Mr. Hickok, while he knew the name, was driven to wade through the communication before he could come by even a glint of its purport. This he did slowly and painfully, feeling his way from word to word as though fording a strange and turbid stream. At last, when he made it out, Mr.

Hickok's face came brightly forth of the shadows like the sun from behind a cloud. Evidently the news was good. Mr. Hickok glanced again at the name. It was the name of Mr. Masterson, whose life he had once saved.

Lest you gather unjustly some red and violent picture of Mr. Hickok, as one to whom the slaughter of his kind was as the air he breathed, it should be shown that he had saved many lives. The record of this truth would gratify Mr. Hickok were he here to read, for he often remembered it in his conversation.

"If I've took life," Mr. Hickok would remark, "I've frequent saved life.

Likewise, I've saved a heap more than I've took. A count of noses would show that the world's ahead by me. Foot up the figgers, an' you'll see I've got lives comin' to me right now."

What Mr. Masterson said was this: He had staked out a claim in the Deadwood district; the a.s.say showed it full of yellow promise. Mr.

Hickok was to be a part owner; likewise, he must meet Mr. Masterson in Cheyenne. Incidentally, the latter had notified the American National to cash Mr. Hickok's draft for two hundred dollars, so that poverty, should such have him in its coils-which it did-might not deter him from proceeding to Cheyenne.

Nothing could have better dovetailed with the broken destinies of Mr.

Hickok. Within thirty minutes he had drawn for those two hundred dollars. In forty he had sent three messages. The first was to Mr.

Masterson, promising an appearance in Cheyenne. The others were of grimmer purpose, and went respectively to Abilene and Hays. These latter were meant to clear the honour of Mr. Hickok.

When Mr. Hickok went into the drama there broke out in Hays and Abilene a hubbub of cheap comment. There were folk of bilious fancy and unguarded lip who went saying that Mr. Hickok had fled to the footlights for safety. He had made enemies, as one who goes shooting up and down is p.r.o.ne to do; certain clots and coteries of these made Hays and Abilene their home camps. It was because he feared these foes, and shrunk from the consequences of their feuds, that he called himself an actor, and went shouting and charging and shooting blank cartridges at imitation Indians throughout an anaemic East! Such childish employment kept Mr.

Hickok beyond the range of his enemies, that was the reason of it; and the reason was the reason of a dog. Thus spake Mr. Hickok's detractors; and none arose to deny, because Mr. Hickok's honour was his honour, and the West does business by the aphorism, "Let every man kill his own snakes."

Mr. Hickok had not gone in ignorance of these slanders; he had heard them when as far away from Abilene and Hays as Boston Common. Now he would refute them; he would give all who desired it an opportunity to burn condemnatory powder in his case. He would pa.s.s through Hays and Abilene on his slow way to Cheyenne. These hamlets should be notified.

Those who objected to Mr. Hickok's past in any of its incidents might come down to the train and set forth their displeasure with their pistols. With this fair thought, Mr. Hickok addressed respectively and as follows the editors of Abilene and Hays:

"I shall go through your prairie dog village Tuesday. I wear my hair long as usual." This last to intimate a scalp unconquered.

The press is a great and peccant engine; and who has public interest more at heart than your editor? Those of Abilene and Hays posted with all diligence the message of Mr. Hickok on their bulletin boards, adding thereunto the hour of the Hickok train, and then made preparations to give fullest details of the casualties.

Mr. Hickok cleaned and oiled his guns. He looked forward carelessly to Hays and Abilene. Experience had taught him that the odds were that not a warlike soul would interrupt his progress. Humanity talks fifty times where once it shoots, and Mr. Hickok was not ignorant of the race in its verbal ferocities. Indeed, being a philosopher, he explained them.

"A man," observed Mr. Hickok, "nacherally does a heap more shootin' with his mouth than with his gun. An' for two reasons, to wit:" Here Mr.

