The Big-Town Round-Up | Page 4

with disappointment and indignation.

CHAPTER I
CONCERNING A STREET TWELVE MILES LONG
"I like yore outfit," Red Hollister grumbled. "You're nice boys, and
good to yore mothers--what few of you ain't wore their gray hairs to the
grave with yore frolicsome ways. You know yore business and you got
a good cook. But I'm darned if I like this thing of two meals a day, one
at a quarter to twelve at night and the other a quarter past twelve, also
and likewise at night."
A tenderfoot might have thought that Hollister had some grounds for
complaint. For weeks he had been crawling out of his blankets in the
pre-dawn darkness of 3 A.M. He had sat shivering down beside a
camp-fire to swallow a hurried breakfast and had swung into the saddle
while night was still heavy over the land. He had ridden after cattle
wild as deer and had wrestled with ladino steers till long after the stars
were up. In the chill night he had eaten another meal, rolled up in his
blankets, and fallen into instant heavy sleep. And five minutes later--or
so at least it seemed to him--the cook had pounded on the triangle for
him to get up.
None the less Red's grumbling was a pretense. He would not have been
anywhere else for twice the pay. This was what he lived for.
Johnnie Green, commonly known as "the Runt," helped himself to
another flank steak. He was not much of a cow-hand, but when it came
to eating Johnnie was always conscientiously on the job.
"These here New Yorkers must be awful hardy," he ventured, apropos
of nothing. "Seems like they're night birds for fair. Never do go to bed,
far as I can make out. They tromp the streets all day and dance at them
cabby-rets all night. My feet would be all wore out."
Stace Wallis grinned. "So would my pocketbook. I've heard tell how a
fellow can pay as high as four or five dollars for an eat at them places."
"Nothin' to it--nothin' a-tall," pronounced Red dogmatically. Hollister

always knew everything. Nothing in the heavens above or the earth
below could stump him. The only trouble with his knowledge was that
he knew so much that wasn't true. "Can't be did. Do you reckon any o'
them New Yorkers could get away with five dollars' worth of ham and
aigs? Why, the Runt here couldn't eat more'n a dollar's worth."
"Sure," assented Johnnie. It was the habit of his life to agree with the
last speaker. "You're damn whistlin', Red. Why, at the Harvey House
they only charge a dollar for a square, and a man couldn't get a better
meal than that."
"Onct in Denver, when I went to the stock show, I blowed myself for a
meal at the Cambridge Hotel that set me back one-fifty," said Slim
Leroy reminiscently. "They et dinner at night."
"They did?" scoffed Johnnie. "Don't they know a fellow eats dinner at
noon and supper at night?"
"I ain't noticed any dinner at noon for se-ve-real weeks," Hollister
contributed.
"Some feed that," ruminated Leroy, with memories of the Cambridge
Hotel still to the fore.
"With or without?" questioned Red.
"I reckon I had one li'l' drink with it. No more."
"Then they stung you," pronounced Hollister.
"Mebbeso, and mebbe not. I ain't kickin' none. I sure was in tony
society. There was fellows sittin' at a table near us that had on them
swallow-tail coats."
Johnnie ventured a suggestion. "Don't you reckon if a fellow et a
couple o' plates of this here cavi-eer stuff and some ice cream and cake,
he might run it up to two bucks or two and a half? Don't you reckon he
might, Clay?"

Clay Lindsay laughed. "You boys know a lot about New York, just
about as much as I do. I've read that a guy can drop a hundred dollars a
night in a cabaret if he has a friend or two along, and never make a
ripple on Broadway."
"Does that look reasonable to you, Clay?" argued Red. "We're not
talkin' about buckin' the tiger or buyin' diamonds for no actresses.
We're figurin' on a guy goin' out with some friends to eat and take a
few drinks and have a good time. How could he spend fifty dollars--let
alone a hundred--if he let the skirts and the wheel alone and didn't
tamper with no straight flushes?"
"I'm tellin' you what I read. Take it or leave it," said Clay amiably.
"Well, I read there's a street there twelve miles long. If a fellow started
at one end of that street with a thirst he'd sure be salivated before he
reached the other end of it," Stace said with a grin.
"Wonder if a fellow could