Roughing It
There was a grand time over Buck Fanshaw when he died. He was a
representative citizen. He had “killed his man”—not in his own quarrel,
it is true, but in defence of a stranger unfairly beset by numbers. He
had kept a sumptuous saloon. He had been the proprietor of a dashing
helpmeet whom he could have discarded without the formality of a
divorce. He had held a high position in the fire department and been a
very Warwick in politics. When he died there was great lamentation
throughout the town, but especially in the vast bottom-stratum of
society.
On the inquest it was shown that Buck Fanshaw, in the delirium of a
wasting typhoid fever, had taken arsenic, shot himself through the body,
cut his throat, and jumped out of a four-story window and broken his
neck—and after due deliberation, the jury, sad and tearful, but with
intelligence unblinded by its sorrow, brought in a verdict of death “by
the visitation of God.” What could the world do without juries?
Prodigious preparations were made for the funeral. All the vehicles in
town were hired, all the saloons put in mourning, all the municipal and
fire-company flags hung at half-mast, and all the firemen ordered to
muster in uniform and bring their machines duly draped in black. Now—let
us remark in parenthesis—as all the peoples of the earth had
representative adventurers in the Silverland, and as each adventurer had
brought the slang of his nation or his locality with him, the
combination made the slang of Nevada the richest and the most infinitely
varied and copious that had ever existed anywhere in the world, perhaps,
except in the mines of California in the “early days.” Slang was the
language of Nevada. It was hard to preach a sermon without it, and be
understood. Such phrases as “You bet!” “Oh, no, I reckon not!” “No Irish
need apply,” and a hundred others, became so common as to fall from the
lips of a speaker unconsciously—and very often when they did not touch
the subject under discussion and consequently failed to mean anything.
After Buck Fanshaw’s inquest, a meeting of the short-haired brotherhood
was held, for nothing can be done on the Pacific coast without a public
meeting and an expression of sentiment. Regretful resolutions were
passed and various committees appointed; among others, a committee of
one was deputed to call on the minister, a fragile, gentle, spiritual
new fledgling from an Eastern theological seminary, and as yet
unacquainted with the ways of the mines. The committeeman, “Scotty”
Briggs, made his visit; and in after days it was worth something to hear
the minister tell about it. Scotty was a stalwart rough, whose customary
suit, when on weighty official business, like committee work, was a fire
helmet, flaming red flannel shirt, patent leather belt with spanner and
revolver attached, coat hung over arm, and pants stuffed into boot tops.
He formed something of a contrast to the pale theological student. It is
fair to say of Scotty, however, in passing, that he had a warm heart,
and a strong love for his friends, and never entered into a quarrel when
he could reasonably keep out of it. Indeed, it was commonly said that
whenever one of Scotty’s fights was investigated, it always turned out
that it had originally been no affair of his, but that out of native
goodheartedness he had dropped in of his own accord to help the man who
was getting the worst of it. He and Buck Fanshaw were bosom friends, for
years, and had often taken adventurous “pot-luck” together. On one
occasion, they had thrown off their coats and taken the weaker side in a
fight among strangers, and after gaining a hard-earned victory, turned
and found that the men they were helping had deserted early, and not
only that, but had stolen their coats and made off with them! But to
return to Scotty’s visit to the minister. He was on a sorrowful mission,
now, and his face was the picture of woe. Being admitted to the presence
he sat down before the clergyman, placed his fire-hat on an unfinished
manuscript sermon under the minister’s nose, took from it a red silk
handkerchief, wiped his brow and heaved a sigh of dismal impressiveness,
explanatory of his business.
He choked, and even shed tears; but with an effort he mastered his voice
and said in lugubrious tones:
“Are you the duck that runs the gospel-mill next door?”
“Am I the—pardon me, I believe I do not understand?”
With another sigh and a half-sob, Scotty rejoined:
“Why you see we are in a bit of trouble, and the boys thought maybe you
would give us a lift, if we’d tackle you—that is, if I’ve got the rights
of it and you are the head clerk of the doxology-works next door.”
“I am the shepherd in charge of the flock whose fold is next door.”
“The which?”
“The spiritual adviser of the little company of believers whose
sanctuary adjoins these premises.”
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Scotty scratched his head, reflected a moment, and then said:
“You ruther hold over me, pard. I reckon I can’t call that hand. Ante
and pass the buck.”
“How? I beg pardon. What did I understand you to say?”
“Well, you’ve ruther got the bulge on me. Or maybe we’ve both got the
bulge, somehow. You don’t smoke me and I don’t smoke you. You see, one
of the boys has passed in his checks and we want to give him a good
send-off, and so the thing I’m on now is to roust out somebody to jerk a
little chin-music for us and waltz him through handsome.”
“My friend, I seem to grow more and more bewildered. Your observations
are wholly incomprehensible to me. Cannot you simplify them in some way?
At first I thought perhaps I understood you, but I grope now. Would it
not expedite matters if you restricted yourself to categorical
statements of fact unencumbered with obstructing accumulations of
metaphor and allegory?”
Another pause, and more reflection. Then, said Scotty:
“I’ll have to pass, I judge.”
“How?”
“You’ve raised me out, pard.”
“I still fail to catch your meaning.”
“Why, that last lead of yourn is too many for me—that’s the idea. I
can’t neither trump nor follow suit.”
