Ma Pettengill | Page 8

whales. He hadn't held with the whale proposition, not
for a minute, after he learned they live in the ocean. He once had a
good look at the ocean and he promptly said "Too much water!" But
here was a land animal packing nearly as much meat as a whale, eating
almost nothing, and as tame as a puppy. "I think, 'Injun how you
smart!'" he says when he got through telling me all this in a very secret
and important way.
I told him he was very smart indeed and ought to have a job with the
Government at a dollar a year telling people to quit beef meat for the
elephant. I said I was much obliged for the tip and if I ever got to going
good in elephants I'd see he had a critter of his own to butcher every
fall. So Pete went out with all his excitement and told the boys how I
was going to stock the ranch with these new animals which was better
than whales because you wouldn't have to get your feet wet. The boys
made much of it right off.
In no time at all they had all the white-faces sold off and vast herds of
pure-bred elephants roaming over the ranch with the Arrowhead brand
on 'em. Down on the flat lands they had waving fields of popcorn and
up above here they had a thousand acres of ripening peanuts; and
Sandy Sawtelle, the king of the humourists, he hit on another idea that
would bring in fifty thousand dollars a year just on the side. He said if a
crowd come along to a ranch and bought the rancher's own hay for the
sake of feeding it to his own steers they would be thought weak-minded.
Not so with elephants. He said people would come from far and near

and bring their little ones to buy our own peanuts and popcorn to feed
our own elephants. All we needed to do was put the stuff up in sacks at
a nickel a throw. He said of course the novelty might die out in time,
but if he could only get the peanut-and-popcorn concession for the first
three years that would be all he'd want for his simple needs of living in
a swell marble house in Spokane, with a private saloon and hired help
to bring him his breakfast in bed and put on another record and minister
to his lightest whim. Buck Devine said he'd be able to throw his own
good money right and left if he could get the ivory privilege, which is
made from the horns of the elephant and is used for many useful
purposes; and one of the other boys says they'll develop a good milk
strain and get a dairy herd, because the milk of this noble animal ought
to be fine for prize fighters and piano movers.
In about ten minutes they was doing quite a business for old Pete's
benefit, and Pete very earnest about it. He says I've promised him a
young animal to butcher every fall, and they tell him there ain't no meat
so good as a prime young popcorn-fed elephant, and he'll certainly live
high. And just then up rides old Safety First again. So they get silent
and mysterious all at once and warn Pete, so Safety will hear it, not to
say a word to any one. Pete looks secretive and hostile at the visitor and
goes back to his woodpile. Safety naturally says what fool thing have
they got into their heads now, and he supposes it's some more of that
whale nonsense.
The boys clam up. They say this is nothing like whales, but a dry-land
proposition too important to talk about; that I've sworn everyone to
secrecy, but he'll see soon enough what it is when the big money begins
to roll in. They don't mind telling him it's an African proposition of
new and nourishing food, a regular godsend to the human race, but they
got to keep quiet until I get my options bought up so I'll have the cream
of the business.
Safety sniffs in a baffled manner and tries to worm out a hint, but they
say it's a thing would go like wildfire once it got known, being so much
tastier than whale meat and easier to handle, and eating almost nothing.
"Whales was pretty good," says Sandy; "but since the boss got a line on

this other animal she's disposed of her whale interests for seventy-three
thousand dollars."
Buck Devine says I showed him the check, that come in yesterday's
mail, and let him hold it a minute so he could say he once held
seventy-three thousand dollars in his hand just like that. And