The Abysmal Brute | Page 3

his neck, and took him in.
"I knew ye'd come, Sam, me boy," said Pat, the while he limped about,
building a fire, boiling coffee, and frying a big bear-steak. "The young
un ain't home the night. We was gettin' short of meat, and he went out
about sundown to pick up a deer. But I'll say no more. Wait till ye see
him. He'll be home in the morn, and then you can try him out. There's
the gloves. But wait till ye see him.
"As for me, I'm finished. Eighty-one come next January, an' pretty
good for an ex-bruiser. But I never wasted meself, Sam, nor kept late
hours an' burned the candle at all ends. I had a damned good candle, an'
made the most of it, as you'll grant at lookin' at me. And I've taught the
same to the young un. What do you think of a lad of twenty-two that's
never had a drink in his life nor tasted tobacco? That's him. He's a giant,
and he's lived natural all his days. Wait till he takes you out after deer.
He'll break your travelin' light, him a carryin' the outfit and a big buck
deer belike. He's a child of the open air, an' winter nor summer has he
slept under a roof. The open for him, as I taught him. The one thing that
worries me is how he'll take to sleepin' in houses, an' how he'll stand
the tobacco smoke in the ring. 'Tis a terrible thing, that smoke, when
you're fighting hard an' gaspin' for air. But no more, Sam, me boy. You
're tired an' sure should be sleepin'. Wait till you see him, that's all.
Wait till you see him.

But the garrulousness of age was on old Pat, and it was long before he
permitted Stubener's eyes to close.
"He can run a deer down with his own legs, that young un," he broke
out again. "'Tis the dandy trainin' for the lungs, the hunter's life. He
don't know much of else, though he's read a few books at times an'
poetry stuff. He's just plain pure natural, as you'll see when you clap
eyes on him. He's got the old Irish strong in him. Sometimes, the way
he moons about, it's thinkin' strong I am that he believes in the fairies
and such-like. He's a nature lover if ever there was one, an' he's afeard
of cities. He's read about them, but the biggest he was ever in was Deer
Lick. He misliked the many people, and his report was that they'd stand
weedin' out. That was two years agone--the first and the last time he's
seen a locomotive and a train of cars.
'Sometimes it's wrong I'm thinkin' I am, bringin' him up a natural. It's
given him wind and stamina and the strength o' wild bulls. No
city-grown man can have a look-in against him. I'm willin' to grant that
Jeffries at his best could 'a' worried the young un a bit, but only a bit.
The young un could 'a' broke him like a straw. An' he don't look it.
That's the everlasting wonder of it. He's only a fine-seeming young
husky; but it's the quality of his muscle that's different. But wait till ye
see him, that's all.
"A strange liking the boy has for posies, an' little meadows, a bit of
pine with the moon beyond, windy sunsets, or the sun o' morns from
the top of old Baldy. An' he has a hankerin' for the drawin' o' pitchers
of things, an' of spouting about 'Lucifer or night' from the poetry books
he got from the red-headed school teacher. But 'tis only his youngness.
He'll settle down to the game once we get him started, but watch out for
grouches when it first comes to livin' in a city for him.
"A good thing; he's woman-shy. They'll not bother him for years. He
can't bring himself to understand the creatures, an' damn few of them
has he seen at that. 'Twas the school teacher over at Samson's Flat that
put the poetry stuff in his head. She was clean daffy over the young un,
an' he never a-knowin'. A warm-haired girl she was--not a mountain
girl, but from down in the flatlands--an' as time went by she was fair

desperate, an' the way she went after him was shameless. An' what d'ye
think the boy did when he tumbled to it? He was scared as a jackrabbit.
He took blankets an' ammunition an' hiked for tall timber. Not for a
month did I lay eyes on him, an' then he sneaked in after dark and was
gone in the morn. Nor would he as much as peep at her letters. 'Burn
'em,' he said.