Page:The Pacific Monthly volumes 1-3.djvu/98

 started likerty skit, an' overhauled Jake 'bout two miles down in No Man's Land He tried to speak, but ther war a hitch in his talkin' apparatus. I said to him. '.Take, old pard, wherever your range is, I'm goin' with you.' When he found he wasn't entirely forsaken, he stuck out his hand an' tried once more to speak, but it broke him all up, an' purty soon we war both blubberin' like a couple of kids with ther lollypops.

"I got him ter stay over at Lone Tree ranch while I went back to Cottonwood an' next morn I war back with a purty fair outfit for two for ther range. I'd also larned in town that Van Dorn and Gretch- en were about to start for their home in B., Missoury.

"I won't spin out this yarn too long, pard, by tellin' you of how we lived for the next two years, but git down ter ther meat of ther thing by tellin' you that Jake writ Gretchen a letter a tellin' her how he come to play that trick, an' addin' that, if God would let him live, he would yet prove hisself all ther man she had thought him. Not a line ever came back in answer, but he kept a workin' like a man on ther range, an' all ther time studyin' jogerpher, readin', writin' an' grammur, till, by an' by, his lingo became so darned high-falutin' that half ther time I didn't know what he war talkin' about, but all ther time he remained ther same quiet good feller.

"We'd been down in ther Panhandle, pard, about two years, when one day ther foreman of ther Circle ranch, where we war workin', sent both of us to Budgeville for supplies. When about six miles from ther town, near the heel of ther evenin', one of them Texas northers came up, an' it warn't long 'fore we war lost in ther worst blizzard I ever seed. Say, pardner, it war a frozen hell of fury let loose. We war lopin' along, headin' northeast almost in ther teeth of ther storm. All ter once Jake's broncho refused to face it longer, an' mine, seein' him turn, follered suit. The devil seemed ter be in 'em, an' spur nor quirt wouldn't make 'em go any other way. There warn't a town fifty miles of us in that direction, so if we hoped to reach shelter, there war only one thing for us ter do, an' that war, hoof it. We tried to lead ther bronks, but they wouldn't face that storm an' we had ter let them go. I shame some ter tell it, pard, but 'fore long I slumped over in ther skurryin' snow dead beat. An' I never knowed any more till I woke up 'fore a roarin' fire, an' I all wropped up in blankets. Jake war layin' long side of me. but hadn't cum to yit, an' ther folks war a pourin' whisky down him ter git ther cirkelation started.

"I larned that we war in Budgetown an' ther folks a half hour ago had heard a faint cry, an', goin' out, they had found me all wropped up in Jake's coat an' slicker, while the poor devil hisself lay on ther groun' in his shirt sleeves, dead beat, after havin' carried me all that way through that blizzard. All I want ter say pardner, ez, if that isn't ther kind of stuff heroes are made of, you can shoot me for a goldurned sneakin' coyote.

"Next day the weekly stage got in ter Budgeville about twelve hours late, but ther news in ther papers it brought set us all afire. Bein' no less than that Uncle Sam had declared war on ther Spanish an' that Teddy Roosevelt, who every puncher knew as ther bulliest dude that ever left N. Y. to ride ther Western ranges, had called for volunteers, for a rigiment of rough riders.

"Enough is said, pard, when I tell you that Jake's name an' mine war not ther last on ther roll of enlistment. When ther rigiment finally came tergather, we found that they warn't all cowboys, but a purty good sprinklin' of New York dudes. But by ther time we got ter Cuba, we had found them a larapin good set of fellers, ever patient on guard or in ther trenches, an' as brave as ther best of us under fire. They took a special shine ter Jake, par- ticularly one young sargent named Jim Hamilton.

"We'd hardly made a landin', fore we war ordered to ther front. You've read of ther first fight of the rough riders, pard, an' how we war ambushed by them cussed Dagos, so there's no use of me trailin' over that, only to say at ther first fusillade several of our boys dropped fore we thought we war in ten miles of ther cut-throat Spanish. Cheerin' ther boys on' young Hamilton war in the lead a bit, out in a leetle clearin', open to ther rain of Mauser bullets, when all ter once he