any good at cards?â
âNo.â
âYou wouldnât steal hosses or rustle cattle?â
âNo.â
âWhen your moneyâs gone how ân hell will you live? There ainât any work a decent feller could do. You canât herd with Mexicans. Why, Blandâs men would shoot at you in the fields. What âll you do, son?â
âGod knows,â replied Duane, hopelessly. âIâll make my money last as long as possibleâthen starve.â
âWal, Iâm pretty pore, but youâll never starve while I got anythinâ.â
Here it struck Duane againâthat something human and kind and eager which he had seen in Stevens. Duaneâs estimate of outlaws had lacked this quality. He had not accorded them any virtues. To him, as to the outside world, they had been merely vicious men without one redeeming feature.
âIâm much obliged to you, Euchre,â replied Duane. âBut of course I wonât live with any one unless I can pay my share.â
âHave it any way you like, my son,â said Euchre, good-humoredly. âYou make a fire, anâ Iâll set about gettinâ grub. Iâm a sour-dough, Buck. Thet man doesnât live who can beat my bread.â
âHow do you ever pack supplies in here?â asked Duane, thinking of the almost inaccessible nature of the valley.
âSome comes across from Mexico, anâ the rest down the river. Thet river trip is a bird. Itâs moreân five hundred miles to any supply point. Bland has mozos , Mexican boatmen. Sometimes, too, he gets supplies in from down-river. You see Bland sells thousands of cattle in Cuba. Anâ all this stock has to go down by boat to meet the ships.â
âWhere on earth are the cattle driven down to the river?â asked Duane.
âThetâs not my secret,â replied Euchre, shortly. âFact is, I donât know. Iâve rustled cattle for Bland, but he never sent me through the Rim Rock with them.â
Duane experienced a sort of pleasure in the realization that interest had been stirred in him. He was curious about Bland and his gang, and glad to have something to think about. For every once in a while he had a sensation that was almost like a pang. He wanted to forget. In the next hour he did forget, and enjoyed helping in the preparation and eating of the meal. Euchre, after washing and hanging up the several utensils, put on his hat and turned to go out.
âCome along or stay here, as you want,â he said to Duane.
âIâll stay,â rejoined Duane, slowly.
The old outlaw left the room and trudged away, whistling cheerfully.
Duane looked around him for a book or paper, anything to read; but all the printed matter he could find consisted of a few words on cartridge-boxes and an advertisement on the back of a tobacco-pouch. There seemed to be nothing for him to do. He had rested; he did not want to lie down any more. He began to walk to and fro, from one end of the room to the other. And as he walked he fell into the lately acquired habit of brooding over his misfortune.
Suddenly he straightened up with a jerk. Unconsciously he had drawn his gun. Standing there with the bright cold weapon in his hand, he looked at it in consternation. How had he come to draw it? With difficulty he traced his thoughts backward, but could not find any that was accountable for his act. He discovered, however, that he had a remarkable tendency to drop his hand to his gun. That might have come from the habit long practice in drawing had given him. Likewise, it might have come from a subtle sense, scarcely thought of at all, of the late, close, and inevitable relation between that weapon and himself. He was amazed to find that, bitter as he had grown at fate, the desire to live burned strong in him. If he had been as unfortunately situated, but with the difference that no man wanted to put him in jail or take his life, he felt
Tristan Taormino, Constance Penley, Celine Parrenas Shimizu, Mireille Miller-Young