The Sheriff And His Partner | Page 4

gambler by profession, called out lightly:
"The crowd and you'll drink with me, Sheriff, I hope? I want another glass, and then we won't keep you up any longer, for you ought to have a night's rest with to-morrow's work before you."
The Sheriff smiled assent. Every one moved towards the bar, and conversation became general. Morris was the centre of the company, and he directed the talk jokingly to the account in the "Tribune," making fun, as it seemed to me, though I did not understand all his allusions, of the editor's timidity and pretentiousness. Morris interested and amused me even more than he amused the others; he talked like a man of some intelligence and reading, and listening to him I grew light-hearted and careless, perhaps more careless than usual, for my spirits had been ice-bound in the earlier gloom of the evening.
"Fortunately our County and State authorities can be fully trusted," some one said.
"Mark that 'fortunately', Sheriff," laughed Morris. "The editor was afraid to mention you alone, so he hitched the State on with you to lighten the load."
"Ay!" chimed in another of the gamblers, "and the 'aid and succour of each and every citizen,' eh, Sheriff, as if you'd take the whole town with you. I guess two or three'll be enough fer Williams."
This annoyed me. It appeared to me that Williams had addressed a personal challenge to the Sheriff, and I thought that Johnson should so consider it. Without waiting for the Sheriff to answer, whether in protest or acquiescence, I broke in:
"Two or three would be cowardly. One should go, and one only." At once I felt rather than saw the Sheriff free himself from the group of men; the next moment he stood opposite to me.
"What was that?" he asked sharply, holding me with keen eye and out-thrust chin--repressed passion in voice and look.
The antagonism of his bearing excited and angered me not a little. I replied:
"I think it would be cowardly to take two or three against a single man. I said one should go, and I say so still."
"Do you?" he sneered. "I guess you'd go alone, wouldn't you? to bring Williams in?"
"If I were paid for it I should," was my heedless retort. As I spoke his face grew white with such passion that I instinctively put up my hands to defend myself, thinking he was about to attack me. The involuntary movement may have seemed boyish to him, for thought came into his eyes, and his face relaxed; moving away he said quietly:
"I'll set up drinks, boys."
They grouped themselves about him and drank, leaving me isolated. But this, now my blood was up, only added to the exasperation I felt at his contemptuous treatment, and accordingly I walked to the bar, and as the only unoccupied place was by Johnson's side I went there and said, speaking as coolly as I could:
"Though no one asks me to drink I guess I'll take some whisky, bar-keeper, if you please."
Johnson was standing with his back to me, but when I spoke he looked round, and I saw, or thought I saw, a sort of curiosity in his gaze. I met his eye defiantly. He turned to the others and said, in his ordinary, slow way:
"Wall, good night, boys; I've got to go. It's gittin' late, an' I've had about as much as I want."
Whether he alluded to the drink or to my impertinence I was unable to divine. Without adding a word he left the room amid a chorus of "Good night, Sheriff!" With him went Martin and half-a-dozen more.
I thought I had come out of the matter fairly well until I spoke to some of the men standing near. They answered me, it is true, but in monosyllables, and evidently with unwillingness. In silence I finished my whisky, feeling that every one was against me for some inexplicable cause. I resented this and stayed on. In a quarter of an hour the rest of the crowd had departed, with the exception of Morris and a few of the same kidney.
When I noticed that these gamblers, outlaws by public opinion, held away from me, I became indignant. Addressing myself to Morris, I asked:
"Can you tell me, sir, for you seem to be an educated man, what I have said or done to make you all shun me?"
"I guess so," he answered indifferently. "You took a hand in a game where you weren't wanted. And you tried to come in without ever having paid the ante, which is not allowed in any game--at least not in any game played about here."
The allusion seemed plain; I was not only a stranger, but a foreigner; that must be my offence. With a "Good night, sir; good night, barkeeper!" I left the room.
The next morning I went