Christmas Eve on Lonesome | Page 5

you," said Mayhall, ruffling a little, "may I axe you--why you--"
"Certainly," said Bill, and he handed over the paper that he held in his hand.
Mayhall took the paper and looked it up and down helplessly--Flitter Bill slyly watching him.
Mayhall handed it back. "If you please, Misto Richmond--I left my specs at home." Without a smile, Bill began. It was an order from the commandant at Cumberland Gap, sixty miles farther down Powell's Valley, authorizing Mayhall Wells to form a company to guard the Gap and to protect the property of Confederate citizens in the valley; and a commission of captaincy in the said company for the said Mayhall Wells. Mayhall's mouth widened to the full stretch of his lean jaws, and, when Bill was through reading, he silently reached for the paper and looked it up and down and over and over, muttering:
"Well--well--well!" And then he pointed silently to the name that was at the bottom of the paper.
Bill spelled out the name:
"Jefferson Davis" and Mayhall's big fingers trembled as he pulled them away, as though to avoid further desecration of that sacred name.
Then he rose, and a magical transformation began that can be likened--I speak with reverence--to the turning of water into wine. Captain Mayhall Wells raised his head, set his chin well in, and kept it there. He straightened his shoulders, and kept them straight. He paced the floor with a tread that was martial, and once he stopped before the door with his right hand thrust under his breast-pocket, and with wrinkling brow studied the hills. It was a new man--with the water in his blood changed to wine--who turned suddenly on Flitter Bill Richmond:
"I can collect a vehy large force in a vehy few days." Flitter Bill knew that--that he could get together every loafer between the county-seat of Wise and the county-seat of Lee--but he only said encouragingly:
"Good!"
"An' we air to pertect the property--I am to pertect the property of the Confederate citizens of the valley--that means you, Misto Richmond, and this store."
Bill nodded.
Mayhall coughed slightly. "There is one thing in the way, I opine. Whar--I axe you--air we to git somethin' to eat fer my command?" Bill had anticipated this.
"I'll take keer o' that."
Captain Wells rubbed his hands.
"Of co'se, of co'se--you are a soldier and a patriot--you can afford to feed 'em as a slight return fer the pertection I shall give you and yourn."
"Certainly," agreed Bill dryly, and with a prophetic stir of uneasiness.
"Vehy--vehy well. I shall begin now, Misto Richmond." And, to Flitter Bill's wonder, the captain stalked out to the stoop, announced his purpose with the voice of an auctioneer, and called for volunteers then and there. There was dead silence for a moment. Then there was a smile here, a chuckle there, an incredulous laugh, and Hence Sturgill, "bully of the Pocket," rose from the wagon-tongue, closed his knife, came slowly forward, and cackled his scorn straight up into the teeth of Captain Mayhall Wells. The captain looked down and began to shed his coat.
"I take it, Hence Sturgill, that you air laughin' at me?"
"I am a-laughin' at you, Mayhall Wells," he said, contemptuously, but he was surprised at the look on the good-natured giant's face.
"Captain Mayhall Wells, ef you please."
"Plain ole Mayhall Wells," said Hence, and Captain Wells descended with no little majesty and "biffed" him.
The delighted crowd rose to its feet and gathered around. Tallow Dick came running from the barn. It was biff--biff, and biff again, but not nip and tuck for long. Captain Mayhall closed in. Hence Sturgill struck the earth like a Homeric pine, and the captain's mighty arm played above him and fell, resounding. In three minutes Hence, to the amazement of the crowd, roared:
"'Nough!"
But Mayhall breathed hard and said quietly:
"Captain Wells!":
Hence shouted, "Plain ole--" But the captain's huge fist was poised in the air over his face.
"Captain Wells," he growled, and the captain rose and calmly put on his coat, while the crowd looked respectful, and Hence Sturgill staggered to one side, as though beaten in spirit, strength, and wits as well. The captain beckoned Flitter Bill inside the store. His manner had a distinct savor of patronage.
[Illustration: Captain Wells descended with no little majesty and "biffed" him.]
"Misto Richmond," he said, "I make you--I appoint you, by the authority of Jefferson Davis and the Confederate States of Ameriky, as commissary-gineral of the Army of the Callahan."
"As what?" Bill's eyes blinked at the astounding dignity of his commission.
"Gineral Richmond, I shall not repeat them words." And he didn't, but rose and made his way toward his old gray mare. Tallow Dick held his bridle.
"Dick," he said jocosely, "goin' to run away ag'in?" The negro almost paled, and then, with a look at a blacksnake whip that hung on the barn door, grinned.
"No, suh--no, suh--'deed