The clergyman sank back in his chair perplexed. Scotty leaned his head
on his hand and gave himself up to thought.
Presently his face came up, sorrowful but confident.
“I’ve got it now, so’s you can savvy,” he said. “What we want is a
gospel-sharp. See?”
“A what?”
“Gospel-sharp. Parson.”
“Oh! Why did you not say so before? I am a clergyman—a parson.”
“Now you talk! You see my blind and straddle it like a man. Put it
there!”—extending a brawny paw, which closed over the minister’s small
hand and gave it a shake indicative of fraternal sympathy and fervent
gratification.
“Now we’re all right, pard. Let’s start fresh. Don’t you mind my
snuffling a little—becuz we’re in a power of trouble. You see, one of
the boys has gone up the flume—”
“Gone where?”
“Up the flume—throwed up the sponge, you understand.”
“Thrown up the sponge?”
“Yes—kicked the bucket—”
“Ah—has departed to that mysterious country from whose bourne no
traveler returns.”
“Return! I reckon not. Why pard, he’s _dead_!”
“Yes, I understand.”
“Oh, you do? Well I thought maybe you might be getting tangled some
more. Yes, you see he’s dead again—”
“_Again_? Why, has he ever been dead before?”
“Dead before? No! Do you reckon a man has got as many lives as a cat?
But you bet you he’s awful dead now, poor old boy, and I wish I’d never
seen this day. I don’t want no better friend than Buck Fanshaw. I knowed
him by the back; and when I know a man and like him, I freeze to him—you
hear _me_. Take him all round, pard, there never was a bullier man in
the mines. No man ever knowed Buck Fanshaw to go back on a friend. But
it’s all up, you know, it’s all up. It ain’t no use. They’ve scooped
him.”
“Scooped him?”
“Yes—death has. Well, well, well, we’ve got to give him up. Yes indeed.
It’s a kind of a hard world, after all, ain’t it? But pard, he was a
rustler! You ought to seen him get started once. He was a bully boy with
a glass eye! Just spit in his face and give him room according to his
strength, and it was just beautiful to see him peel and go in. He was
the worst son of a thief that ever drawed breath. Pard, he was on it! He
was on it bigger than an Injun!”
“On it? On what?”
“On the shoot. On the shoulder. On the fight, you understand. He didn’t
give a continental for anybody. _Beg_ your pardon, friend, for coming so
near saying a cuss-word—but you see I’m on an awful strain, in this
palaver, on account of having to cramp down and draw everything so mild.
But we’ve got to give him up. There ain’t any getting around that, I
don’t reckon. Now if we can get you to help plant him—”
“Preach the funeral discourse? Assist at the obsequies?”
“Obs’quies is good. Yes. That’s it—that’s our little game. We are going
to get the thing up regardless, you know. He was always nifty himself,
and so you bet you his funeral ain’t going to be no slouch—solid silver
door-plate on his coffin, six plumes on the hearse, and a nigger on the
box in a biled shirt and a plug hat—how’s that for high? And we’ll take
care of you, pard. We’ll fix you all right. There’ll be a kerridge for
you; and whatever you want, you just ’scape out and we’ll ’tend to it.
We’ve got a shebang fixed up for you to stand behind, in No. 1’s house,
and don’t you be afraid. Just go in and toot your horn, if you don’t
sell a clam. Put Buck through as bully as you can, pard, for anybody
that knowed him will tell you that he was one of the whitest men that
was ever in the mines. You can’t draw it too strong. He never could
stand it to see things going wrong. He’s done more to make this town
quiet and peaceable than any man in it. I’ve seen him lick four Greasers
in eleven minutes, myself. If a thing wanted regulating, he warn’t a man
to go browsing around after somebody to do it, but he would prance in
and regulate it himself. He warn’t a Catholic. Scasely. He was down on
’em. His word was, ‘No Irish need apply!’ But it didn’t make no
difference about that when it came down to what a man’s rights was—and
so, when some roughs jumped the Catholic bone-yard and started in to
stake out town-lots in it he went for ’em! And he cleaned ’em, too! I
was there, pard, and I seen it myself.”
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“That was very well indeed—at least the impulse was—whether the act was
strictly defensible or not. Had deceased any religious convictions? That
is to say, did he feel a dependence upon, or acknowledge allegiance to a
higher power?”
More reflection.
“I reckon you’ve stumped me again, pard. Could you say it over once
more, and say it slow?”
“Well, to simplify it somewhat, was he, or rather had he ever been
connected with any organization sequestered from secular concerns and
devoted to self-sacrifice in the interests of morality?”
“All down but nine—set ’em up on the other alley, pard.”
“What did I understand you to say?”
“Why, you’re most too many for me, you know. When you get in with your
left I hunt grass every time. Every time you draw, you fill; but I don’t
seem to have any luck. Lets have a new deal.”
“How? Begin again?”
“That’s it.”
“Very well. Was he a good man, and—”
“There—I see that; don’t put up another chip till I look at my hand. A
good man, says you? Pard, it ain’t no name for it. He was the best man
that ever—pard, you would have doted on that man. He could lam any
galoot of his inches in America. It was him that put down the riot last
election before it got a start; and everybody said he was the only man
that could have done it. He waltzed in with a spanner in one hand and a
trumpet in the other, and sent fourteen men home on a shutter in less
than three minutes. He had that riot all broke up and prevented nice