The Lonesome Trail and Other Stories | Page 2

yuh," the schoolma'am had forsaken Joe Meeker, with whose
parents she boarded, and had deliberately chosen Weary. The Happy
Family had, with one accord, grinned at him in a way that promised
many things and, up to the coming of the Fourth of July, every promise
had been conscientiously fulfilled.
They brought him many friendly messages from the schoolma'am, to
which he returned unfriendly answers. When he accused them openly
of trying to "load" him; they were shocked and grieved. They told him
the schoolma'am said she felt drawn to him--he looked so like her
darling brother who had spilled his precious blood on San Juan Hill.
Cal Emmett was exceedingly proud of this invention, since it seemed to
"go down" with Weary better than most of the lies they told.
It was the coming of the Fourth and the celebration of that day which

provoked further effort to tease Weary.
"Who are you going to take, Weary?" Cal Emmett lowered his left
eyelid very gently, for the benefit of the others, and drew a match
sharply along the wall just over his head.
"Myself," answered Weary sweetly, though it was becoming a sore
subject.
"You're sure going in bum company, then," retorted Cal.
"Who's going to pilot the schoolma'am?" blurted Happy Jack, who was
never consciously ambiguous.
"You can search me," said Weary, in a you-make-me-tired tone. "She
sure isn't going with Yours Truly."
"Ain't she asked yuh yet?" fleered Cal. "That's funny. She told me the
other day she was going to take advantage of woman's privilege, this
year, and choose her own escort for the dance. Then she asked me if I
knew whether you were spoke for, and when I told her yuh wasn't, she
wanted to know if I'd bring a note over. But I was in a dickens of a
hurry, and couldn't wait for it; anyhow, I was headed the other way."
"Not toward Len Adams, were you?" asked Weary sympathetically.
"Aw, she'll give you an invite, all right," Happy Jack declared. "Little
Willie ain't going to be forgot, yuh can gamble on that. He's too much
like Darling Brother--"
At this point, Happy Jack ducked precipitately and a flapping,
four-buckled overshoe, a relic of the winter gone, hurtled past his head
and landed with considerable force upon the unsuspecting stomach of
Cal, stretched luxuriously upon his bunk. Cal doubled like a threatened
caterpillar and groaned, and Weary, feeling that justice had not been
defeated even though he had aimed at another culprit, grinned
complacently.
"What horse are you going to take?" asked Chip, to turn the subject.
"Glory. I'm thinking of putting him up against Bert Rogers' Flopper.
Bert's getting altogether too nifty over that cayuse of his. He needs to
be walked away from, once; Glory's the little horse that can learn 'em
things about running, if--"
"Yeah--if!" This from Cal, who had recovered speech. "Have yuh got a
written guarantee from Glory, that he'll run?"
"Aw," croaked Happy Jack, "if he runs at all, it'll likely be
backwards--if it ain't a dancing-bear stunt on his hind feet. You can

gamble it'll be what yuh don't expect and ain't got any money on; that
there's Glory, from the ground up."
"Oh, I don't know," Weary drawled placidly. "I'm not setting him
before the public as a twin to Mary's little lamb, but I'm willing to risk
him. He's a good little horse--when he feels that way--and he can run.
And darn him, he's got to run!"
Shorty quit snoring and rolled over. "Betche ten dollars, two to one, he
won't run," he said, digging his fists into his eyes like a baby.
Weary, dead game, took him up, though he knew what desperate
chances he was taking.
"Betche five dollars, even up, he runs backwards," grinned Happy Jack,
and Weary accepted that wager also.
The rest of the afternoon was filled with Glory--so to speak--and much
coin was hazarded upon his doing every unseemly thing that a horse
can possibly do at a race, except the one thing which he did do; which
goes to prove that Glory was not an ordinary cayuse, and that he had a
reputation to maintain. To the day of his death, it may be said, he
maintained it.
Dry Lake was nothing if not patriotic. Every legal holiday was
observed in true Dry Lake manner, to the tune of violins and the
swish-swish of slippered feet upon a more-or-less polished floor. The
Glorious Fourth, however, was celebrated with more elaborate
amusements. On that day men met, organized and played a matched
game of ball with much shouting and great gusto, and with an umpire
who aimed to please.
After that they arranged their horseraces over the bar of the saloon, and
rode, ran or walked to the