Hickok would raise an impressive trigger finger. "He's a sh.o.r.er, quicker shot with his mouth; and it costs less for ammunition. A gent can load and fire his mouth off fifty times with a ten-cent drink of licker, while cartridges, fifty in a box, are a dollar and four bits a box."

Still, some vigorous person, whether at Abilene or Hays, might appear in the path of Mr. Hickok on battle bent. Wherefore, as aforesaid, he oiled and loaded fully his Colt's-45s.

"Because," said Mr. Hickok, "I wouldn't want to be caught four-flushin'

if some gent did call my bluff."

It will seem strange that Mr. Hickok stood willing thus to invite hostilities. The wonder of it might be explained. Mr. Hickok was, like most folk who put in their lives upon the dreary, outstretched deserts of the West, a fatalist. He would live his days; until his time he was safe from halter, knife and gun. Mr. Hickok had all unconsciously become a fashion of white Cheyenne, and based existence on a fearlessness that never wavered, plus an indifference that never cared. He was what he was; he would be what he would be. Men were merest arrows in the air, shot by some sightless archery of nature, one to have a higher and one a lower flight, and each to come clattering back to earth and bury itself in the grave. That was the religious thought of Mr. Hickok, or rather Mr. Hickok's religious instinct, for he never shaped it to an idea nor piled it up in words.

There were scores to greet Mr. Hickok at Hays and Abilene, but none in hostile guise. While the train paused, Mr. Hickok came down from the platform and stood with his back against the car. There he received his friends and searched the throng for enemies. He was careful, but invincible, and his hair floated bravely as for a challenge.

As the bell rang Mr. Hickok backed smilingly but watchfully aboard. He had no notion of exposing himself, and there might be someone about with the required military talent to manage an attack in flank. But the peace of those visits pa.s.sed unbroken, and Mr. Hickok's honour was repaired.

Mr. Hickok was not above a sedate joy concerning his healed honour, for, though he might not own a creed, he had a pride.

Now that Hays and Abilene had gone astern with the things that had been, Mr. Hickok sat himself down to a contemplation of Cheyenne. This would be his earliest visit. Nor had he in days gone by made the acquaintance of any one who wrote Cheyenne as his home. Mr. Hickok decided on a modest entrance.

"Which if thar's one thing that's always made me tired," observed Mr.

Hickok, as he talked the subject over with himself, "it's a party jumpin' into camp as though he owned the yearth an' had come to fence it."

Mr. Hickok planned an un.o.btrusive descent upon Cheyenne. He would appear without announcement. He would let Cheyenne uncover his merits one by one and learn his ident.i.ty only when events should point the day and way. He would claim no privileges beyond the privileges of common men.

Such was the amiable programme of Mr. Hickok, and he arrayed himself to be in harmony therewith. The yellow mane that had flaunted at Hays and Abilene was imprisoned, as in Kansas City, beneath a small-rimmed soft felt hat, to the end that it enkindle rage in no man. Because the brightness of the sun on the parched pampas hurt his eyes, worn as they were with much scanning of midnight decks, Mr. Hickok donned dark goggles. His coat was black and long-to cover his armament-and almost of pulpit cut. To put a closing touch on a whole that spoke of lamb's-wool peace, Mr. Hickok, limping with a shade of rheumatism, the harvest of many nights on rain-soaked prairies, carried a cane. This latter was a resplendent creature, having been the b.u.t.t end of a rosewood billiard cue, and was as heavy as a Sioux war club. Thus appeared Mr. Hickok when he made his Cheyenne debut; and those who observed him halting up the street held him for some wandering evangelist, present with a purpose to hold services in the first hurdy-gurdy he caught off his foolish guard.

Mr. Masterson was not in Cheyenne when Mr. Hickok arrived. There was word waiting that he had gone to Deadwood, and would not return for a week. Mr. Hickok, upon receiving this news, resolved for recreation.

