, “I hopes for Hudkins gore! I jest wisht one of them tough Bearfields was here. I’d show him a thing or two, I betcha!”
“Well, git the exhibition started!” I said, heaving up so sudden I upsot my table and Joe fell off his stool. “I’ve stood all I can from you illegitimates.”
“Who the devil air you?” gasped Jabez, jumping up, and I says, “I’m a Bearfield from the Pecos, and Joab Hudkins is my kin! I’m askin’ you like a gent to refrain from swearin’ out that warrant you all was talkin’ about I’m here to see that he don’t molest nobody else’s hawgs, but I ain’t goin’ to see him tromped on, neither!”
“Oh, ain’t you?” sneered Bill, fingering his pistol, whilst I seen Joe sneaking a bowie outa his boot. “Well, lemme tell you somethin’, you dern mountain grizzly, we aims to put that there pig snatchin’ uncle of yore’n behind the bars! How you like that, hey?”
“This is how much, you blasted swamp rat!” I roared, shattering my steak plate over his head.
He fell offa his stool howling bloody murder, and Joe made a stab at me but missed and stuck his knife in the table and whilst he was trying to pull it out I busted the catsup bottle over his head and he j’ined Bill on the floor. I then seen Jabez crouching at the end of the counter fixing to shoot me with his pistol, so I grabbed a case of canned tomaters and throwed it at him, and what happened to the waiter was his own fault. He oughta stayed outa the fight in the first place. If he hadn’t been trying to git a shotgun he had behind the counter he wouldn’t of run between me and Jabez jest as I heaved that case of vegetables. T’warn’t my fault he got hit in the head, no more’n it was my fault he ketched old Jabez’s bullet in his hind laig, neither. I kicked Jabez’s pistol out of his hand before he could shoot again, and he run around behind the counter on his all-fours, jest as the cook come out of the kitchen with a iron skillet.
It always did make me mad to git hit over the head with a hot skillet; the grease always gits down the back of yore neck. So I grabbed the cook and went to the floor with him jest in time to duck the charge of buckshot old Jabez blazed at me with the waiter’s shotgun from behind the counter. I then riz up and throwed the cook at him and they both crashed into the wall so hard they brung down all the shelves on it and the cans of beans and milk and corn and stuff fell down on top of Jabez till all I could see was his boots sticking out and his howls was arful to hear.
I was jest on the p’int of throwing the kitchen stove on top of the pile, because I was gitting mad by this time, when a feller hit the porch outside on the run, and stuck his head and a shotgun into the door and hollered, “Halt, in the name of the law!”
“Who the devil air you?” I demanded, rising up amidst a rooin of busted chairs, tables, canned goods and unconscious Watsons.
“I’m the sheriff,” says he. “For the Lord’s sake what’s goin’ on here? You must be one of John McCoy’s men!”
“I’m Pike Bearfield of Wolf Mountain,” I says, and he says, “Well, anyway, yo’re under arrest!”
“If you was a fair-minded officer,” I says, grinding my teeth slightly, “I wouldn’t think of resistin’ arrest. But I can see right off that yo’re in league with the Watsons! This here’s a plot to keep me from aidin’ my pore misguided uncle. I see now why these scoundrels come in here and picked a fight with me. But I’ll foil you, by gum! A Bearfield couldn’t git jestice in yore jailhouse, and I ain’t goin’!”
“You air, too!” he hollered, swinging up his shotgun. But I clapped my hand over the lock between the nipples and the hammers before he could pull the triggers, and I then taken hold of the barrels with my other hand and bent ’em at right angles.
“Now lemme see you try to shoot me with that gun,” I says. “It’ll explode and blow yore fool head off!”
He wept with rage.
“I’ll git even with you, you cussed outlaw!” he promised. “Yore derned uncle has run off and j’ined John McCoy’s bandits, and yo’re one of his spies, I bet! You’ve defied the law and rooint my new shotgun, and I’ll have revenge if I have to sue you in the county court!”
“Gah!” I retorted in disgust, and stalked out in gloomy grandeur, emerging onto the street so sudden-like that the crowd which had gathered outside stampeded in all directions howling bloody murder. I never seen sech skittish folks. You’d of thunk I was a tribe of Comanches.
I headed for the wagon yard, and it was a good thing I got there when I did, because Sinclair’s Defeat had got to fighting with Tom Hanson the yard owner’s saddle pony, and when Tom come out with a pitchfork he bit a chunk outa him and run him into a stall where they was a yoke of oxen. The oxes hooked Tom and every time he crawled out Sinclair’s Defeat kicked him back in again and the oxes taken another swipe at him. You oughta heard him holler.
Well, Sinclair’s Defeat was feeling so brash he thought he could lick me, too, so I give him a good punch on the nose and ontangled Tom from amongst the oxes. He bellyached plumb disgusting about gitting mulebit, so to shet him up I give him my last ten dollar bill. He also wanted me to pay for his britches which the oxes had hooked the seat out of, but I refused profanely and as soon as Sinclair’s Defeat come to, I clumb onto him and headed out along the Choctaw Bayou road.
I hadn’t more’n got outa town when I met a old coot legging it up the road on foot, with his whiskers flying in the wind. As soon as he seen me he hollered, “Whar’s the sheriff ? I got work for him!”
“What kind of work?” I ast, hit by a sudden suspicion.
“Larceny, kidnapin’ and a salt and batter,” says he, stopping to git his breath whilst he fanned hisself with his old broad-brimmed straw hat. “Golly, I’m winded! My farm’s three mile back in the piney woods and I’ve run every step of the way! You know what? While ago I heered a arful racket out to my pigpen and I run out and who should I see but old Joab Hudkins tryin’ to rassle my prize Chester boar, Gen’ral Braddock, over the fence! I sung out: ‘Drap that defenseless animal, you cussed outlaw!’ and I’d no more’n got the words outa my mouth when old Joab up and hit me with a wagon spoke. . . . Looka here!” he displayed a knot on his head about the size of a hen aig. “When I come to,” he says, “Joab was gone and so was Gen’ral Braddock. Sech outrages ain’t to be endured by American citerzens! I’m goin’ after the sheriff!”
“Now wait,” I says. “I dunno what’s the matter with Uncle Joab, but le’s see if we cain’t straighten this out without draggin’ in the law—”