He took to calling me Shell. That was after I told him my right name was Edwin Shelvin Tucker.
“Shell,” he said once, “the thing that shows the man is his willingness to accept responsibility for himself and his actions. Only a from blames what he is on his folks or the times or something else besides himself. There have been good men and great men in all periods of history, and they did it themselves.” The way he said things they never seemed like preaching, and even had they been, I’d have listened.
Con Judy was the kind of man you believed. When I stacked Kid Reese and Doc Sites up against him, they came out the short-horns they were.
We found no more tracks and we looked for none.
We were heading for Denver City, a fast-growing town with saloons and dance halls that were wide open to a man with money.
There was something nagging at me, and I mentioned it to Con.
“That Heseltiiae now … I wonder how hell like sharing that rnonev with Sites and Reese?
And even if he’s willing, how about her?” Con smiled. “You’re growing up, Shell.
I’d lay even money they’ve ALL done some thinking about that.” Never in my born days had I seen such a place as Denver. Brick blocks were going up all about, and several had been completed. The log cabins and sod houses that had been the beginning of the town looked down-at-heel and shabby beside the new buildings. Nor had I ever seen so many people. You’d have thought there was a picnic in town.
“How will we ever find them?” I asked Con.
“I never saw so many people before.” “Well call on Yim Cook. He’s been a lawman here, and he makes it his business to know all the crooks in the country and to keep them located.
If they’re here or have been here, he mill know.” Jim Cook was a fine, tall man with a mustache. “Yes, I know the man.
I believe He’s in Leadville. There are more outlaws in that town today than any place in Colorado or Kansas.we had camped in an arroyo.
Con was making coffee and I had washed out my shirt and hung it on a bush to dry in the sun.
Many a time I’d had to let the heat of my body dry a wet shirt, for a man couldn’t pack much in the way of clothes when he was high-tailing it across country.
“After you catch up to them, what then?” Con asked me.
Con had a way of asking questions that set a man to thinking.
Worrying, even.
Well, what would I do? Until now everytbhig had been ordered by circumstances, or by pa. There had been work to do, and not much choice at b-out when to do it.
If a man wanted to eat he had to work, and he had to be at it from sunup to sundown. I’d done a lot of daydreaming, and a certain amount of that goes into the making of a man, but all that talk with Reese and Sites had been another kind of daydreaming.
Ofttimes a boy” gets rid of some of the restlessness tbaes in him by imagining heffness a wild bandito on the Texas plains, and he thinks outlaws are bold and daring men. The trouble comes when he has to face up to reality, and then such daydreams had best be forgotten.
There’s something almighty real about a sheriff’s posse, a loaded gun, and a hangman’s noose.
What would I do? Get the money back, ride to Texas, and pay those folks what they had coming.
There’d be a little left, and there was the place. It was a good place, but it wasn’t in me to go back there alone and raise cows.
Con said nothing more, but he surely didn’t need to.
He could ask questions a man found hard to answer, questions that made him face up to himself. when a man answered questions like that he found himself a lot wiser about himself and the world.
Like Con said one time, a man should stop ever, now and again and ask himself what he was doing, where he was going, and how he planned to get there. And the hardest thing to learn is that there aren’t any shortcuts.
His questions nagged at me because whilst I had big ideas of what I wanted to do and become, I hadn’t any Way of making them into reality.
I could imagine myself riding a fine horse and wearing the best clothes, buying drinks in saloons, and maybe gambling a little for big stakes, but nowhere could I see where the money was coming from.
I said as much.
“Can you read”…”…Sure.” “Then read. Read anything, everything.
You’ll come up with an idea. But about the gambling for big stakes .
forget it. That’s just a way of showing off. If a man is something and somebody, he doesn’t have to show off. at Come sunup, we were on the trail to Leadville.
The night we rode into the town there had been rain, and the clouds hung low among the mountains, right down over the store-tops, in fact, because Leadville was a high-up town. We’d had to stop again and again to let our horses get their breath.
The trail had been wet, and here the streets were muddy.
Chestnut Street was empty when we slopped up the road between tow P.
standing three-legged in the rain, bedraggled, woebegone, and miserable-looking.
We glimpsed a book-store sign, and one for a justice of the Peace, then Goldsoll’s Loan Office, with a doctor’s rooms upstairs.
We drew rein, sizing up the town, and looking for a saloon or a restaurant. Bob Heseltine and the others would be spending and gambling, and the sooner I could get our money back the more there would be to get Midnight was already long gone, but when we rounded a corner we saw some saloon lights shining through the rain, and beyond them a livery stable.
We put up our horses, walking through the place to see if any of the horses was familiar. The hostler watched us, his eyes gloomy.
“Hunting’somebody?” “Might be.” They come, they go.” Three men and a woman, a young woman … might be a dance-hall girl.” He studied us. “You’d not be wanting them. Not now.” my not now?” ‘Theyve got friends. In this town yoed better have the right friends or you have nothing. And if you don’t have the right friends all you’ll have is enemies.” We walked up the street to a saloon and went up to the bar. Wet as it was, there were a good many men there.
The bartender started to place a bottle on the bar, then looked up and saw Con Judy. “Oh?
Didn’t recognize you, Mr. Judy.” He put the bottle away and got out a fresh one, a good brand of Scotch whiskey.
“Have you seen Bob Heseltine?” ‘I saw him. He’s over on State Street with a couple of friends and a girl … Ruby Shaw. She has friends over there … if you know what I mean.” Con filled our glasses. “Who’s marshal now?” “Mart Duggan. He’s mean and dangerous, but he doesn’t hunt trouble unless it hunts him … unless he’s drinking.
Ben this is my partner, Shell Tucker. A favor to him is a favor to me.” Ben extended a hand. He was a medium-built man with sandy hair plastered down over a round head. He had a quick, friendly way and a firm grip. “Ben Garry here.
I’ve known Con for quite a spell.we finished our drinks, and then pushed our way through the crowd, studying every face we saw. At the door Con stepped out first, and when I joined him, indicated the room we had left with a jerk of his head.
‘Theyre ALL here, Shell. Rounders and drifters from every mining and cattle camp in the country.
There’s money to be made here and they can smell it.
Ever do any mining, Shell?” “No, sir. I’m pretty good with a pick and shovel, but no mining.” A lighted window showed a restaurant still open, and we crossed the street. a “There’s beef,” the man said, and beans and potatoes.
Might scare you up a piece of pie, but I ain’t cookin” no more tonight.
I’m done played out.” “It’ll do … if there at s coffee. “There’s a-plenty.” He brought a fire-blackened pot to the table. “We fix a fair meal in the evenin”, and there’s breakfast, ifn I get up in time.” He put beef and beans on the table, and some slabs of homemade bread and butter. “Make our own butter.
Have our own cows. We got us four Holsteins and we’re buyin” more.
Brung’em over the trail myself.” We ate in silence, but finally I asked a question that had been on my mind for days. “Do you think they know they’re being followed?” “I believe so.” Then we might run into trouble when we don’t expect it?” “You must always expect it. when you start hunting men, they can hunt as well. Regardless of that, it pays to be on your toes. This town is rough, and the country is rough.” It was raining border outside. If they were in Leadviue the chances were slight they would attempt to leave in at storm. The trails were slippery and narrow, with always the danger of slides. Mountain country was new to me, and worrisome. there were too few trails and passes.