It was ten of the evening clock, and Mr. Hickok decided to creep about on his billiard-cue, and take a friendly view of Cheyenne. It was well to go abroad, with what decent speed he might, and acquire a high regard for Cheyenne people; it would be a best method of teaching them to entertain a high regard for him.

"But no trouble!" ruminated Mr. Hickok, with a shake of the head. He was, according to his custom, advising with himself. "No trouble! Thar's nothin' in it! Besides, the pitcher that goes often to the well gets busted at last," and Mr. Hickok sighed sagaciously. Then, as one who registers a good resolve: "The next sport who gets a rise out o' me will have to back me into a corner an' prove concloosive that he's out to kill. Then, of course, I'll be obleeged to take my usual measures."

Such were the cogitations of Mr. Hickok, and all on the side of law and order, when he turned into the Gold Room.

"What'll you have, Sport?" asked the barkeeper.

"Licker," said Mr. Hickok.

The barkeeper tossed up gla.s.s and bottle in a manner of scorn. He had called Mr. Hickok "Sport," not for compliment, but derision, and because Mr. Hickok looked like an agriculturist who had gone astray.

"Got a potato ranch some'ers?" remarked the barkeeper, and his tones were the tones of sarcasm. "Or mebby is it hay?"

Mr. Hickok made no reply as he paid the double price which the astute bar man charged him. He knew he was derided and he knew he was robbed; but full of peace he bore it in wordless humility. Musingly, he recalled a gallant past.

"Now if that barkeep," he reflected, "knowed who I was, he'd simply hit three or four high places and be miles away."

Mr. Hickok inched towards a faro game which was hungering for victims.

The faro game was at the far end of the Gold Room. Over and above a handful of silver, Mr. Hickok had two 50-dollar bills, the remaining moiety of those two hundred sent him by Mr. Masterson. Mr. Hickok was a born speculator; in a moment he had been caught in the coils of the game.

While he had but the even hundred dollars, Mr. Hickok was no one to prolong an agony. He bet the half on the "high card." The turn came, "nine-trey;" Mr. Hickok's fifty were swept into the bank. Mr. Hickok wagered the other fifty on the "high card." The turn came, "deuce-eight."

The dealer counted down twenty-five dollars.

"How's that?" asked Mr. Hickok.

"The limit's twenty-five," spake the dealer gruffly, and the gruff lookout hoa.r.s.ely echoed: "Limit's twenty-five!"

"But you took fifty when I lost."

"Fifty goes if you lose!" retorted the dealer, insolently, and the hoa.r.s.e lookout with echoing insolence repeated: "It goes if you lose!"

Then did Mr. Hickok rejoice because of a provident rheumatism that furnished him his billiard-cue. "Biff! bang!"

Mr. Hickok tapped the dealer and then the lookout. They fell from their perches like apples when one shakes November's bough. Having thus cleared a path for the feet of justice, Mr. Hickok reached across to the bankroll and helped himself to a bundle of money, which, to quote the scandalised barkeeper who beheld the rapine from afar, was, "big enough to choke a cow." These riches Mr. Hickok pocketed in the name of right.

Having repaired his money wrongs, as that portion of the Cheyenne public then and there present fell upon him, Mr. Hickok resumed his billiard-cue and went to work. Mr. Hickok did heroic deeds. He mowed a swath through the press! A dozen heads suffered! He fought his way to the wall!

"Now everybody fill his hand!" shouted Mr. Hickok, pulling his 8-inch six-shooters.

Mr. Hickok's goggles had fallen to the floor; his loosened locks were flying like a war banner. Altogether, when thus backed against the wall, and behind a brace of Mr. Colt's best pistols, flowing hair, and eyes gray-fire, Mr. Hickok made a striking figure-one to live long in Cheyenne memory! The public stood at gaze. Then some wise man yelled:

"It's Wild Bill!"

There was no dispute as to Mr. Hickok's ident.i.ty. The public instantly conceded it, and began going through doors and windows in blocks of five.